Infants, Parents and Carers Bill

Debate between Rachael Maskell and Caroline Johnson

Wednesday 14th October 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Rachael Maskell]

I am grateful to the right hon. Member for his clarity. I hope that airing the issue in this debate will ensure that we measure the elements and secure the right environments.

A further issue that is particularly important to me, as chair of the APPG on adoption and permanence, is that of children at risk. We know that if early interventions are made to support parents through a pregnancy, we can diminish the risk of a child being taken into the care system. I spoke to our director of midwifery about the distress caused to midwives by trying to support a distressed mother as her child is removed. Reducing the risk of that happening is important.

Information sharing between health services and local authorities is absolutely crucial for interventions to be made to try to secure the relationship between the child and their parents, and for reducing the risk of a child being removed at birth or in the early days after it. I recognise that, in the lone local authority in my constituency, much is done to secure family bonds at the point the baby is born, but it is important that interventions are made during pregnancy to reduce the risk of a child being removed. The issue often stems from inequalities, so being able to measure them is incredibly important.

My final two key points look at input under clause 4(2). We know that the issue of workforce has been incredibly difficult to address at times, because we do not have a comprehensive workforce plan for the multi-agency teams involved in work around an infant. I therefore propose that the Minister consider creating an integrated, multi-agency workforce plan for the 1,001 critical day period to ensure real integration of service. That would also ensure that we do not see a workforce deficit, because clearly, not having the workforce there would have a huge impact on outcomes, particularly for more vulnerable families.

On how the report will be produced under clause 4, we need a pathway within the measurement, as it is important that parents and carers with lived experience have agency and voice in its formulation. I would appreciate the Minister commenting on that in her remarks, because we have demonstrated in York that when parents and carers are involved in providing feedback, services improve.

[Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Siobhain.

I start by congratulating my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest West on introducing this important Bill. I also recognise the contributions of Members of both Houses, and that of the former Members of Parliament Andrea Leadsom and Will Quince, who have done so much work in this area. I declare an interest, Dame Siobhain, as a consultant paediatrician in the NHS and a member of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. I put on record that the Opposition support this Bill.

Child development is hugely important; that is why Committee members are here today. It is also why I am in this place at all, as it was a major motivator for me to become an MP. As a paediatrician, I saw the profound effect that children not receiving the care that they need in the early years can have. Some cases were of deliberate neglect, and I saw children who had delayed growth, delayed development or physical changes. I remember one little boy who was admitted with vomiting, but he was not ill with a medical condition. We discovered that he had learnt to vomit because nobody came when he cried. Those children need us to step up in a way that we do not always do at the moment.

There is a spectrum, and most of the children are thankfully not in that situation, but it does demonstrate the profound changes that can occur if children are not looked after. However, we also see the profound improvements that can occur if children receive all the things that they need to thrive to their best potential. Sometimes parents may not understand the importance of certain interventions, or they may need support to deliver them. That is where this Bill comes in.

Infants, Parents and Carers Bill (First sitting)

Debate between Rachael Maskell and Caroline Johnson

Committee stage
Wednesday 14th October 2026 Public Bill Committees

[Rachael Maskell]

I am grateful to the right hon. Member for his clarity. I hope that airing the issue in this debate will ensure that we measure the elements and secure the right environments.

A further issue that is particularly important to me, as chair of the APPG on adoption and permanence, is that of children at risk. We know that if early interventions are made to support parents through a pregnancy, we can diminish the risk of a child being taken into the care system. I spoke to our director of midwifery about the distress caused to midwives by trying to support a distressed mother as her child is removed. Reducing the risk of that happening is important.

Information sharing between health services and local authorities is absolutely crucial for interventions to be made to try to secure the relationship between the child and their parents, and for reducing the risk of a child being removed at birth or in the early days after it. I recognise that, in the lone local authority in my constituency, much is done to secure family bonds at the point the baby is born, but it is important that interventions are made during pregnancy to reduce the risk of a child being removed. The issue often stems from inequalities, so being able to measure them is incredibly important.

My final two key points look at input under clause 4(2). We know that the issue of workforce has been incredibly difficult to address at times, because we do not have a comprehensive workforce plan for the multi-agency teams involved in work around an infant. I therefore propose that the Minister consider creating an integrated, multi-agency workforce plan for the 1,001 critical day period to ensure real integration of service. That would also ensure that we do not see a workforce deficit, because clearly, not having the workforce there would have a huge impact on outcomes, particularly for more vulnerable families.

On how the report will be produced under clause 4, we need a pathway within the measurement, as it is important that parents and carers with lived experience have agency and voice in its formulation. I would appreciate the Minister commenting on that in her remarks, because we have demonstrated in York that when parents and carers are involved in providing feedback, services improve.

[Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dame Siobhain.

