Bereaved Families Condemn NHS Maternity Investigation as 'Performative'
Families enduring everlasting grief after losing babies due to NHS failings have launched scathing criticism of a government-commissioned rapid review into maternity services, accusing it of sidelining victims and forcing them to compress traumatic experiences into brief time slots.
'Compressed' Experiences and Limited Involvement
The Maternity Safety Alliance has renewed calls for a statutory inquiry, urging the Government to abandon what they describe as a performative approach. According to the campaign group, families participating in the review are allocated just eight minutes per person to share their experiences, with involvement limited to sharing stories rather than participating in decision-making processes.
Emily Barley, whose daughter Beatrice died because of failings at Barnsley Hospital in 2022 and who co-founded the Maternity Safety Alliance, told the Press Association: "When they're meeting with family panels, they're meeting first of all with a select few, so there's not many people who get to even speak directly to the review. And then they're being given an eight-minute time limit, which is not enough time to get into the real detail of what happened and who did what."
Investigation Background and Scope
The National Maternity and Neonatal Investigation (NMNI) was commissioned by Health Secretary Wes Streeting in June last year and is being led by Baroness Valerie Amos. The probe will examine 12 NHS trusts, with a report due in the spring. Investigators are spending two days on site at each trust involved in the review.
Miss Barley, 37, who now lives in Cornwall, argued this timeframe is insufficient: "It's not enough time to understand what's going on. It's also not just about what happened at the time of your baby's death or their injury, or your own injury. It's about what happened after and the attitudes of staff, and what happened in investigations, because all of this is part of why babies continue to die."
Traumatic Experiences and Systemic Failures
Miss Barley described being "shoved in a side room and ignored" after going into labour with Beatrice. Monitoring showed her baby's heart rate had slowed, but she was transferred to a ward instead of having an emergency Caesarean. "Then they spent close to an hour doing what I can really only describe as faffing around," she recounted. Staff eventually brought in a portable ultrasound machine and discovered that Beatrice had died.
Last month, Baroness Amos launched a call for evidence for the NMNI which will be open until March 17. Two surveys are available: one for women who have experienced pregnancy and used maternity services, and another for people who have supported someone through pregnancy. Miss Barley described this element as an "insult," noting the 500-word limit forces families to compress experiences that unfolded over days or weeks.
Government Response and Alternative Perspectives
In January, Mr Streeting said he was "keeping open the option of a public inquiry" but highlighted that the process can take years. A spokesperson for the NMNI argued that its rapid review would allow improvements to be made faster than would be possible with a statutory inquiry, stating: "This is a rapid review so improvements can be made more quickly than would be possible with a statutory public inquiry."
The spokesperson added: "Our aim is to develop and publish one set of national recommendations to drive the improvements needed to ensure high quality and safe maternity and neonatal care across England. A national maternity and neonatal taskforce, chaired by the Secretary of State, is being set up. The taskforce will use the recommendations made by Baroness Amos' investigation to develop a new national action plan."
Broader Concerns and Historical Context
In December, Baroness Amos published her initial thoughts from the first three months of the probe, stating nothing had prepared her for the "scale of unacceptable care that women and families have received, and continue to receive." The report showed the NHS had recorded 748 recommendations relating to maternity and neonatal care in the past decade, and detailed discrimination against women of colour, working-class women, younger parents and women with mental health problems.
However, Miss Barley branded the document a "waste of time," adding: "It just repeated everything we've heard before, which I think actually is probably what the whole review will do."
Campaign Group's Final Plea
A statement from the Maternity Safety Alliance expressed deep concern about the rapid review, claiming it lacks the power to "deliver justice for bereaved and harmed families or implement meaningful improvements." The statement concluded: "Many families have been enduring everlasting grief for years with no accountability. This is not something that should be rushed or rapid. The children and mothers who have died or been harmed deserve this to be done properly, however long that takes, not 'rapidly' to fit a political agenda. We are asking the Government to abandon this performative approach and establish a truly independent, transparent and robust statutory inquiry."
