Do we need more midwives??

[liznay]

I think so and so do the Royal College of Midwives!
Please take 1 minute to sign this e-petition to get the government to recruit 5,000 more full-time midwives. Apparently if the petition gets 100,000 signatures then it has to be debated in the house of commons.
It's only at 5,000 signatures at the moment, so come on mumsnetters help the cause!

would help if I actually posted the link! (sorry baby brain ATM! )

epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/13716

I will absolutly go and sign your e-petition! There is such a HUGE HUGE shortage of midwives! The lack of midwives at my own labours was exactly why i trained to become a Birth Doula myself 7 years ago - realising the lack of support to expectant and labouring mums within the NHS made me realise that there was a gap in the service being provided. My ultimate dream is to become a midwife but with four little girls and the extensive training required to be a midwife makes it off the cards for a little while. I think this is a great petition and i will post your link on my other sites - i hope this helps!x

Petition as link for the lazy

YES! Absolutely! I will sign this.

There really isn't a shortage of midwives but a shortage of jobs for midwives, and that can be attributed to hospitals trying to cut costs and not hiring rather than anything else.

London probably has worse staffing levels than other areas of the country but north of the London area and in Scotland, there are just no jobs for midwives at all.

Even in London, when our hospital was recruiting for some midwives recently, there were over 8 midwives applying for each job.

So while I agree that many hospitals are poorly staffed, until hospitals start recruiting, which is unlikely to happen due to the financial squeeze at the moment, even getting this to the debate stage will achieve nothing useful.

Sorry to sound negative:(

thanks asll! I feel I should clear up some confusion here... This petition has been started by the Royal College of Midwives - not me :-) I'm only helping to spread the word.
Bruxeur thanks for posting the link...
I think the idea is that the government should debate the issue and then create 5,000 more posts as what Mintpurple said is true, it's a shortage of jobs that is really the problem...
You can add the link to your facebook page once you've signed the petition which will help to spread the word.
At my local hospital there is a desperate shortage of midwives IMO this must be due to cost saving measures...

I've already signed but as said before we're training plenty of midwives, it's the fact that there is a freeze on recruitment in so many areas that is the problem. I have friends in Glasgow who are travelling to Southend to work, she has to leave her kids and stay down there in nursing accommodation and then on her days off travel back. I have a friend near Edinburgh who has to work in Carlisle and does that commute every work day. The situation is abysmal.

Sign the petition, write to your MP to aks specifically about improvements in your area, and add your voice to the campaign for better postnatal care too Mumsnet Campaign thread here

I have recently written to my (Tory) MP asking why the tories have not honoured their pledge of extra midwives and complaining that in our area the maximum ratio of mw's to mums has been breached, badly. I got a letter back from the minister for maternity services (Anne somebody, think it might have been Milton) saying they are trying to improve the service by recruiting "midwifery support workers" .

Our votes are important and our views count - but we need to make ourselves heard!

SIgned the petition but while health authorities are freezing recruitment and cutting staff:patient ratios (like where I work) it's not going to make any difference. I also know a number of newly qualified midwives who have no jobs to apply for.

It is dire out there it truly is.

Signed

All over the news this morning.

Signed and facebooked. I laboured alone for most of my first DS!