I start by congratulating my right hon. Friend the Member for New Forest West on introducing this important Bill. I also recognise the contributions of Members of both Houses, and that of the former Members of Parliament Andrea Leadsom and Will Quince, who have done so much work in this area. I declare an interest, Dame Siobhain, as a consultant paediatrician in the NHS and a member of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health. I put on record that the Opposition support this Bill.

Child development is hugely important; that is why Committee members are here today. It is also why I am in this place at all, as it was a major motivator for me to become an MP. As a paediatrician, I saw the profound effect that children not receiving the care that they need in the early years can have. Some cases were of deliberate neglect, and I saw children who had delayed growth, delayed development or physical changes. I remember one little boy who was admitted with vomiting, but he was not ill with a medical condition. We discovered that he had learnt to vomit because nobody came when he cried. Those children need us to step up in a way that we do not always do at the moment.

There is a spectrum, and most of the children are thankfully not in that situation, but it does demonstrate the profound changes that can occur if children are not looked after. However, we also see the profound improvements that can occur if children receive all the things that they need to thrive to their best potential. Sometimes parents may not understand the importance of certain interventions, or they may need support to deliver them. That is where this Bill comes in.

Crime and Policing Bill

Debate between Rachael Maskell and Caroline Johnson

Report stage
Tuesday 17th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Dr Caroline Johnson (Sleaford and North Hykeham) (Con)]

I rise to speak in support of new clause 106, which stands in my name, but first I will speak briefly to new clause 1, which we have been discussing so far. The hon. Member for Gower (Tonia Antoniazzi) spoke about some pretty harrowing cases, and said how the first lady was utterly traumatised by having had her abortion at home, which she received via telemedicine. My new clause seeks to make women safer by ensuring that they are seen and given the opportunity for proper medical consultation before they get to the stage where they are given inappropriate medication because of a misunderstanding, and then end up traumatised, delivering a relatively mature foetus unexpectedly at home.

The hon. Lady did not say during her speech whether she believes that a baby should be terminated right up to term, but I want to put on the record that I do not. I work as an NHS consultant paediatrician, and I have cared for and personally held babies in my hands from 21 weeks and six days’ gestation right through to term. I am very aware that babies from, say, 30 weeks upwards have a more than 98% chance of survival, so although I am supportive of women’s right to choose early in pregnancy, I am not supportive of similar rights in relation to healthy babies right up to term.

Until the pandemic, women had to attend abortion clinics, where they would see a professional and talk through their desire for an abortion and the reasons for it. At the clinic, it would be checked that the woman was pregnant and how far pregnant she was. The hon. Lady raised cases of women who believed they were so far pregnant, but who turned out to be much further pregnant, which are well known; sometimes it goes the other way. One of the key reasons for this confusion is that women often bleed in early pregnancy, and they may believe that those bleeding episodes represent a period; when a woman thinks that she is 10 weeks pregnant, therefore, she may actually be 14 weeks pregnant.

That consideration is important in the context of accessing an abortion because at-home abortions via telemedicine are allowed only up until 10 weeks. The reason for that is not to be difficult or awkward, or to make it more difficult for women to access abortions; instead, it is a safety issue, because we know that complications are greater later in pregnancy. What happens in the early stages is that the procedure essentially causes the foetus to be born. If that happens to a baby much later in pregnancy, the procedure will cause it to be born when it has a chance of survival, which can lead to a traumatic experience for the mother as they deliver a much larger foetus than expected. It can lead to bleeding and, in one case I am aware of, has led to the death of a mother who was given pills to take at home when she was much further along in her pregnant than she had expected.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

If this is about safety, then we also have to think about the safety of the baby. In my constituency, a baby had a live birth at 30 weeks’ gestation. Tragically, that baby went on to live for just four days, struggling over that period, and then died. Must we not consider the baby’s safety as much as the woman’s safety?

[Dr Caroline Johnson]

I thank the hon. Lady for that intervention. I think we need to consider both.

I remember a case involving a lady, Carla Foster, in June 2023. From my reading of the case, she admitted to lying about where she was in her gestation, saying that she was further back in pregnancy, at seven weeks, when she was actually much further along; she turned out to be around 33 weeks pregnant when her baby—her little girl, whom she called Lily—was born. In the papers I have read about the case, she described being traumatised by the face of that baby, which could have been prevented if she had been to a proper clinic and seen a health professional, as that health professional would have clearly seen that she was not seven weeks pregnant, and that taking abortion pills intended for early pregnancy was not a suitable or safe medical intervention.

If one has a termination later in pregnancy, it is done by foeticide. Essentially, an injection of potassium chloride is administered to kill the baby, and then the baby is born in the usual way, but deceased. That is why it is important to know what the gestation is—because the termination offered under the law is done by a different route, to make sure that it is done safely. We know that the later in pregnancy a termination happens, the more a woman is at risk of medical complications.