Morecambe MP responds to damning NHS maternity services inquiry

The MP for Morecambe and Lunesdale said that "families have been treated appallingly after tragedies" in her response to an investigation into maternity services.

Lizzi Collinge was speaking after this week's publication of the final report from the Independent Investigation into Maternity and Neonatal Services in England.

Led by Baroness Amos, the review found that there are still systemic problems in maternity and neonatal care, despite multiple local reviews, including one in Morecambe Bay in 2015.

“Yet again we have seen women and families let down by maternity services," said Ms Collinge.

"Despite the majority of women and babies experiencing a safe birth, there are still too many families harmed by poor care, poor systems, and poor culture. 

“Women have not been listened to, leading to riskier births and missed opportunities to prevent tragedy. 

"Triage systems have not been used properly or been adequately resourced with the right skill level and staff teams don’t always work together across different disciplines.

"Families have been treated appallingly after tragedies, with hospital trusts doing inadequate investigations and being more interested in defending themselves than finding the truth."

Ms Collinge has been appointed to an expert reference panel as part of the National Maternity and Neonatal Taskforce and is vice chair of the Maternity All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG).

“I have met local families harmed by poor care and it’s for them that I joined the Maternity Taskforce and have focused my patient safety work on maternity," she said.

"It cannot be allowed to continue.

“The Amos Review contains very important information and recommendations that must be taken on board.

"However, I was surprised by the finding that normal birth ideology was not currently widespread in the maternity services they visited in England. This is in contrast to the recent (maternity investigator Donna) Ockenden findings (in a recent investigation into failings in Nottingham)."

‘Normal birth ideology’ is a culture promoting unassisted vaginal birth, without any medical interventions, such as pharmaceutical pain relief or forceps.

Dr Bill Kirkup, who authored a report into failings at the Morecambe Bay health trust in 2015, resigned from the recent government-commissioned review over the normal birth ideology issue.

He disagreed with the finding that a drive in some maternity units for normal (vaginal) birth, including denying women caesarean sections, was not prevalent nationally.

Dr Kirkup also told the BBC that criticism of a 'normal birth drive' was removed from the government-commissioned review eight days before publication.

"We ought to acknowledge that this is a problem, and that it's got patient safety implications for mothers and babies," said Dr Kirkup.

Maternity safety campaigner James Titcombe said this week he was "utterly shocked" by Dr Kirkup's claims, reported the BBC.

Mr Titcombe's son Joshua was one of 11 babies and a mother who died at Furness General Hospital in Barrow in 2008, due to major patient safety failings, leading to the inquiry led by Mr Kirkup.

"These events raise profound questions about the integrity and independence of the review process," said Mr Titcombe.

"Bereaved families deserve complete transparency."

However, author and midwife Leah Hazard welcomed the conclusion of the review.

Writing on social media, she said: "The Amos review is out and it could not be clearer.

"There is no evidence that 'normal birth ideology' exists in any definable way or that it dominates maternity care in England."

In response to the report, the Health Secretary James Murray has committed to appoint the UK's first ever Maternity and Neonatal Commissioner to hold the system to account and rebuild trust with families.

This has proven controversial, with Emily Barley, whose daughter Beatrice died at Barnsley hospital in 2022, telling the BBC the idea was "fundamentally dangerous" and placed too much power in the hands of one person.

The government will also publish a National Action Plan in December, setting out priority work and long-term reform for safer, fairer care.

Changes to services include new national standards for maternity triage so women are assessed quickly and listened to properly, and the roll-out of Martha's Rule to all maternity and neonatal services, giving parents the right to rapid independent reviews.

The government is also adding 1,000 temporary roles to help newly qualified midwives join the NHS and gain vital experience, investing an additional £41m to improve safety at maternity and neonatal facilities and rolling out anti-discrimination training to make sure all women and get babies get the same safe, compassionate care.

The review, carried out by Baroness Valerie Amos and published earlier this week, calls for urgent change to the way women and families are treated, after it found they were often ignored, concerns dismissed and left to suffer avoidable harm.

The Amos review gathered the views of hundreds of families and received more than 10,500 responses to a public call for evidence.

Twelve NHS trusts with poor records on maternity - including the University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust - were visited and more than 9,000 staff contributed to the investigation.

The report said: "There is absolutely no justification for the tragic cases of unsafe care and avoidable harm we continue to see in England.

"Nor is it acceptable that so many women and families experience a poor response and lack of accountability when something has gone wrong.

"We found staff morale to be generally low with a feeling that Morecambe Bay was once more under scrutiny.

"Midwives told us about public attention causing them to remove their work badges in public and being made to feel ashamed of their jobs despite being inherently proud of the work they do."

Steve Williamson, Chief Executive of the University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust, said: “We welcome the publication of the National Maternity and Neonatal Investigation, and want to thank Baroness Amos and her team for carrying out this important piece of work.

“As a trust, we were keen to be involved in the investigation as it gave us the opportunity to share learning and examples of good practice from our improvement journey and highlight any further work we could do to strengthen our maternity services.'

Steve Williamson

“It’s important that we acknowledge the ongoing pain that some families are going through because of actions taken by this Trust in the past. While we have made significant changes and improvements in recent years, that does not lessen the impact on those involved, and we will never forget that.

“However, we are in a very different place now and our teams have given their all to make positive changes to the services we offer local families. These changes include establishing a new leadership team, strengthening governance and oversight, and embedding a culture focused on openness, learning and effective multidisciplinary working.

‘’We are listening more closely to families, investing in bereavement support and triage facilities, improving staffing levels, and taking targeted action to ensure more equitable care for all women and their babies.

“These improvements have been recognised by the CQC who recently rated our maternity services as ‘good’ for the first time since 2019, We were also ranked fourth nationally for overall positive scores in the recent CQC Maternity Survey with most survey questions showing either stability or improvement.

“These significant changes deserve to be celebrated but it isn’t the end. We know we have more to do and are absolutely committed to continuing to work with our teams, families, key partners and local communities to move forward.”

The trust runs local hospitals including the Royal Lancaster Infirmary (below), Westmorland General and Furness General in Barrow.

Read more: Morecambe Bay hospital trust named in damning national review of maternity services - Beyond Radio