In a submission to a 1993 judicial review of past adoption practices, an organisation that worked with many relinquishing mothers, concluded that "many, possibly a majority of the birth mothers seen at the centre, described the adoption as having been in the child's best interests in view of their own youth, lack of family support, inadequate finances and unreadiness for parenthood".

It was a very different world back then. Single parenthood was not really a viable option. I well recall the horror stories of deprivation that circulated when Whitlam first talked about providing state assistance for those few who were single parents. It was usual and accepted that unwed and unattached young girls could not and would not adequately look after themselves or their new offspring. Additionally, back then they knew what we now try to forget...that a child raised in a household with both a father and mother, on average, does much better then one raised with just one parent.

Now fast-forward 20 or 40yrs and we find the then scared and bewildered girl is now a regretful woman. Maybe she has been re-united with the adopted child. Now she needs to justify in her own mind why she did what she now regrets. Solution...I was forced. I so desperately wanted to keep the child but the state/the church/the grandparents/the society conspired to take the child from me. And even then they had to trick me, drug me to drag the child from my loving arms. A perfectly reasonable rationalisation. But, I suspect, rarely the truth.

But, as with the stolen generation, the truth isn't the issue. Much easier to just accept their rationalisations as true, apologise on behalf of unnamed perpetrators and get the warm inner glow.

Apologies on behalf of long gone others is the easiest thing in the world. Apologise for the stolen kids. Apologise for slavery. Apologise for taking orphans. I'm just waiting for the Germans to apologise for deceiving Varus.

L you will not see, the truth or hear it while your head is in the sand read the reports of some victims.
See why we, all too late said sorry.

Dear Luciferase,

I can't understand why you state that you can find no
evidence when all you have to do is Google the subject.
There's heaps of websites ranging from the BBC, to CNN,
to The Guardian, and heaps more. Perhaps the following
may help:

http://news.yahoo.com/australian-pm-apologizes-forced-adoptions-005244507.html

I have to agree with Luciferase, Banjo, Jay and mhaze, there is a lot of ill-conceived rationalisation going on, pointing the blame solely on various institutions, and the 'state', when the reality is that times were different then, whether we like it or not.

Suse, you are sadly misinformed, and your bias is just so clear.

As with the stolen generations, it was a sad thing that conditions back then were simply not conducive to providing welfare willy-nilly, and society relied on children being raised by able couples.

To look at some of today's 'camps' one has to wonder if many of those 'stolen' back whenever were not actually 'saved' from an otherwise outrageously lousy existence? How much has changed - except that now we dare not attempt to 'save' anyone. Pendulum.

It is wrong to take history out of context, whether it gives you a warm 'glow' to do so, or not.

They all report on what the apology was about, Lexi, but there is precious little on what legislation or formal policies were followed other than many fatherless children born to young women were routinely adopted (60% at its height before availability of welfare, oral contraceptives and legalized abortion) while fewer were kept within the women's families. Where is a consistent baby theft policy to be found in this fact?

The Senate committee report found that the federal government had contributed to forced adoption by failing to provide unwed mothers with full welfare benefits to which a widow or deserted wife would have been entitled until 1973. The differentiation was due to a federal judgement about irresponsible breeding that was jettisoned in 1973 and which we've been paying for financially and in societal ways ever since, IMO.

We have arrived at what I believe to be a ridiculous situation where a women can simply decide to be a mother and she and her offspring will be carried financially by the community as if she were doing it a service. Furthermore, following the apology, we are now morally if not legally bound to compensate thousands for the actions of their own families in giving them up for adoption rather than the government fostered baby theft now painted.

Those good people who thought their role was doing right have now been consigned to the status of concentration camp guards.

Commonwealth contribution to former forced adoption policies and practices,

http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Senate/Whats_On/Commonwealth_contribution_to_former_forced_adoption_policies_and_practices

"We now can say it was a horror of our history and not pretend it didn't happen..." (from a speech in reply)

To add, would it be any less a horror where parents were forced by circumstance to give up their child for adoption? That is the problem where parents are not informed, counselled and supported to give a home to their child.

We should also remember that these practices continued right up into the Eighties. The many thousands of mothers, fathers and children affected are still alive. Just think about that for a minute or so. It is not ancient history at all.

The supporters of the big State and centralisation, of government continually interfering in the private lives of citizens really need to sit up and listen to the experiences of these parents and to the stories of previous Wards of the State.

To imagine that it couldn't happen again, that government wouldn't be secretive and abuse its control over citizens is to live in a fools' paradise. The public regularly turns a blind eye to abuses of privacy and to strong arm tactics directed at individuals by government. As we discuss forced adoption, government is busily trying to limit free speech and there are groups who support them in that, expecting secondary gain from denial of free speech and the self-censorship that inevitably follows.