Oral Answers to Questions

Ian Roome Excerpts

Tuesday 20th October 2026 Commons Chamber

[Dame Diana Johnson]

My hon. Friend makes a very important point. That is why we have revised the women’s health strategy. It makes it very clear that medical misogyny is not acceptable and that women’s voices must be heard.

[Ian Roome (North Devon) (LD)]

13. What steps her Department is taking to improve NHS maternity services in Devon.

[The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care (Yvette Cooper)]

As I made clear earlier, we are determined to see support given to North Devon maternity services so that they can reopen to provide quality maternity care. It is the responsibility of the trust to ensure that safe staffing levels are in place, but NHS regional and national teams are also working to support them.

[Ian Roome]

I thank the Secretary of State for her earlier answer to my hon. Friend the Member for North Shropshire (Helen Morgan) about North Devon maternity unit. As the local MP, I can attest to how urgent reopening the centre is to the local community. I heard what the Secretary of State said about the plans under way to improve local recruitment. Will she meet me to update me on the work that is under way and will she update the House on the national workforce plan, which is long overdue?

[Yvette Cooper]

The national maternity and neonatal intensive support team has visited the trust to look at what more can be done. The trust has a particular issue with the recruitment of consultants, and measures that it had assured us would be put in place ended up not being effective, so it now has to take further action. It is important that it continues to do so. We will keep the hon. Gentleman up to date with all the measures that we are taking nationally, but I know he is also in close contact with the local trust. Hopefully, the continued local, regional and national pressure will ensure that those services can open as swiftly as possible.