I’ve always delved deeply into the vibrant world of queer history, immersing myself in lesbian literature, cinema, and art, and writing extensively on contemporary lesbian culture. So, it caught me completely off guard when I recently uncovered the history of children being taken from their lesbian mothers by the state.
This revelation unfolded in July when a radio producer reached out to me about Judi Morris, a 74-year-old woman whose son, George, had become addicted to heroin and cycled in and out of the legal system. That initial call sparked the creation of a radio documentary titled “Missing Pieces: The Lesbian Mothers Scandal.”
The roots of addiction are intricate, but a significant factor surfaced during George’s early years. A court granted his father sole custody, a decision fueled by spite due to Judi’s sexual orientation. George’s father didn’t just stop at winning custody; he placed George in private foster care and left the country. Although Judi regained custody when George was five, the harm had already settled in. Judi recounted in our BBC Radio 4 documentary how her son was neglected during those formative years, deprived of proper care and exposed to situations no child should witness.
The trajectory from that court ruling to George’s tragic death at 51 from an infected needle wasn’t predestined. Still, one can’t help but ache for Judi, who must continuously ponder the different path her son’s life might’ve taken if she had been allowed to raise him.
Through my research, I unearthed at least 30 similar cases between the 1970s and the 1990s, where British courts removed children from the custody of lesbian mothers.
Former politician Linda Bellos shared with us the emotional toll of losing custody of her children, describing how she fought fiercely for three years just to see them. “Winning,” she said, meant being allowed one supervised visit per month, under the assumption that her lesbian identity posed some risk to her children. Jackie Holmes, filmmaker Sandi Hughes’s daughter, also opened up about enduring depression from being separated from her mother at the tender age of eight.
Bellos, Holmes, and other affected women are seeking an official apology from the government. Although the Ministry of Justice acknowledged the discriminatory attitudes of the past and expressed sympathy, this falls short for those who continue to bear the emotional scars of such injustices.
There wasn’t any legislation explicitly barring lesbians from keeping their children. However, before the Equality Act, bias thrived in the ambiguous areas of the law. Judges often allowed their personal prejudices to influence their interpretations of child protection guidelines.
One document I examined, for example, showed Justice Dame Rose Heilbron, a judiciary trailblazer, referencing Sandi Hughes’s lesbianism directly in her custody ruling. She stipulated that Hughes’s children should not be exposed to Hughes’s “lesbian associates.”
Another finding was a 1983 ruling by Lord Justice Sir Roger Ormrod, who argued that “homosexual relationships do tend to be even more unstable than heterosexual relationships.” Such blanket statements and the pejorative language branding women as “militant lesbians” or “ardent feminists” shockingly masqueraded as child welfare concerns.
One anonymous woman shared her experience fighting for her children’s custody, where her ex-husband’s severe misconduct was downplayed, while her judge fixated on her lesbian and feminist identities. Only after complying with certain degrading conditions did she regain custody. Similarly, a Guardian report from 1978 highlighted a case where a lesbian mother’s partner had to leave the room whenever her child needed the bathroom.
These stories had wider repercussions: by 1980, a support group for lesbians reported that out of 150 calls each week, one-third were from mothers too terrified to come out due to the courts’ clear bias against lesbian parents.
Courts, supported by societal stigma, locked many lesbians into the shadows. These actions not only infringed on personal lives but also hampered the growth of a thriving lesbian community, one that could have significantly bolstered the women’s movement.
The government was aware back then, with evidence that Lord Justice Elwyn Jones met activists from Action for Lesbian Parents in the 1970s. An activist recalled him feeling powerless to help. It required the diligent work of Susan Golombok from the University of London, whose research showed that children from two-mother families fared just as well as those from single-mother families, to begin changing judiciary perspectives. The 1989 Children Act marked a cultural shift, reframing custody in terms of child arrangement orders, allowing more individuals, beyond biological parents, to participate in childcare.
Today, much has improved, with legal pathways now open for female couples to both be recognized as parents, though challenges remain with accessibility to services like NHS IVF and facing societal issues like childcare costs and workplace discrimination.
Despite progress, the struggles of these pioneering lesbians, now in their elder years, remain underrecognized and unresolved. Their stories cry out for acknowledgment and justice. As allies or progressives, it’s crucial to learn from this past and take decisive steps to address these injustices. Now is the time to bring the full history into the light.
Sophie Wilkinson, a freelance journalist, shines a light on topics like entertainment, celebrity, gender, and sexuality.
