‘difficult’ State Of Nhs Maternity Care Due To Tory Inaction, Inquiry Head Says

One of nan UK’s astir elder midwives has said inaction by nan erstwhile authorities complete maternity attraction failures has led to nan “difficult” business successful wards crossed England and a emergence successful reports of commencement trauma.

Donna Ockenden, who is starring nan biggest enquiry successful NHS history into maternity failures successful Nottingham, said nan Conservatives had been fixed a “blueprint” for really to amended maternity services but that it had not been implemented.

“I deliberation nan existent authorities has inherited a really, really difficult image astir perinatal care, commencement attraction and expanding reports of commencement trauma. If only nan erstwhile authorities had done what it said it would do, that inheritance would person been very different,” she said.

Ockenden is starring a reappraisal into maternity services at the Nottingham assemblage hospitals NHS trust, nan largest enquiry into a azygous work successful nan history of nan NHS, pinch 2,406 affected families taking part. The findings will beryllium published successful June 2026.

She expressed vexation complete nan slow gait of alteration aft her study connected nan Shrewsbury and Telford maternity scandal, which recovered that 300 babies died aliases were near brain-damaged arsenic a consequence of inadequate care.

“We published [that report] successful March 2022 and location were 22 instantly basal actions, arsenic good arsenic hundreds of actions for nan NHS trust,” she said. “But pinch nan chaos that followed successful nan twelvemonth earlier nan wide election, things sewage mislaid and we are not arsenic acold up pinch those instantly basal actions arsenic we should be.”

Guardian study has recovered that nan NHS is facing a £27bn measure for maternity failings successful England since 2019, importantly much than nan wellness service’s astir £18bn fund for newborns successful that time.

Ockenden said nan figures near her “deeply concerned”, and she stressed that nan costs of avoidable maternity harm was felt crossed “mental health, different wellness services, nan economy, nan wider community, relationships, full families and careers”.

“This is not nan measurement it should be. I would perfectly not opportunity that families do not merit compensation erstwhile they person a mediocre outcome, but alternatively that if nan money was invested upfront into making nan work safer, past we could make important strides towards reducing this very important harm,” she said.

She said maternity wards were besides dealing pinch problems caused by precocious levels of poorness crossed nan country.

“There are a number of families, mothers and children surviving successful destitution – which sounds very Victorian, but I do spot examples of that. I perceive astir it from crossed nan state and I spot examples of existent deprivation successful Nottinghamshire,” she said.

“Maternity services are not an island. What comes successful nan beforehand doorway of a maternity portion is that which is retired location connected our streets, whether that’s women surviving successful exile status, successful bum hostels, women who travel to antenatal clinics quiet because it’s a prime betwixt giving their children thing for meal aliases [the women] eating.”

Last month, nan wellness secretary, Wes Streeting, criticised what he described arsenic “the normalisation of deaths of women and babies” and said: “We person women who are classed arsenic having a normal commencement still leaving traumatised and scarred.”

He announced a nationalist investigation into NHS maternity services successful England, on pinch a nationalist maternity and neonatal taskforce comprising a sheet of experts and bereaved families.

Ockenden said nan news was “encouraging” and that “hearing, amplifying and acting upon family voices must beryllium nan aureate thread that runs done it all”.

“It is my dream that nan changes outlined successful these plans amended perinatal services coming and successful nan future, and drastically trim nan consequence of harm. Women and families merit safe maternity care, always,” she said.