Cockermouth councillor Rebecca Hanson is the latest to call for the Success Regime’s controversial health consultation to be suspended until a detailed risk assessment is made public.

Today Mrs Hanson published her own detailed study comparing transfer times for women in labour in Cumbria to other parts of England, Wales and Scotland – and said the evidence suggests that women and babies will die if consultant-led services are removed from Whitehaven.

It states that at present in England only 40 births a year take place in midwife-led units where the journey time to the nearest consultant is more than 35 minutes. These are in Berwick-Upon-Tweed and Alnwick, where the nearest consultant-led unit is at Cramlington.

She claims that the Berwick unit, where there were 10 such transfers in 2015/15, has been associated with two maternal mortalities, which Mrs Hanson said suggests there is statistically no significant evidence to say it would be safe for women to travel over 45 minutes.

Her research also looks at Wales, where only 60 births a year take place in units more than 45 minutes away from a consultant.

In comparison, the Success regime predicts that between 300 to 400 women a year would use the stand alone midwife-led unit they are proposing for Whitehaven’s West Cumberland Hospital.

Mrs Hanson, a member of Cockermouth Town Council, also referred to the 2006 Closer to Home consultation, when a similar proposal to move services was mooted but then later scrapped.

“Average transfer times, measured from the time a decision to transfer is made, were provided as being 102 minutes 33 seconds.

“There are substantial reasons to believe that the journey from Whitehaven to Carlisle will lead to poor birth outcomes for some women. For example, NICE (National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) on caesarean sections states that when there is immediate threat to life of the mother or foetus, a section should be carried out within 30 minutes,” Mrs Hanson, a Liberal Democrat, explains in the report.


Rebecca Hanson She is therefore calling for the consultation to be stopped until more detailed research and risk assessments can be carried out.

“The Success Regime consultation has not risk-assessed this issue. This consultation must be suspended until appropriate risk assessments have been done and it can be demonstrated that there is a safety case and a financial case for downgrading services,” she said.

Her research has the support of the West Cumbrians’ Voice for Health Care group, which has published its own travel time analysis by postcode.

This shows how long people in each area would have to travel if consultant-led maternity and other urgent services are removed from the West Cumberland Hospital to Carlisle.

The Government-appointed Success Regime, which has drawn up the controversial plans, states in its Healthcare For The Future consultation document that the average additional travel time for women who need to go to Carlisle to give birth would be 45 to 48 minutes.

The Voice group has looked at a wide range of postcodes and drawn up actual predicted travel times, based on a normal daytime journey without additional delays due to roadworks, accidents or adverse weather.

For example it states that those living in Seascale would face a total journey of one hour 24 minutes, Ravenglass a total of one hour 30 minutes, and Beckermet a total of one hour 17 minutes.

It also looks at the fastest possible journey times, which in comparison is one hour nine minutes for those from Seascale, one hour 14 minutes for Ravenglass, and one hour three minutes from Beckermet. The group believes their assessment, drawn up by Jon Ward, “wipes the floor” with that produced by the Success Regime.

Its report added: “The intent is to illustrate to the Success Regime the work that they should have done.

“As some postcodes cover a large geographic area, there will be a number of residents for whom journey times will be significantly greater than stated.”