Hospital leaders say maternity wards need extra £400m a year to improve patient safety

Hospital leaders say maternity wards will need an extra £400m of spending every year in order to make them safer for mothers and babies.

They warn that without increased funding, the NHS will be unable to fully implement recommendations made by an inquiry into poor maternity care at the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospitals Trust, where dozens of babies were left brain damaged or lost their lives in the biggest maternity scandal in the history of the NHS.

A number of maternity care failings at hospitals across the country in the last year have sparked concerns over the safety of mothers and babies with MPs on the Commons Health Select Committee launching an investigation into the issue last year.

NHS Providers’ chief executive Chris Hopson said ministers faced a choice of either making the additional cash available or forcing the NHS to cut funding elsewhere, adding “Trust chief executives feel strongly that this is a really important agenda but they can’t implement the recommendations from the Ockenden Review in full unless there is more funding made available.

“This clearly depends on the government making the funding available or NHS England making this a priority, but that would mean deprioritising something else. We need one of these two solutions to come through.”

He added “We are urging the select committee to recognise the importance of allocating the required funding and make it a recommendation in their forthcoming report. The onus will then be on the government to formally respond to that recommendation.”

A spokesperson from the Department of Health and Social Care said “We are fully committed to patient safety, eradicating avoidable harm and making the NHS the safest place in the world to give birth.

“There are record numbers of midwives working across the NHS and we recently launched a new training programme NHS maternity and neonatal leaders to improve workplace culture and foster more collaborative working between nurses, doctors, midwives and obstetricians.”

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