Baby Loss Awareness Week

Debate between Andy MacNae and Peter Swallow

Monday 12th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Andy MacNae]

Unfortunately, the tragic case my hon. Friend describes is just too common, as is reflected in so many accounts I have heard from families at our all-party group. Yet again, it just adds to the weight of evidence showing that we need urgent and immediate action. We cannot wait. We cannot let those families down.

[Peter Swallow (Bracknell) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend has brought forward an incredibly important debate, which will allow many such stories, like the one we have just heard, to be shared. I want to share the story of my constituents whose son Jesse died in their arms just six days after he was born. His parents are now bravely campaigning for placental cord insertion to be routinely assessed as part of a 20-week scan to reduce preventable stillbirths and neonatal deaths. Will he take this opportunity to pay tribute, as I do, to the bravery of Jesse’s parents in launching this campaign?

[Andy MacNae]

I pay tribute to those parents, and to so many parents who have launched campaigns in their children’s names. I hope and believe that that particular measure will be considered alongside many other methods and actions that could prevent the tragedies we see all too often. I thank my hon. Friend for bringing that to our attention.

The national maternity targets are vital, because without these clear targets, it is harder to maintain focus, measure progress or hold the system to account. The Government should adopt this call. Progress must be published regularly, and the data must show not only the national picture, but which communities are being failed and where. We must understand where babies are dying, which families are experiencing the poorest outcomes, where learning is taking place and, ultimately, whether changes in policy are actually making a difference.

This must include better data on miscarriage. At present, we do not routinely collect the information needed to understand fully how many families experience miscarriage, how those experiences differ between communities and whether outcomes are improving.

Road Safety

Debate between Andy MacNae and Peter Swallow

Tuesday 7th January 2025 Commons Chamber

[Andy MacNae]

Absolutely. I will touch on this later, but I feel that devolution and local government reorganisation create a huge opportunity to ensure new levels of co-operation between authorities, and we should have no hard borders when it comes to road safety.

Again, the conclusion we reach is that we need action to prevent deaths and injuries, yet when communities raise their concerns and real-world experience with the county council and the police, they are told that the KSI—killed or seriously injured—data does not meet the threshold for speed cameras and other meaningful interventions.

[Peter Swallow (Bracknell) (Lab)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that, too often, an accident waiting to happen has been forced to become an accident that has happened before action is taken, and that when communities know that a road they live on and live with every day is unsafe, we should listen to those communities much more and act before the accident happens?

[Andy MacNae]

I agree entirely. Again, it is devastating for communities to raise those issues repeatedly, stridently and sometimes desperately, yet feel that they are not being heard. The message they get back is, in effect, “We have to wait for someone to get killed before we do anything”, which is surely is not the message our communities should be hearing.

As well as Burnley Road in Rossendale, I could tell stories about Todmorden Road, Burnley Road East through Whitewell Bottom, Market Street in Whitworth, Bury Road in Edenfield, Newchurch Road in Waterfoot, Bolton Road, Sunnyhurst Lane, Hollins Grove and Pole Lane in Darwen. In each case, residents see close calls day by day, but are told that the statistics do not merit action, and even when they do, they are simply told there is no money. This approach is nonsensical and out of line with even the county council’s own adopted vision zero strategy and is decades behind those employed internationally. Ultimately it costs lives and money. Beyond this, unsafe roads have far-reaching impacts affecting an area’s sense of place and identity. They take lives, devastate families and shake up communities. Roads felt to be unsafe have a significant impact on the day-to-day lives of people living near them. Residents feel less able to get around, uncomfortable on their own doorstep and cut off from each other.