Question to the Department of Health and Social Care:

To ask the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of ringfencing of a proportion of her Department's funding settlement for the training and development of maternity and neonatal staff.

No formal assessment has been made. However, NHS England has also invested £127 million in National Health Service maternity workforce and improving neonatal care. This includes approximately £50 million to increase staff in maternity and neonatal services, £34 million for culture and leadership development programmes and supporting staff retention and £45 million to increase the number of neonatal cots in England.

This is in addition to the £95 million investment made in 2021 to fund the establishment of a further 1,200 midwifery and 100 consultant obstetrician posts, with £26.5 million for training multidisciplinary teams.   We have allocated £2.8 million to the Perinatal Culture and Leadership Development Programme to support multi-professional teams in maternity and neonatal services. In addition, £500,000 was provided training for NHS maternity and neonatal leaders to address poor workplace culture and facilitate collaborative working between nurses, doctors, midwives and obstetricians.