We need more midwives, more midwives and to keep the midwives that we have now.

Rebecca Smyth spoke at the demonstration to Save Liverpool Women’s Hospital on Saturday, October 7th. We had excellent weather and a good turnout. We will be publishing all the speeches.

Hello everyone,  

I worked for 35 years as a midwife, and a nurse before that. I’m also an active member of Save the Liverpool Women’s Hospital Campaign group. 

I’m wanting to tell you what is happening in midwifery and maternity care. I’ve never known a time when Midwifery is under such threat. Midwifery is a profession almost entirely of women, providing care for women and here we are outside the Liverpool Women’s Hospital and all 3 are at risk; the midwives, the women AND the hospital.

Let me tell you how it is in midwifery now and about the crisis in maternity and why I believe the moving of the hospital will worsen the situation for Midwives and of course the women, babies and families that are cared for.

Now our understanding at the moment is that the hospital will move to the new Royal Hospital site…. Can you imagine that?! And we are campaigning to keep the hospital here.

To understand how catastrophic this is, I want to tell you about the crisis in maternity that we’re experiencing now.

Well in a nutshell there aren’t enough Midwives, the official figures say we are 3,500 short. If you haven’t got enough midwives then the services you provide are not safe.

Without midwives childbirth is at risk,

without midwives families are not safe,

without midwives women don’t get the care they need and deserve.

Because, how can you give safe care when they’re just aren’t enough of you?

And why aren’t there enough midwives?

Well, Midwives are leaving in their droves; and that’s because morale is at rock bottom, midwives are overworked and completely exhausted. They are working in an environment that often isn’t safe. So, many leave… either retiring early (like me), reducing their hours, changing careers completely, or leaving for no job at all.

And the reasons they are giving are insufficient staff numbers, burnout and stress.

They are literally on their knees.

The consequence of this, is that there is not one maternity unit in the country that is adequately staffed. That’s every day, that’s today, that’s now.

Not a day goes by when we do not hear about a maternity unit closing its doors and women being sent to other hospitals. Did you ever imagine the day would come when you would hear that a hospital closed its doors? That is what shops do, that is how businesses are run. Yes, businesses…. There’s a thought?

I talk with midwives and they tell me they are frightened, imagine going to work and being frightened, frightened because they’re so short-staffed. They are frightened that they’re going to harm a baby so the child never reaches their true potential, never has the life they should have, and even worse the baby dies. I’m talking about avoidable deaths. And women too, the thought of harming a women you are looking after is horrendous.

How can we expect people to work in this way?

One midwife said to me recently “I’m leaving before my PIN is taken off me”. Your PIN is your unique number which we all are given when we qualify. So, in other words, she left because of fear of being removed from the register. She was worried that something awful would happen on her shift, not because of her own wrongdoing, but because there aren’t enough midwives. It’s just not safe.

And the staffing numbers are getting worse, year on year … for the last few years we’ve been losing around 300 midwives per year, however the latest figures (reported last year/2022) are in fact worse and shows a loss of 677 midwives in a twelve month period. We cannot lose this many!

And if you think the solution is to train more midwives it’s not as easy as that. In order to increase the size of the workforce by just one full-time midwife, we need around 30 student midwives graduating. That’s because so many of midwives are leaving. It’s the leaky pipeline effect.

Now as well as midwives leaving because of safety concerns, there’s also a problem because we’re an aging workforce – Almost a third of midwives are in their 50’s and 60’s. These by definition are the most experienced with the most expertise, but inevitably they will all be retiring soon, so we could lose a third of our workforce in the next 5years. And this is the reality….if you lose 10 midwives each of them with 30 years experience then you lose 300 years of experience. That cannot be replaced with 10 newly qualified midwives. Fabulous as they’ll be but compare 10 to 300.

Also, if you keep on increasing the student numbers (which has been done recently), as we stand there are not enough lecturers to provide the teaching, not enough clinical placements to take them, the classrooms in universities aren’t even big enough! And not enough qualified midwife mentors or assessors to teach the students in the clinical area.

It’s catastrophic what is happening now and getting worse.

Maternity care is in crisis.

And too few midwives is a political decision. But it is the clinicians that get the blame when things go wrong, it’s the clinicians who end up in court, not the government.

It’s not an easy listen I know and I’m certainly no scaremonger, but it’s now come to such a crisis that we all have to face the current situation we are in regarding the care we are able to provide pregnant women. 

Remember in midwifery we have two patients, not just one.

I’m sure many of you will have heard and read about the terrible scandals in maternity. Unnecessary deaths and harm to women and their babies. The impact is heart-breaking and devastating. Recently, there have been a number of very high-profile large investigations which have included many women and their babies. What was prominent about the Reviews was the catastrophic shortage of midwives as well as obstetricians and the lack of support for junior staff (midwives and obstetricians) and delays in appropriate review of care. All to do with the shortage of staffing.

So, Midwives (and doctors) haven’t all of a sudden become unkind, haven’t all of a sudden become uncaring, or incompetent. There just aren’t enough of them.

And here is why I believe moving this hospital to what looks like the New Royal’s site will not be of benefit to women, their families or the workforce

I believe keeping the hospital on the Crown Street site is a safe and viable option. Just recently the hospital has had their Care Quality Commission investigation. This is a routine assessment for all hospitals. The Report gives no indication that women are at risk due to the hospital being on Crown Street. The report does though identify poor staffing of midwives and obstetricians. Staffing will not improve if the hospital is moved.

What the hospital needs now is more midwives, more doctors, not closing down.

And something that always always needs saying, as many people I’m sure don’t know. Black women are nearly 4 times as likely to die in childbirth than white women. Asian women nearly twice as likely. Suicide in pregnancy is escalating, maternal deaths also on the increase. This is where the discussions need to be focused, this is where the energies of the Cheshire & Mersey ICB need to be focused.

These are the issues that need addressing, not how to close and move a hospital.

Everything I’ve said has all been the result of political decision making. Not a consequence of the NHS not working, the NHS is wonderful. It’s not broken it’s BEING broken. PURPOSELY.

We can’t let this cruel, nasty, evil government destroy lives. They are literally getting away with murder.

And its complicit ‘opposition’. They too are all literally getting away with murder.  

Our campaign aim is clear. No closure. No privatisation. No cuts. No merger. Fully fund our hospital. And keep it on its Crown Street Site as a hospital dedicated to Women and Babies.