Midwives: Bullying

Baroness Cumberlege Excerpts

Tuesday 16th April 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Markham (Con)]

I will come back to the noble Lord with the exact number, but he is correct: the long-term workforce plan is all about making sure that we have the right resources and infrastructure to train the required number of people. Behind that, we have funded an extra 150 spaces this year and we have a target to increase them by 1,000 by 2026. It is absolutely as the noble Lord maintains: we are putting training in place domestically, as well.

[Baroness Cumberlege (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend share my view about the evidence that, when midwives and other clinical staff understand the importance of continuity, it leads to safer care and better outcomes for both the mother and the baby? One of the midwives quoted in chapter 2 of the report that was sent to us—I thank my noble friend for that—says that working in a continuity team was the best, most rewarding time in their career. Continuity is absolutely critical; it comes up in a number of reports, some of which I have had a part in writing. We know that you need continuity if you are going to make a real impression on the midwifery service and that the women who are party to it must really understand what continuity does and can achieve.

[Lord Markham (Con)]

I thank my noble friend, who has been a tireless campaigner on continuity of care. I challenged the chief midwife on this just this morning, and the objective behind the long-term workforce plan is to make sure that we have the resources in place to maintain that, starting with ethnic minorities. We all know that there is a disparity of outcomes in terms of inequality, so the first priority for continuity of care is that setting, but the objective is to spread that across the whole system.