Latest news with #PauletteHamilton
BBC News
18-05-2025
- Health
- BBC News
Birmingham MP says maternity care for black women must improve
An MP has said maternity care for black women "has to improve" after an inquiry into services got under Hamilton, who represents Birmingham Erdington, said one in four black women receiving maternal care were "dying or having poor outcomes" across Labour MP's comments came after the health and social care select committee, of which she is acting chair, launched its inquiry into black maternal health earlier this week."Mothers go into hospital and it's supposed to be a happy occasion," she told BBC Politics Midlands. "But they're coming out with no children, dying or are disabled for some reason. It has to be improved."Ms Hamilton defended the government on the issue and said it was committed to improving maternity services in the NHS. 'Not really fair' Councillor Ade Adeyemo, leader of the Liberal Democrat group on Solihull Council, agreed people from ethnic minorities "do extremely badly in maternity".He criticised the government's reorganisation of integrated care boards (ICBs), which he said would distract health leaders from improving services."The focus is not going to be on maternity care," he said. "By the time they finish sorting out the reorganisation, we've got mothers, parents, families who are having to go through bad experiences with their maternity which is not really fair."Ex-Conservative MP Theo Clarke, who represented Stafford from 2019 to 2024, recently criticised the government for its lack of progress in improving maternity care. She suffered severe blood loss and needed emergency surgery following a 40-hour labour to deliver her daughter at the Royal Stoke University Hospital in Conservative Police, Fire and Crime Commissioner Ben Adams praised Ms Clarke for raising an issue that many first-time mothers "didn't feel comfortable raising"."Having a child is such a wonderful thing but it is a traumatic, massive act and I think fundamentally we need the NHS and others to listen very carefully about what Theo has said about how they can improve," he added. 'Greater needs' As a result of a landmark review into maternity care at the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust, NHS England said it would increase spending on maternity care by £95m a analysis of NHS funding for this year, carried out by the Health Service Journal, showed just £2m of the £95m was to be ringfenced for and Social Care Minister Stephen Kinnock defended the government's decision and said decisions about funding should be made locally by told BBC Politics Midlands: "They are best placed to determine how best to manage care across their areas. There will be greater needs in some parts of the country than others." Follow BBC Birmingham on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
BBC News
06-03-2025
- Health
- BBC News
Overseas NHS recruitment in Midlands 'not sustainable', MP warns
It is "not sustainable" to continue looking abroad for NHS staff, an MP and former nurse has one in five NHS workers in the Midlands have been recruited from abroad, according to workforce data from NHS rate has almost doubled nationally since 2009, the BBC found, with approximately 42% of doctors being non-British, as are 25% of nurses and healthcare visitors, 3% of managers and 2% of senior MP for Erdington Paulette Hamilton said: "We can't take nurses from abroad in the same number anymore because a lot of countries can't spare them." The growth of recruitment programmes over the past decade has come amid a series of vacancies at NHS trusts, particularly in nursing, which continues to be on the list of occupations facing ongoing shortages. Jerico Mentil, 35, arrived in the UK in late 2016, after being recruited as a nurse from the began working at New Cross Hospital in Wolverhampton, where he continues to work in the emergency department and on a project to digitise patient records."It is a big pedestal to be able to say you worked abroad – but to be able to work in the NHS in the UK was an even higher pedestal. It was prestigious."It was simpler nine years ago when we came, nowadays when you move to the UK you are faced with a lot more challenges for example the economic crisis, changes in house prices, it's harder to adapt." Between 2021 and 2023, the Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust led the biggest overseas recruitment programme seen in the Midlands in recent years, recruiting about 1,500 nurses to work in the Black Country and west Birmingham. The nurses arrived from countries including the Philippines, South Africa, Brazil, Ghana, Nigeria, Nepal and India."There was a national shortage of nurses so our international recruitment was pivotal in helping us fill vacancies and it's also provided us with an opportunity to diversify the workforce," Leanne Walford, a senior matron at the trust, said."A lot of our intake have a wealth of knowledge and experience"."It's about making sure that everything is planned so it's not just about the recruitment of the individual it's about respecting the transition and the challenges of packing up your whole life and moving to a different country." Recruitment 'hammer blow' The trust has also maintained links with universities in the West Midlands to recruit graduate nurses, but figures from UCAS suggest the number of students applying to study nursing is at a record Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said a collapse in numbers of 35% in England and 34% across the UK was a "hammer blow for the government's planned NHS reforms".Last September, England's former chief nurse Dame Ruth May criticised a "catastrophic decision", in 2015, to replace the grant or bursary paid to student midwives and nurses with loans. It led to reduction of about 5,700 trainees in England by 2020, Dame Ruth said, which "would have made a difference" in the RCN has called on the government to provide better financial backing for student nurses. Hamilton, who worked as a district nurse in Birmingham and in Parliament is a member of the Health and Social Care Committee, said: "The way things have been done over the past few years, we've had this austerity crisis where people have not been growing their own – training our own nurses."We've been to other parts of the world looking for people to do the job for us," she said, "but that is not sustainable.""I went into my nursing life without being in debt, we have to offer that to the new generation of nurses."She said the government had been looking at the situation with Health Secretary Wes Streeting stating he wanted to train 5,000 more health visitors and 8,500 mental health nurses."He wants to get general nurses into training," Hamilton added."It's not that we haven't got a willingness, but for that to become a reality we have to look at the way that training is offered in this country." Follow BBC Birmingham on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
