Michael served as an expert witness for the UK Parliamentary inquiry into the historic forced adoption of children of unmarried mothers in Britain from the 1940s to the 1970s. The inquiry focused on the lived experiences of birth mothers and their children, and the lasting harm caused by separation. In this talk Michael looks at the archival records of historic forced adoption, the ethical and research problems in accessing closed and confidential data from the recent past, and why they reveal a historic injustice requiring an apology from the UK Government.