Maternity: UK needs private standards as a public service, says new Green report

15 April 2009

A new policy report from the Green Party will demand radical improvements in UK maternity services.

A Green New Deal for the NHS (1) will demand a single-tier approach for all mothers, funded from the public purse:

The Greens announced these policies on the day that a study was published in the British Obstetrics and Gynaecology Journal showing that home-birth is no more dangerous than hospital birth, for “normal” pregnanices – something Greens had long claimed, and which has now been demonstrated in a study of half a million births in the Netherlands.

The party’s recent spring conference decided the Greens must take the lead in proposing huge improvements in UK maternity services. The conference debate was told:

NHS maternity services need to change direction towards midwife-led, women-centred services that provides medical interventions only when necessary.

The Greens estimate that the dramatic improvements in maternity services proposed in A Green New Deal for the NHS would cost about £500m.

Green Party leader Caroline Lucas MEP, who is widely tipped to become the first Green MP at Westminster in the next general election, said today: “The UK must achieve the best possible standards of maternity care. Currently, due to shortage of funding, shortage of midwives and excessive interventions, we are far behind where we ought to be. The Green Party will fight the next general election on this platform – huge improvements in the NHS, and not least in maternity services.”

Note

1. The full report A Green New Deal for the NHS is scheduled to be published on Friday 17 April.

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