DHSC launches national investigation into 14 NHS maternity services
The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has launched a rapid, independent national investigation into maternity and neonatal services across 14 NHS trusts, chaired by Baroness Valerie Amos. The inquiry, shaped with input from bereaved and harmed families, will focus on understanding lived experiences, reviewing safety and quality of care, addressing systemic failings and inequalities, and making national recommendations, with interim findings due in December 2025. The trusts, selected on the basis of safety data, mortality rates, patient surveys, diversity of provision and family feedback, include Barking, Havering and Redbridge, Blackpool, Bradford, East Kent, Gloucestershire, Leeds, Oxford, Sandwell and West Birmingham, Shrewsbury and Telford, King’s Lynn, Leicester, Morecambe Bay, Sussex and Somerset. Three of the trusts—Shrewsbury and Telford, East Kent Hospitals, and University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay—have previously been subject to investigations, and lessons from those reviews will be incorporated. The investigation will run alongside a National Maternity and Neonatal Taskforce chaired by the Secretary of State, with the shared aim of tackling inequalities, strengthening accountability and securing consistently safe, high-quality maternity and neonatal care nationwide.