Bereaved maternity families’ treatment ‘completely unacceptable’

Wes Streeting has praised bereaved parents in Leeds who have called for an urgent review into maternity safety in the city, and called their testimony “shocking and chilling”.

Responding to a letter from the families, the health secretary did not commit to a review – but said he was determined to “fix our maternity services” and it was “completely unacceptable” that these parents and babies had “not received the care they deserve”.

The letter followed a BBC investigation that found that, over the past five years, the deaths of at least 56 babies and two mothers at Leeds Teaching Hospitals (LTH) NHS Trust may have been prevented.

LTH said the vast majority of births at its two maternity units were safe, and deaths of mothers and babies were very rare.

In a statement, the health secretary said that while “change will not happen overnight”, he was determined to “take swift action to ensure all women and babies receive safe, personalised and compassionate care, so there are no repeats of these unimaginable tragedies”.

Among those who signed the letter were Fiona Winser-Ramm and Dan Ramm, whose baby, Aliona Grace, died at Leeds General Infirmary in 2020, only 27 minutes after she was born.

An inquest three years later found a “number of gross failures of the most basic nature that directly contributed to Aliona’s death”.

The couple, who connected with other bereaved parents after setting up a Facebook group, believe there are many more affected.

The BBC investigation used a Freedom of Information request to obtain data from the trust showing potentially preventable baby deaths.

This revealed at least 56 cases between January 2019 and July 2024 – 27 stillbirths and 29 neonatal deaths (deaths within 28 days of birth) at the city’s General Infirmary and St James’s University Hospital.

The families’ letter to the health secretary said that such figures were “truly shocking for such a short period of time”.

LTH told the BBC that there were an increasing number of complex pregnancies and births in the region – including an increase in babies born with severe cardiac conditions.

The trust said the number of neonatal deaths it had recorded as potentially avoidable was “very small”.

The two Leeds maternity units are rated “good” by England’s healthcare regulator, the CQC, but two whistleblowers have told the BBC they believe the units are unsafe.

One experienced clinical staff member, speaking anonymously, described the service as “completely broken” with chronic understaffing that left women and babies “not getting the care we want them to get”.

The bereaved families have told the BBC they don’t think any future investigation at Leeds by the CQC could be independent, because the trust’s former chief executive, Sir Julian Hartley, is now in charge of the regulator. The CQC says it has “robust policies in place to manage any conflict of interest”.

In their letter to Wes Streeting, the families said they wanted an “open book review that leaves no stone unturned”, and called for it to be carried out by Donna Ockenden, the midwife who chaired independent reviews into maternity services at trusts in Shropshire and Nottingham.