We desperately need a public inquiry into maternity safety – and Jeremy Hunt is the key to making it a reality

Responsible as he was for various governments’ underfunding of the NHS, he can use his position as Health and Social Care Committee chair to bring about much-needed change

Former minister has also called for the reinstatement of a maternity safety training fund (EPA)

In a parallel world, one where Boris Johnson’s manifest shortcomings were more disturbing to his party’s membership, Jeremy Hunt might be prime minister today, and at least some aspects of public life would be the better for it. Who knows, perhaps Mr Hunt would not be now pursuing a no-deal Brexit as a deliberate policy choice.

Still, Mr Hunt seems commendably determined to stay in politics, and to use his extensive experience as secretary of state for health and social care for the good of the country. Much-maligned as he sometimes was, Mr Hunt managed to keep the NHS from becoming even more of a political football during his lengthy, six-year tenure. Now he is to chair of the Commons Health and Social Care Committee, and it will be intriguing to watch when he grills his successor, the rather less sure-footed Matt Hancock.

Mr Hunt is also to be praised for backing The Independent’s campaign, with Baby Lifeline, to improve maternity care. “Improve”, in this case, being something of an understatement in some NHS trusts, as the recent appalling scandals in Shrewsbury and Kent demonstrate so distressingly. In maternity, of all areas, there can be no complacency about patient care, which is exactly what has crept into some hospitals all too easily. In Shrewsbury, the interim report by Donna Ockenden, a leading midwife, revealed that substandard care had become the norm for decades – leading to the needless deaths of mothers and babies.

Like Jonathan Ashworth, the shadow health secretary, who also backs The Independent’s campaign, Mr Hunt believes a public inquiry into maternity safety is essential. Too many mistakes are cropping up time and again; an unwelcome pattern is developing. Were he still health secretary Mr Hunt would set up a public inquiry; and he will no doubt leverage whatever influence he now has to ensure Mr Hancock follows his advice. If not, then there’s going to be an awkward hearing awaiting Mr Hancock when he next goes to the Health and Social Care Committee.

Though responsible as he has been for the various Conservative-led governments’ underfunding of the NHS, Mr Hunt is right to call for the reinstatement of a maternity safety training fund. With a modest cost of £8.1m, that should yield a disproportionate benefit to maternity care.

Where fallings are uncovered, more notice needs to be taken of the victims. Our campaign also calls for patients and their families to be involved in investigating incidents – with a statutory right to do so. Again, this is something MPs in all parties should not find difficult to support.

The recent inquiry into Ian Paterson, the rogue surgeon who may have harmed more than 1,000 breast cancer patients reminds us too of how often large-scale catastrophic failures can hit the NHS. The names are familiar: Alder Hey (callous use of body tissues); Stafford (widespread neglect of patients); the Bristol heart scandal; the misuse of opiates in Gosport; the mass homicides of Harold Shipman; the incubation of so-called superbugs and the infected blood scandal were all linked by a culture of undue deference to the clinicians and a neglect of appropriate auditing and learning from mistakes. There is much that can be practically accomplished, and well within the NHS budget, to reduce the chances of future failures.