• ITV News Central correspondent Jane Hesketh met with a mother from Leicestershire who was 16-years-old when her son was taken away and adopted without her consent.

A mother from Leicestershire is backing calls for the Government to formally apologise, after her son was taken away from her 58 years ago at just one-week-old.

Sandra Hobson from Hinckley didn’t see her son Tony for 53 years – she was reunited with him for the first time in 2021, after her son found her on social media.

An estimated 185,000 children were taken from unmarried mothers and adopted between 1949 and 1976 in England and Wales.

Witnesses and victims gave evidence at a Parliamentary Education Committee today, where Children and Families Minister, Josh MacAlister, said an apology for the state’s role in historic forced adoption is being “actively considered” by the Government.

A report by the UK Government’s Joint Committee on Human Rights (JCHR) in 2022 recommended ministers apologise to unmarried women who were “railroaded” into unwanted adoptions.

Josh MacAlister MP today said he recognised the urgency with which the issue of the state’s role in historic forced adoption needs to be addressed, but did not commit to a timescale for when a formal apology might be issued by the Government.

In 2023, responding to the report, the then-Conservative government said while it was sorry “on behalf of society” for the way the women had been treated, it did not think a formal apology appropriate “since the state did not actively support these practices”.

The JCHR at the time said the lack of apology was “disappointing”.

Mr MacAlister told the Education Committee on Tuesday: “The case for an apology is powerful, and it is something that the Government is actively considering”.

He said he accepted “the state had a role” in “a practice that went on for decades, forcibly removing children from these women in homes that were sometimes run by the state, enabled and overseen by social workers employed by the state, and social attitudes that were reinforced by practices that carried on for many years”.

He said he understood campaigners’ calls for a formal, official Government apology, adding: “That is something that is being actively considered, as of now, by the Government.”

He said it would need to be delivered “by someone senior in Government to reflect the gravity of what happened”.

MPs were told by campaigners that alongside an apology more support was needed for mothers and adoptees, including fast-tracking them for trauma-informed support as well as better access to their records.

The Department for Education said that, following concerns raised by the MAA about difficulties obtaining adoption records, the Government is boosting funding by £200,000 to help support those trying to locate records and reconnect with their birth families.