Nottingham NHS maternity review head sends condolences to Lucy Letby’s victims

Donna Ockenden said she does not think it’s helpful to compare Letby’s crimes to the failings in Nottingham.

Donna Ockenden, who is leading an inquiry into maternity care within Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust (Jacob King/PA) (PA Wire)

The chairwoman of the review into maternity services at a Nottingham NHS Trust has said she does not think it is helpful to compare the failings in the city to those that led to Lucy Letby’s crimes.

Donna Ockenden extended her “heartfelt condolences” to the families of those murdered by Letby, who will serve the rest of her life behind bars for murdering seven babies and attempting to murder six more.

Ms Ockenden is leading a review into maternity care at the Nottingham University Hospitals NHS Trust (NUHT), which was launched a year ago on Friday.

The Nottingham Families Maternity Group called for Nottinghamshire Police to investigate failings at NUHT, but Ms Ockenden said she did not think it was “helpful” to compare Letby’s case to her review.

She said: “My heartfelt condolences have to go out to the families whose lives have been changed forever in such terrible circumstances. I’m not in Chester, I’ve seen as everyone else that an inquiry has been set up and I think it’s really important now that that independent review is enabled to start its work and proceed through its work.

“In all honesty, other than send my heartfelt condolences to the affected families with the awful things that have happened to them, I don’t think it’s helpful for me to sit here today and say, ‘Well, potentially the review I did in X place was similar to Chester or potentially the work I’m doing now might be similar’, because I don’t know, I’m not there.

“I don’t think it’s helpful then to therefore sit and analyse things from a distance.

“I’m pleased that there’s going to be a very rigorous independent inquiry, that the families will always get the answers that they want and they deserve, and that the right actions will be taken, and again, [I extend] my heartfelt sorrow to those families.”

An inquiry into Letby’s crimes was given statutory footing on Wednesday, meaning it will have legal powers to compel witnesses, including both former and current staff of the Countess of Chester Hospital Trust, to provide evidence.

It comes after it emerged that whistleblowers within the NHS raised concerns to bosses about Letby a year before she was removed from her ward in 2016 and assigned to clerical work.

Parents of babies have also claimed they received a “total fob off” from hospital medical director Ian Harvey after raising concerns, a lawyer representing them previously said.

In Nottingham, families have said they too had concerns dismissed by NUHT despite concerns being raised by one couple, Dr Jack and Sarah Hawkins, as early as 2016 following the death of their daughter during labour.

690 staff have come forward to share concerns with Ms Ockenden and her team, many choosing to do so anonymously.

The Nottingham Families Maternity Group has said it “expects action” from police over the care failings, calling on them to assess whether anyone is criminally culpable.

Ms Ockenden said that it was a matter for the police as to whether an investigation was launched, but said she had a “public duty” to inform police “in a timely way” if evidence of criminality was uncovered.