‘Profound disappointment’ as ICBs are allowed to cut safety funding

A leading midwife and chair of government maternity inquiries has cited “significant concern about safety and wellbeing” following a substantial cut to nationally ring-fenced funding.

The concerns follow more than £90m of service development funding being cut from maternity allocations and transferred into core integrated care board budgets in 2025-26, as revealed by HSJ this week.

NHS England said “maternity care remains a top priority” and it was “misleading” to suggest otherwise. But leading maternity safety campaigners and royal colleges expressed concerns that funding will now be lost because of deficits and competing demands.

NHSE 2025-26 planning guidance says organisations must still “improve safety in maternity and neonatal services, delivering the key actions of the ‘three-year delivery plan’”, as well as “paying particular attention to challenged and fragile services, including maternity and neonatal”.

Donna Ockenden, a former senior midwife,  who chaired a government-commissioned review into maternity failings in Shropshire and is currently leading its inquiry into Nottingham Hospitals, said on social media site X: “Talking to colleagues across perinatal services, the sense of disappointment is profound, with everyone I’ve spoken to tonight expressing significant concern about safety and the wellbeing of children and mental health.”

Influential safety campaigner James Titcombe said the move was “pulling in the opposite direction to promises health and social care secretary Wes Streeting had made to families failed by poor maternity care”.

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Source: HSJ, 1 May 2025