Recognise the Babies Taken Through Forced Adoption in Tasmania's Redress Scheme

The Petition of the undersigned citizens of Tasmania draws to the attention of the House:

Tasmania's Historical Forced Adoption Redress Scheme recognises mothers affected by forced adoption, but excludes the babies who were taken from them and who are now adults.

Forced adoption did not happen to only one person. It happened to a mother and her baby.

Mothers affected by forced adoption deserve recognition, apology, support and redress. However, the babies taken through forced adoption were also harmed. Those babies grew up. Many Tasmanian adoptees continue to live with lifelong impacts, including loss of identity, separation from biological family, lack of access to family medical history, difficulty accessing records, grief, trauma, and the ongoing search for truth, family and answers.

The current scheme is incomplete because it recognises the harm of a baby being taken, while failing to recognise the baby as a person harmed by that same act.

Adoptees are the other half of the separation. A redress scheme that recognises the mother but excludes the child does not tell the whole truth.

Redress that forgets the child is not full redress. It is unfinished justice.

Your petitioners, therefore, request the House to call on the Government to urgently review and expand the Historical Forced Adoption Redress Scheme to include babies taken through forced adoption, now adult adoptees, and provide them with recognition, formal apology, trauma-informed counselling, practical support to access records, search and reunion support, access to family medical history, and fair redress, including appropriate financial redress for the lifelong harm caused by forced separation, secrecy and identity loss.