Maternity Commissioner

Debate between Helen Morgan and Helen Maguire

Monday 20th April 2026 Westminster Hall

[Helen Morgan]

I thank my hon. Friend for his intervention—he was quick off the mark. Yes, I agree that it will be useful to have a maternity commissioner to share those experiences and ensure that people learn from them.

The campaigners, Theo and Louise, have shared their heartbreaking experiences. I commend their work in securing this important debate. Liberal Democrats wish to be their allies. As a previous co-chair of the APPG on baby loss, I am all too familiar with the acute need for better standards of care for mothers across the country. I was also a member of the APPG on birth trauma when it was headed so ably by Theo Clarke, when the need for a maternity commissioner was first discussed and recommended. I am delighted to see the traction that this proposal has had thanks to the campaigning of Theo, Louise and many others.

Last month, the Lib Dems launched our maternity rescue package, which would guarantee high-quality care wherever people live and would make Britain the safest country in the world to have a baby.

[Helen Maguire]

I have a constituent who had a history of rapid births. She wanted the safety net and support of a home birth team alongside the community team, as recommended, but she was unable to have both teams involved. Does my hon. Friend agree that it is difficult to have confidence in a safe birth if the right medical support simply is not there?

[Helen Morgan]

My hon. Friend makes a good point. Patient voice—listening to women, understanding their wishes and understanding the risks that their wishes might represent and how to manage them best—is such a critical part of safe maternity care.

In drawing up our rescue package, I have drawn from my experience on the all-party groups on birth trauma, on maternity and on baby loss. There is so much common ground with the cause of the petitioners. We hope that they are buoyed by the fact that someone in Westminster is listening. With our package, a national maternity commissioner would oversee improved standards of care nationally, while a director of midwifery would be appointed in every maternity unit, alongside an extra 300 consultant midwives, to drive clinical excellence in each unit.

Our plans would invest £600 million to tackle these vital staffing requirements, but the NHS could save billions of pounds on maternal clinical negligence claims, which cost more than £1.3 billion in 2024 alone. Those huge clinical negligence costs have consistently been reflected in the findings of local and national reviews, but most importantly, the package would save babies’ lives and spare families the trauma of injury or worse happening to mum and baby at what should be the most joyous time of their life.

Liberal Democrats welcome the recent interim review by Baroness Amos. The findings of the review were devastating, showing that too many mothers are not receiving the level of care that they need, with devastating consequences for women, babies and their families. But this is the latest in a string of national and local reviews and inquiries, which have produced more than 700 recommendations. Those reviews, with their myriad but similar recommendations, illustrate why we need a maternity commissioner—someone who can bring together the learnings from past failings, along with the best practice from around the country, and oversee a step change in training and culture that will enable all the health professionals in maternity to work as effective teams and give women the personalised and high-quality care that is needed.

People across the country were truly shocked by the findings of Donna Ockenden’s review of the Shrewsbury and Telford hospital trust, which serves my constituents. The review found that the deaths of more than 200 babies could have been prevented. Over the years, I have heard—sometimes as a friend, sometimes as an MP—from traumatised and grieving parents, each with their own experience of birth trauma, injury to their baby or worse. They have told me how important it is to them that the reports and inquiries spark the vital change that is needed, and do not lead only to warm words from politicians followed by decades of gathering dust on the shelves of the Department of Health.

Since the Ockenden review, the Shrewsbury and Telford hospital trust has accepted and taken steps to implement almost all the immediate and essential actions that Donna Ockenden recommended. While that process has not been perfect, it has clearly been conducted with appropriate focus. The latest CQC rating for maternity at SATH is good, showing that with the right recommendations and leadership, positive change can happen. The team at SATH should be commended for that achievement. They demonstrate the value of focusing on the steps needed to get care right.

As we found out subsequently, however, unsafe maternity care was not unique to Shropshire, or indeed to Morecambe, East Kent or any of the other places about which we have heard such awful stories. We know that women all over the country are still not receiving the care they need. None of the services that the Care Quality Commission inspected in its national review was rated outstanding. Some 65% of maternity units were unsafe for women to give birth in. It is a scandal that mothers in this country have to settle for potentially dangerous levels of care at what should be one of the happiest moments in their life.

The introduction of a maternity commissioner is not a quick fix, but a commissioner would provide the leadership required for serious change to the way women and staff on maternity wards are listened to. That commissioner could look at disparities in maternity care and the poorer outcomes that we see for black and Asian women and those in deprived communities, and drive the change needed to make having a baby safe, no matter what your background is. Other improvements are needed, too.

Our proposals are to guarantee specialist doctors on every maternity unit 24/7, and one-to-one midwifery care for every woman during labour to respond to the desperate need for safe staffing highlighted in each of the reviews and in the inquiries by the all-party groups that deal with maternity care. Previous research found that 73% of maternity units in England do not have a consultant present at night, despite most births taking place outside working hours. Many negligence claims for poor maternity care are linked to failings in care outside regular working hours.

