Govt cuts Funding for Maternity Services Development from £95 million to £2million

[MoominUnderWater]

In the wake of all the issues surrounding the Ockenden enquiries, etc this is pretty unbelievable. This will have a massive impact on the safety of women and their pregnancy outcomes

https://rcm.org.uk/media-releases/2025/04/shocking-budget-cuts-will-compromise-the-delivery-of-safe-maternity-care-in-every-way-says-rcm/

This is absolutely shocking!

This is awful. Has there been any comment or explanation from the government op?

What the heck are they thinking?
NHS isn't doing too well, let's cut the funding to one of the key services they provide for women and families.
Madness!!

I’m struggling to find much. The money will be transferred into Integrated Care Board budgets apparently.

what that means in practice for maternity services I’m not sure. Will all the millions be spent on maternity services…..I would be doubtful? More likely the ICBs will just use the money to spend on whatever their priorities are? Which let’s face it women’s services are not often top of the list!

donna Ockenden has spoken out against the cuts on Twitter now.

its thought lots of specialist midwife positions may be lost…stuff like infant feeding specialist, bereavement care, teenage pregnancy midwife as well as midwives focused on training and development of other midwives. Because of all the failings and issues there’s been a big increase in the amount of professional development midwives to help drive up standards and thereby improve safety and outcomes and now it looks like these will be slashed!