We need ministers to stop pretending this is someone else’s problem
Earlier this month, I stood in the House of Commons and told the story of Yeovil’s maternity unit. A much-valued, much-used service, where 1,300 babies are born each year, was forced to shut its doors with barely a week’s notice. The cause? A combination of staff sickness, pressure, and a damning Section 29A notice from the Care Quality Commission.
This is not just a story about one hospital in Somerset. It is a warning about a national system in deep distress.
Data compiled through the House of Commons library show maternity services in England closed a total of 2,201 times between May 2020 and April 2024. In the last year alone, that number hit 848. These are not short-term diversions. These are women in labour being told their local unit cannot provide safe care, and being sent further afield in the middle of a medical emergency. Many of them are in rural areas like mine, where the nearest alternative hospital may be 45 minutes away – on a good day, without traffic.
When I raised this in my adjournment debate, I expected to hear urgency from the minister. I hoped for clarity, or at the very least, some acceptance that we are facing a national maternity crisis. What I received instead was vague reassurances, a list of outdated policies, and no commitment to investigate or improve the situation. It was a disheartening moment not just for me, but for the thousands of families across Somerset and beyond who feel abandoned by the system.
Let’s not forget what led to the closure of Yeovil’s unit. The Care Quality Commission found serious concerns with staffing and governance. The trust’s leadership said sickness levels left the rota unsafe. But what I have heard directly from staff paints a darker picture – of senior clinicians off sick with work-related stress, citing bullying and poor culture from hospital management. It is unacceptable. The NHS is only as strong as its people, and our midwives and paediatric teams deserve leadership that supports, not silences, them.
However, perhaps most alarming of all is the manner in which this closure was handled. Frontline NHS staff found out just six days before the doors were set to close. Some were told over Teams. Others discovered it on social media. Local MPs, council leaders and even the hospital charity (which had been fundraising for the maternity unit) were left in the dark. This is not just a communications failure. It is a fundamental breach of public trust.
And the impact will ripple far beyond Yeovil. Hospitals in Taunton, Dorchester, Bath and Salisbury are now expected to take on thousands of additional births a year. Taunton’s Musgrove Park, for instance, was already described as “traumatic, super-hot and overcrowded” in 2023. Piling more pressure on already stretched services risks undermining care across the region. Staff are exhausted. Services are fragile. There is simply no capacity to absorb more.
This is where the numbers become human. I have spoken to mothers in my constituency who have told me they may delay or cancel plans to have children because of the uncertainty around safe, local maternity care. Others have shared terrifying accounts of emergency births, where just a few minutes made all the difference. One family told me their child is alive today only because Yeovil’s unit was five minutes away. That will no longer be the case for families like theirs.
The government says safety must come first. I agree. But using safety as the reason to close units while refusing to act on the root causes—understaffing, poor management, and system-wide neglect—is not leadership. It is abdication.
What is needed now is urgent and practical. We need:
- A full review of all 2,201 maternity closures, with clarity on which services reopened, which remain closed, and why.
- National standards on how closures are communicated to staff and the public.
- Ringfenced funding for maternity workforce recruitment and retention, particularly in rural areas.
- A clear commitment to restore safe maternity services in Yeovil and protect the long-term future of our district general hospitals.
Above all, we need ministers to stop pretending this is someone else’s problem. Maternity care is collapsing in communities up and down the country. Over half of England’s maternity units are now rated inadequate or in need of improvement. That is not just a local failure. It is a national disgrace.
It should not take headlines or heartbreak to get this government to act. But if that is what it takes, I will continue to speak up—inside Parliament and out—until every woman, no matter where she lives, has access to safe and local maternity care.
Because bringing a baby into the world should never depend on your postcode.
Adam Dance is the Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament for Yeovil and a campaigner for improved maternity care and NHS accountability.
Left Foot Forward doesn’t have the backing of big business or billionaires. We rely on the kind and generous support of ordinary people like you.
You can support hard-hitting journalism that holds the right to account, provides a forum for debate among progressives, and covers the stories the rest of the media ignore. Donate today.