The proposals come alongside a new capital investment programme to fix crumbling maternity units in need of urgent repair and to deliver new dedicated bereavement suites. We would start with the 7% of maternity units that are at risk of imminent breakdown, and would restore the 42% of units in need of major repairs. These crucial steps come alongside many other proposals to improve staff training, to invest in bereavement support, neonatal specialists and pre-conception services and to eliminate maternal health disparities.

It is really, really, really important to say that the vast majority of babies are delivered safely, even when things do not go to plan. But we should not dismiss those instances where they go wrong, and we should be tireless about making the improvements required. I congratulate the campaigners on the success of the petition so far. I continue to urge the Government to demonstrate that recommendations will be turned into actions, and that the cries for help from countless mothers and families will be listened to.

Medical Training (Prioritisation) Bill

Debate between Helen Morgan and Helen Maguire

Committee of the whole House
Tuesday 27th January 2026 Commons Chamber

[Helen Maguire (Epsom and Ewell) (LD)]

Last year, research by the Royal College of Radiologists found that 76% of English cancer centres had patient safety concerns due to workforce shortages. While we welcome the Government’s recent commitment to ending the postcode lottery of cancer care, does my hon. Friend agree that the Government need to publish an assessment of the Bill’s impact on doctor numbers, broken down by speciality, to ensure that cancer treatment is not delayed because of staff shortages?

[Helen Morgan]

I thank my hon. Friend for her point, which I agree with fully. That is why we have tabled new clause 1. It will require the Government to publish a report on the Bill’s impact on the number of applicants to foundation and speciality training programmes and, crucially, to break that down by speciality. If applications fall as a result of these changes, the Government would be required to assess the impact on the total number of fully qualified doctors entering the NHS. This report would be produced annually after three years, allowing time for a full training cycle to complete. It is a sensible safeguard, one that ensures that we do not inadvertently exacerbate the very workforce shortages that we are trying to address. To return to the core principle that is at stake, we are not opposed to the Bill’s objective. We support the principle of prioritising those who have trained in the UK, but that principle must be implemented fairly, transparently and with proper oversight.

Housing Development Planning: Water Companies

Debate between Helen Morgan and Helen Maguire

Wednesday 12th March 2025 Westminster Hall

[Helen Morgan]

My hon. Friend describes a situation that I think we are all familiar with. I agree with her about the role of water companies and will go on to talk about that point at some length in my speech, so I thank her for that intervention.

When there is heavy rain, the residents I met struggle with surface water flooding and, unfortunately, with sewage backing up into homes and gardens, which we all agree is pretty horrible. Further homes in the area are in the planning process, so the residents are extremely concerned. Each year, their situation gets worse. An elderly resident told me that sometimes, when it has been raining heavily, she has to ask her neighbours not to use their bathroom, because sewage will flood into her garden if they do. That is not a position that any homeowner should be put in, so we need to ask ourselves how we have allowed this to happen in the first place.

We are acutely aware of the need to build more homes, and we support the Government in their mission to build more homes, but it is essential that the infrastructure for both new and existing residents keeps pace with development. Astonishingly, water companies are not statutory consultees when a housing development goes through the planning process. That means that there is no statutory safeguard for home buyers that the company responsible for dealing with their foul waste has ensured or confirmed that its existing sewers will cope; nor is there any statutory safeguard for existing residents against a new development bringing some unpleasant surprises.

[Helen Maguire (Epsom and Ewell) (LD)]

I thank my hon. Friend for securing this very important debate. River Mole River Watch, a local citizen scientists’ charity, has found that smaller pumping stations near new housing developments are seeing a sharp rise in storm overflows. More homes mean more sewage, as she has eloquently explained, and if the infrastructure cannot cope, raw sewage ends up in the River Mole. Does she agree that water companies must be statutory consultees in the planning process, so that sewage infrastructure is upgraded at the same time as building takes place? Otherwise, the problem will only get worse.

[Helen Morgan]

My hon. Friend is exactly right. Water companies have certain powers to object to developments that exacerbate existing capacity problems, but they are very much constrained by duties under the Water Industry Act 1991, which obliges them to accept domestic flows from new developments. Moreover, developers have an automatic right to connect to the existing network for domestic flows, which limits the ability of the water companies to object solely on the basis of network capacity. They can apply for Grampian conditions—planning conditions attached to a decision notice that prevent the start of the development until off-site works have been completed on land not controlled by the applicant. Developers can do that through the planning authority, but only if there is already a scheme promoted and a date for the improvements to be delivered has been set, so Grampian conditions are rarely used.

My hon. Friend the Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) tabled an amendment in Committee to the Water (Special Measures) Bill, which would have provided some of those safeguards by making water companies statutory consultees and ensuring that water infrastructure requirements were considered.