Our staff work incredibly hard to provide the best possible care for everyone using our maternity and neonatal services. They are experienced and well-trained, caring, compassionate and dedicated.
We recognise that we do not always get everything right for every family and we are committed to continuously learning and improving our services.
There are currently a number of reviews taking place into our maternity and neonatal services which are helping us to identify issues and make changes.
We want to be open and honest about these reviews and the changes we are making, to reassure our families that we are absolutely committed to providing safe, compassionate care.
You may have seen recent news reports about our maternity and neonatal services.
CQC inspections of maternity and neonatal services 2025
The CQC visited Leeds General Infirmary and St James’s University Hospital to inspect our maternity and neonatal services in winter 2024/25.
The CQC has now published its reports, and has graded the Trust’s maternity services as inadequate and neonatal services as requires improvement. You can find out more about these here: CQC inspections of maternity and neonatal services 2025
Steps we have already taken to improve our maternity and neonatal services include:
- Recruiting 55 midwives since autumn 2024 after additional funding was agreed by the Board last year.
- We are currently 11 midwives short of our nationally recommended target of 367 but we continue to actively recruit to meet this standard.
- A further 35 newly qualified midwives are due to start work with us this autumn.
- We have appointed additional midwifery leadership roles to support our clinical teams to deliver safe high-quality care to all our families.
- Addressing the concerns around culture within our maternity services
- We have increased the number of Freedom to Speak Up Champions, encouraging staff to report concerns.
- We have embedded regular ‘Time to Talk’ meetings for each staff group.
- We have monthly open meetings with the Chief Executive, the Chief Nurse and the Director of Midwifery and Nursing.
- We are improving our infection control and cleanliness
- Greater presence of matrons on our wards
- Increased visits and inspections to ward areas
- Replacement of damaged furniture and equipment
- We are improving our medicine storage and management
- Full stock audit
- Comprehensive checks implemented
- We immediately responded to CQC concerns about some babies being transferred from Leeds General Infirmary to the special care baby unit at St James’s University Hospital when it wasn’t safe to do so.
Other improvements include:
- We are establishing a Maternity and Neonatal Improvement Programme and Board which will have an independent chair and include people who have used our maternity and neonatal services, and staff
- We are reviewing our complaints process to ensure we are listening and understanding our patients’ experiences, and working with them to identify ways to improve their care
- We are commissioning an external review of neonatal mortality (MBRRACE) data to understand more about how we compare with other similar organisations, and whether there are areas we can improve
- A workforce review is underway to address pressures on staffing
- A long-term strategy to increase consultant workforce is in progress
- New Maternity Community Triage Line to support patients is now live
- Maternity assessment calls have been moved out of clinical areas to improve patient privacy
- New Personalised Care and Choice midwives are increasing support and access to Birth Reflections
- We are holding civility and inclusion workshops for staff
We will share our progress on this page and keep you updated about further improvements to our services.
Reviews of our services
More detailed information about the reviews into our services can be found on these pages: