Prime Minister apologizes for forced adoption, calling it a 'black spot in British history'

 

Prime Minister apologizes for forced adoption, calling it a 'black spot in British history'

 

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer formally apologized on Thursday for the forced adoption of an estimated 185,000 children born to unwed mothers in England and Wales between 1949 and 1976, calling the practice a “dark stain on British history.”

According to the French news agency AFP, during the scandal, mothers were pressured to separate from their children, many of whom were young girls. They were convinced through social, institutional and family pressure that adoption was the only way out for them.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said in parliament that “we deeply apologize to those mothers who were not considered fit for the role of motherhood and who were prevented from raising the children they so desperately wanted and who have been bearing the burden of this separation for decades.”

“This shame is not yours, mothers,” he insisted. “It was never yours. This shame is ours.”

The British Prime Minister paid tribute to the victims who campaigned for the apology and “told their painful stories with extraordinary courage and fought time and again to bring the truth to light.”

The apology comes four years after a parliamentary committee recommended a formal apology.

The Australian government made a historic apology over forced adoptions in 2013, while Ireland did so in 2021.

British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, speaking to British lawmakers after meeting a group of victims in Downing Street, said: “What happened to them and the treatment of thousands of mothers, children and families should never have happened.”

“The state is responsible for the entire system that funded the process of forced adoption and made these practices possible by providing legal protection. I sincerely apologize for this administrative failure.”

Former Labour health minister Anne Keane said that in 1966, when she was 17, her newborn son was taken from her in Wales shortly after birth.

A parliamentary committee investigating the scandal found that mothers were abused in a number of ways.

According to the report, painkillers were deliberately withheld in hospitals during and after childbirth as a form of “punishment”.

In some cases, babies were forcibly taken from crying mothers’ arms and taken away for adoption.

Last month, the Church of England also apologised for its role in forced adoptions.