What should be the attitude of the state towards a baby born outside marriage?
Should the baby be discriminated against by the state?
Should it be declared illegitimate, outside the law?
And what of the mother should she be discriminated against and together should they be placed in a position of disadvantage?
These are just some of the questions which arise out of one of societies more complex programs the single mother...
...and those questions are just the start.
Then come all the questions dealing with social attitudes towards the single mother and her child.
It’s not a new problem but it is an increasing problem despite the more widespread use of contraceptives,...
more children are born to single women in Australia each year...
...and it’s a pattern seen in all comprarable countries.
In this focus report producer Gordon Bick looks more closely at the child of the single mother.
In the past year 18000 illegitimate babies have been born in Australia,...
...one birth in 12 is illegitimate.
Between 20 and 25% of all brides in Australia are pregnant.
(Music: ‘All you need is love’)
Love making is a practise in modern society...
 which is being enjoyed by single men and women with increasing effect on the national birth rate.
Society, less shocked than it was by sex relations out of wedlock,...
...still imposes certain legal impositions on the by-product of such relations – the illegitimate child. 
‘Get out, get ou!t’
‘May I get my things?’
‘Your things?'
'What is your things except the filth in which you’ve been wallowing.'
'The mire to which you’ve tried to drag my name.’
'Get out.’
The old fashioned concept of father throwing unwed daughter out into the cold...
 as depicted in this movie Hatter’s Castle
...is still with us though perhaps to a lesser extent and perhaps with less melodrama.
But the clash of moralities between older and younger generations over sex before marriage still continues.
‘You listen to me for the last time.'
'You’re no longer a daughter of mine.' 
'I’m going to cast you out like a leper...
...and if you don’t want to walk the streets where you belong...
...you better run so that you can still catch a fancy man at the station.
It’s a beautiful night for a stroll,
you….’
‘Car vacant 89 Maxwell street Brunswick'
'K79'
'K79, it's 89, eight...nine Maxwell Street. Urgent maternity.'
'Roger base.'
…to the women’s hospital as quick as you can’.
'Thank you.'
Though the number of unwed mothers in the older age groups has declined or remained static,
...births in the younger age groups, 15 and under continue to climb dramatically. 
This is Lyn, an expectant mother at 15.
To avoid embarrassment in her New South Wales home town...
...her parents have sent her interstate to Melbourne to have her baby. 
The decision to have the baby adopted is already made for her by parental persuasion and the stigma of unmarried motherhood in a small town.
To many thousands of older single mothers the solution is not as easy as Lyn’s.
The Royal Women’s Hospital Melbourne...
 1300 babies, more than a fifth of the total number of babies born in one year at the hospital are those belonging to single women. 
Whether these babies were born out of love or lust, most of them will be punished for the action of their mothers or fathers.
To single mothers the birth of a baby becomes a moment of truth,...
...when all her natural emotions conflict with pangs of doubt, loneliness, fear, guilt and the practical problems confronting her.
It is at this moment of reality that she must fully face a decision which she may later regret.
Whether to keep her baby or offer it for adoption.
