Families fear maternity review ‘doomed’ to fail as chair named

The former diplomat Baroness Valerie Amos has been chosen to lead a rapid review into maternity care in England.

Announcing her appointment, Health Secretary Wes Streeting said that she had “an outstanding record of leadership and driving change” and would “uncover the truth”.

But a leading group of families say the investigation is “doomed before it has started” due to the behaviour of NHS England and the Department of Health and Social Care. They’re urging Mr Streeting to “get a grip”.

There has been no announcement of which NHS Trusts will have their maternity services investigated as part of the review. The health secretary said up to 10 areas could be examined.

Mr Streeting announced his intention to conduct a review of maternity care in June and had hoped the work would be under way by now and completed by the end of December.

The health secretary said more work was needed on appointing the panel of experts who will support Baroness Amos, as well as on the terms of reference of the review.

Some families have contacted Mr Streeting in recent weeks expressing huge reservations about the people the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) had proposed to chair the review and sit on the expert panel.

The other candidates to chair the review suggested by the DHSC were Sir Bruce Keogh, the former medical director of NHS England, Dame Lesley Regan, former president of the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists and Dame Donna Kinnair, former chief executive of the Royal College of Nursing.

Many families considered all three of them wholly inappropriate, viewing them as part of the healthcare system that has caused the harm that they are living with.

DHSC say Baroness Amos will now work with families to devise a panel of experts they have confidence in.

“Wes Streeting instigated this investigation with all good intentions, but DHSC and NHS England have turned it into the same old, same old,” said Emily Barley from the Maternity Safety Alliance, a group of parents whose children died due to poor maternity care.

“We now believe it will have the same effects as previous such national reviews and achieve nothing but further delay. Meanwhile, babies continue to be killed by NHS failings.

“We were promised that this investigation would be co-produced [with families], but instead we have been ignored, bulldozed and at times re-traumatised.”

Calling for a statutory public inquiry, she added: “While we do not criticise Baroness Amos personally, we believe this investigation is doomed before it has started.”

Separately, families in both Leeds and Sussex have been repeatedly requesting that the senior midwife Donna Ockenden lead inquiries into allegations of poor maternity at their trusts. Both received letters on Wednesday saying no decision had been made.

In a statement to the BBC, the Sussex families said: “We have been clear for over a year. We want Donna Ockenden to review our babies’ deaths, providing the same gold-standard scrutiny that she has conducted elsewhere in the country.

“We don’t understand what the hold-up is and we won’t accept anything less. It is what our babies deserve.”

Ms Ockenden is currently leading a review of maternity care in Nottingham due to be completed next year, with around 2,500 cases being examined.

Families in Leeds are similarly adamant that Ms Ockenden has to carry out a review into the care they received.

“Donna is the only person with the leadership, experience, track record and standing with families that make her uniquely placed to carry out the kind of honest process that Leeds families need and deserve.”

Baroness Amos was appointed a Labour peer in 1997. She was the first black Cabinet member when she was appointed International Development Secretary in 2003.

She served with the United Nations from 2010 until 2015 and is currently the head of University College, at Oxford University – the first black person to lead that college.

In his letter to families, Wes Streeting said he would not have appointed her unless he was “100% certain about her integrity and commitment to this work”. He promised she would engage with families to talk through their concerns and “to reassure you that your experiences will be at the heart of how she runs the investigation”.

Baroness Amos said she would “carry the weight of the loss suffered by families with me throughout this investigation.

“I hope that we will be able to provide the answers that families are seeking and support the NHS in identifying areas of care requiring urgent reform.”