‘I didn’t give him up, he was taken’: Horrifying BBC documentary Stolen Babies shows how the forced adoption scandal is ‘like The Handmaid’s Tale’

As the BBC's horrifying exposé of the forced adoption scandal instantly lets viewers know, between 1949 and 1976, 250,000 unmarried mothers in the UK were forced to have their babies adopted.

Stolen Babies airs on September 2 on BBC Two and BBC iPlayer, and the 90 minute film uncovers the true extent of the cruelty women and girls faced, just for becoming pregnant out of wedlock.

Some victims of the forced adoption scandal were in relationships and abandoned when they found out they were expecting a baby, others faced further trauma of having their babies as a result of sexual assault.

The documentary outlines "shunned" women, sent away to give birth, who were often denied pain relief and in one case, slapped during delivery, as penance for their so-called "sins."

"This scandal has echoes of everything that horrifies people about The Handmaid's Tale," says Dr. Michael Lambert, a lecturer and historian who appears in the documentary whose expertise helped uncover the extent of the horrors.

Victim Ann Keen hauntingly adds, "Let's face it, we were working-class, unmarried girls having babies that were being adopted by middle-class women."

Most of the women and girls wanted to keep their babies, but had no power against the church, state, social workers and a system that used them as vessels to provide children for women deemed to be of better social standing, unable to have their own.

"It was a machine that gathered vulnerable young women, and left us broken," says Judy, another victim.

Viewers hear distressing details of girls in the mother and baby homes gathering as they hear footsteps of adoptive parents arriving to take a baby away, not knowing whose child it be.

This would be followed by grieving howls when one of them realised it was her child, and she would be left devastated by the forced loss.

In some instances, a girl wouldn't find out her baby had gone until she was faced with an empty cot one morning and told to change the sheets ready for the next baby.

Joan Chambers spent nine months with her baby boy before he was taken. "Not knowing where your child is, it's complete and utter torture every day of you life," she says.

Heavy misogyny of the time placed all blame and responsibility on the shoulders of the girls who fell pregnant.

Some describe moments of kindness from midwives and workers in the mother and baby homes, but for most, they had become fallen women and forced to deal with their trauma and shame with no support or empathy.

Former social worker Wes Cuell appears in the documentary to give an idea of how the unmarried mothers were treated at the time.

"It was highly charged in terms of morality," he says, adding, "It was that they had morally transgressed and it was their fault, their responsibility, they were reprehensible and they were unfit to be a mother."

He finishes, "The only option we would be considering was adoption."

Scotland were the first to apologise to women who had their babies taken through forced adoption. Wales followed, and in 2025, Northern Ireland began a public inquiry into their own.

After years of campaigning for official accountability, The UK government formally apologised for the forced adoption scandal on July 2, 2026.

Speaking after the apology is delivered, victim Judy Baker says, "I think of all the things this experience brings, all the pain, the sorrow, the grief, the guilt, the biggest thing to deal with is shame."

She continues, "To be relieved of it is just amazing."

Although the figure of 250,000 victims of the scandal has been given, it's also been acknowledged that the true numbers will never be known.

Stolen Babies airs on BBC Two and BBC iPlayer.