Steve Yemm column: Panorama showed maternity failures demand a national inquiry

But for too many families in Nottinghamshire, it will not have felt like new information.

It will have felt like recognition, after years of fighting to be heard.

The stories that have emerged from maternity services are devastating.

Mothers dismissed, families ignored, warning signs missed, babies who should have been protected, but were not.

For too long, these failures have been treated as isolated incidents.

They are not.

They form a pattern and that pattern demands a serious national response.

Here in Nottinghamshire, the scale is already staggering.

More than 650 baby and maternal deaths and hundreds of cases of life-changing harm are under review.

The wider investigation is expected to examine up to 2,500 cases linked to Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust (NUH), making it the largest maternity review in NHS history.

Behind every number is a family, a mother a baby, a father, grandparent or sibling whose life has been changed forever.

In Mansfield, more than 100 constituents signed a petition calling for change.

That's a clear message from local people that this cannot be allowed to continue.

Panorama showed what many families have been saying for years – that women were not listened to, concerns were dismissed and too often, the system closed ranks instead of confronting the truth.

We have seen this confirmed in the courts too when NUH was fined £1.6m following the deaths of three newborn babies, with the judge identifying ‘serious and systemic failures’.

Those words should make every part of the health system stop and think.

Donna Ockenden’s ongoing work has been vital.

It has helped expose failures that must never be repeated.

But the central question remains, how has this been allowed to happen repeatedly, in different places, under different leadership, over so many years?

That is why I am calling for a full national public inquiry into maternity services.

A public inquiry would have the power to compel evidence.

It could hear directly from families and frontline staff.

It could examine not only clinical practice, but the culture within our health system, whether women are listened to, whether staff feel able to speak up and whether recommendations from previous reviews are actually acted upon.

A maternity commissioner, a national public inquiry and decisive action on past findings are not competing ideas.

They are complementary and together they offer a route to real accountability and lasting change.

This is not about attacking dedicated NHS staff, many of whom work under immense pressure and want the safest possible care for mothers and babies.

It is about making sure the system supports them, listens to families and acts when warning signs are raised.

Families deserve answers – but they also deserve change.

The time for incremental reform has passed.

What is needed now is clarity, accountability and the courage to act.

We owe that to the families who have already suffered unimaginable loss.

We owe it to every parent who will rely on maternity services in the future.

And we owe it to every mum and baby, whose safety must always come first.