Clemmie Hooper Facing Midwifery Misconduct Hearing

[Nedmund]

I've not yet seen any other threads on this.

It's not yet clear why there's a heating but it would be interesting to read the decision by the Nursing and Midwifery Council when it's posted online. The hearing ends 8th March.

I'm wondering if the racism she trolled with played out in her work?

I said she worked in a diverse environment and therefore should be more aware of the issues that black women and babies are experiencing. Not that working for those patients would automatically make her not racist: if only that were the case.

I have spent a lot of time in the sort of middle class white SE London mummies social circle and I think a fair chunk of them would be fully aware of the connotations of the phrase ‘play the race card’, especially those who have additional reason to consider diversity issues. You would have hoped that a front line medical professional would be one of those, but clearly not. As others have said, that’s a bigger problem than this one bad apple.

@TrixiesPillboxHat I think there's a difference between knowing something and actively believing in it. I know a teacher, from a very MC background who insists that poverty shouldn't be a barrier to education because schools are free and libraries provide free resources and Internet. There is a lot more research within this field than the Black maternal health issue, yet she still doesn't believe it - because she can't relate to it and it doesn't affect her.

Clemmie’s Gas and Air blog started off as a really good resource on research in maternity practice, with a leaning towards evidence for lower interventions. At the time she was working with one of the groups of community midwives running out of Kings which supported a lot of home births. The blog was often recommended to parents wanting to understand what sat behind NICE guidelines and hospital policy.

Then she started flogging stuff on Instagram and moved away from all of that, and wrote a book about buying yourself a size 10 leather jacket for after the birth.

The original blog was exactly the sort of place you might have thought the maternal outcomes report would have been covered. It feels like a big shift but of course it’s obviously possible to be aware of issues but not connect our own behaviour to a problem.

Ok. She's expressed regret and learning but that's been dismissed as lip service. There aren't enough midwives. This episode aside she presents as committed and competent. But never mind that. Let's sack her, shall we? Would that make you happy? There will be one midwife less to cover stretched maternity units but this fly in the ointment will be out of it. Is there sufficient for you? You've made it clear that you think she's being redemption/awareness training.

I don't think there's much more to say from you except an admission that you'd like her sacked and to hell with the maternity unit that loses her shift.

beyond not being

Then she started flogging stuff on Instagram and moved away from all of that, and wrote a book about buying yourself a size 10 leather jacket for after the birth.

She wrote a whole book about buying yourself a size 10 leather jacket post delivery? Gosh. Are you sure you didn't read one page and extrapolate? It seems a lot to create a book out of.

I don't think they're desperate so they shouldn't remove her PIN is a particularly sound argument, I mean where do we draw the line? Lower standards for all healthcare workers? She shouldn't have needed to educate herself on the comments she made, that's beyond unconscious bias. If she wasn't aware of the issues black women and also actually black newborns face in maternity care then she's ignorant and isn't keeping up with the standards she should have been. Yes of course it was swept under the rug for many decades, but 5 x more and all sorts of other campaigns were readily available for her to look into and being actively promoted in midwifery.

Essentially she chose to promote the fact she was a midwife on social media as it made her money, therefore she needs to take responsibility for the poor decisions she has made that rightly make people question her practice.

But that’s not what I said, at all. The punishment is the absolute pillorying online and in the press. It’s certainly a large punishment, whoever you are. One that results in suicide at times.

Are you her? 😆

It’s one single shift a week. They’re stretched but I don’t think it’s comparable to losing a proper full time midwife.

And I agree with the poster that the prospect of lowering healthcare standards because staffing is short is a dangerous move.

yes I’d be quite happy to lose 12 hours a week from a midwife who thinks black women weaponise the feature that means they’re more likely to die in childbirth. And I’m a midwife

*his not he's.

He's means "he is"

You’ve got me. There are other words in the book (which I have read). It is definitely not the book that Gas and Air Clemmie would have been commissioned to write, and there are frequently passages that I raised my eyebrows at because an NHS midwife had written them in a book aimed at new mothers.

I believe that Clemmie genuinely didn't think twice about her racist comment. Despite her having just had Candice Braithwaite on her blog and despite supposedly having just read "Why I'm no longer talking to white people about race." It was all in one ear and out the other because women of colour just don't feature in Clemmie's white, white, white middle class bubble. It clearly demonstrates her utterly casual and ingrained racism.

Right? It's not exactly a sad loss is it.

The comments were made in 2019 and she has been working since so how would she be dismissed over something that happened so long ago, with presumably no complaints of the same nature since - wouldn't that leave the NHS trust she is working for now open to accusations of knowingly endangering their BAME patients for the past 3 or so years?

What she said was abhorrent and she came across as a shallow and vacuous person in her influencers days, but everyone deserves a second chance and her colleagues are full of praise for her in relation to her current conduct at work. I am mixed race myself so I understand how problematic her comments were, but I think her losing her job now, 3 years later would be a disproportionate measure.

@SchoolTripDrama well this is embarrassing

Fortunately I don't think anyone with power is going to agree with you.

Well, it was a little ridiculous - I'm sure the book contained a lot more content than that. She wasn't producing NHS material - people have to be free to speak.

But she'll probably return in time.

No I'm not her!!

I don't think some of these posters would stop until she had committed suicide. There's literally no redemption or chance of it.

That’s what worries me, when someone is so completely shamed in this way, with no chance of redemption, then what do we learn? The thing that bothers me the most is that I suspect many of the most vociferous posters might not be concerned about the racism at all, but rather themselves and how if they are shouting loudly enough to ‘burn the witch’ then they are safe from being thought a witch themselves. I don’t think that does much to address the underlying issues at play.

Perhaps a genuine, heart felt apology might be a good start.

The thing that bothers me the most is that I suspect many of the most vociferous posters might not be concerned about the racism at all, but rather themselves and how if they are shouting loudly enough to ‘burn the witch’ then they are safe from being thought a witch themselves

Hmmm I’m inclined to agree. It does seem to be a race on here sometimes to be the most woke/liberal and want to string up anybody who says ‘ok I agree this was offensive, but not absolutely unforgivable or unredeemable’.

Now somebody will be along to tell me that I think not being racist is ‘woke’ 🙄

But there’s a huge difference between what she said and the Tommy Robinsons of this world.

The punishment should fit the crime, and I think losing her public platform, her endorsements and all her freebies (as well as the embarrassment of having her comments published) fits the crime here. With 4 children to raise and a husband who is also a precarious ‘influencer’, I’m not sure sacking her is the right course of action in the absence of any mistreatment of patients in her care.

And yes it has crossed my mind that it’s become a witch hunt so others can prove how ‘un-racist’ they are.

I think you’re way too overinvested and have lost sight of what you’re saying.

Suggesting posters want her to commit suicide is absolutely fucked.