£35 million investment to boost maternity safety
Almost £35 million will be invested to improve maternity safety across England with the recruitment of additional midwives and the expansion of specialist training to thousands of extra healthcare workers.
The investment, which was announced as part of the Spring Budget 2024, will be provided over the next 3 years to ensure maternity services listen to and act on women’s experiences to improve care.
The funding includes:
- £9 million for the rollout of the reducing brain injury programme across maternity units in England, to provide healthcare workers with the tools and training to reduce avoidable brain injuries in childbirth
- investment in training to ensure the NHS workforce has the skills needed to provide ever safer maternity care. An additional 6,000 clinical staff will be trained in neonatal resuscitation and we will almost double the number of clinical staff receiving specialist training in obstetric medicine in England
- increasing the number of midwives by funding 160 new posts over 3 years to support the growth of the maternity and neonatal workforce
- funding to support the rollout of maternity and neonatal voice partnerships to improve how women’s experiences and views are listened to and acted on to improve care.
Health and Social Care Secretary Victoria Atkins said:
"I want every mother to feel safe when giving birth to their baby.
Improving maternity care is a key cornerstone of our Women’s Health Strategy and with this investment we are delivering on that priority - more midwives, specialist training in obstetric medicine and pushing to improve how women are listened to in our healthcare system.
£35 million is going directly to improving the safety and care in our maternity wards and will move us closer to our goal of making healthcare faster, simpler and fairer for all."
Source: Gov.UK, 10 March 2024