Lancaster academic provides crucial research in fight for government apology for women forced to give up babies

Dr Michael Lambert first became aware of the issue more than 10 years ago while studying for his PhD in social history at Lancaster University and since then has supported the thousands of women campaigning for the government to apologise for their involvement.

He most recently appeared on ITV’s Tonight programme which highlighted the ongoing campaign and in 2021 submitted evidence to the Joint Committee on Human Rights inquiry into ‘The right to family life: adoption of children of unmarried women, 1949-1976’.

He hopes to further highlight Lancaster’s part in forced adoption next year with a guided walk of locations involved.

Despite the Scottish government’s apology for its part in forced adoptions, previous English governments have refused to follow suit and although Dr Lambert has written to Lancaster MP Cat Smith, he fears the new Labour administration may also drag its feet.

“The government’s denial of responsibility and their refusal to issue an apology is astounding and insulting,” said Dr Lambert, now a research fellow and director of widening participation at Lancaster Medical School.

He has been contacted by women from across the country, many of them now elderly, who felt forced to give their babies up for adoption because they were unmarried.

However, so far, he’s had no contact from women sent to the ‘Girls Hostel’ in Queen Street, Lancaster, which operated from 1931 until the late Seventies.

Dr Lambert estimates that around 500 babies were adopted from Queen Street from 1931-78.

“Secrecy and stigma meant most women did not go to their 'local' home, so those from Lancaster usually went elsewhere although this was not always the case,” he said.

Among homes outside the district were those in Preston, Blackburn and St Monica’s in Kendal, which has since gained notoriety for the way women were treated.

The Queen Street hostel was part of the Church of England moral welfare movement. It was bought and run by Lancaster and Morecambe District Moral Welfare Association and came under the broader responsibility of the Diocese of Blackburn.

Pregnant women were admitted to the home six weeks before they were due to give birth, which they did at Bay View Hospital, part of Lancaster’s workhouse, until it closed in 1960/61. They were then sent to the former Beaumont Hospital until the new maternity unit opened at the Royal Lancaster Infirmary in 1972.

They would return to Queen Street after the birth and stay there with their babies for another six weeks as adoption was being organised, mainly through the Blackburn Diocese, which was a registered adoption agency. Some also went through the Children’s Society and Barnardo’s.

“Choice was illusory at best,” said Dr Lambert.

“There weren't really options in terms of housing and welfare support or social security for young women to make the idea of choice viable, and where they were available, they were not offered to 'undeserving' categories of claimant.

“Parental, social and cultural pressure was piled upon further by moral welfare workers who diagnosed unmarried pregnant women as deficient mothers by default. They also pressurised parents who were supportive of their children to make the 'right' decision.”