Select committee: Health and Social Care Committee
Recommendation 27
Fourth Report - The safety of maternity services in England
Published 6 Jul 2021
Paragraph 164
Addressed to Department of Health and Social Care
Health and Social Care Committee Safety of maternity services in England All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Recommendation (the committee's words)
The central aim of maternity services must be to achieve, in the words of Michelle Hemmington, “a safe, healthy, positive experience of birth and to come home with a baby”. And yet, during the course of this inquiry, we heard of women who were made to feel like a failure for having a Caesarean Section. We have heard clear agreement among those working in maternity services, that “the only birth is a safe birth”, and we challenge all those working in leadership positions in maternity services in NHS England and Improvement, the Royal Colleges, and individual services, to take action to enshrine that ideology at the heart of England’s maternity services. Furthermore, those organisations need to work hard to stamp out the damaging ideological focus on “normality at any costs”, which caused such huge loss and suffering at Morecambe Bay and Shrewsbury and Telford - and may exist in other trusts today. We heard that senior leaders in maternity services no longer use the term ‘normal birth’ and we urge an end to the use of this unhelpful and potentially damaging term.
From: Health and Social Care Committee, Fourth Report - The safety of maternity services in England (HC 19), paragraph 164, 6 July 2021
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 21 September 2021 (deadline 6 September 2021).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The Government welcomes the Committee's report and responds to each of its 15 recommendations, accepting some in full or in part, rejecting one and stating that it is considering others.
- On the recommended £200-350m a year funding increase, the Government says it "is considering this recommendation" and will take the recommendations on funding for staffing "into consideration", alongside an assessment of midwifery and obstetric workforce levels.
- It "accepts" the recommendations on obstetric training posts, safety training targets, and training for Continuity of Carer, while accepting others only "in part", including ringfenced training budgets and a disparity target.
- It rejects the Rapid Redress and Resolution Scheme, stating it "does not intend to put in place" the scheme, and that the scheme "did not address the high and rising cost of clinical negligence cases".
- On litigation reform and compensation, the Government says it will publish a consultation, and "Decisions on next steps will be taken following the consultation".