A SPECIALIST team set up to address the outcomes of a report into failings in maternity services is to be stepped down.

The University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust has approved the disbanding of its internal Kirkup Programme. The project included a dedicated trust board sub-committee and work group set up to oversee the implementation of recommendations of the Kirkup Report, published in March 2015. The Report of the Morecambe Bay Investigation included 18 recommendations for UHMBT to address across its sites, including Furness General Hospital. Another 26 were made for the wider NHS.

Trust medical director, Dr David Walker, said: “The ‘stepping down’ of our trust Kirkup Programme is by no means the end, and it should not be interpreted that we think all the work to improve is complete.

“The specific project structure and governance arrangements we put into place to respond fully to the Kirkup Report were always intended to be short term. This allowed us to put the resource and focus into doing what needed to be done in the best way we could to meet the recommendations in the timescales given.

“We have now implemented all the recommendations in full, with the exception of the new Maternity Unit at FGH by December 2017. This means that this specific project structure is no longer needed. 

“The remaining recommendation and the continued monitoring of the changes and improvements to ensure they are sustained will now be done as part of normal trust ‘day-to-day’ activity through our existing governance structures and committees.”

The decision comes alongside the publication of a trust report detailing its progress in addressing the findings of the investigation. The ‘One Year On - How we implemented the Kirkup Report’ document provides a summary of the work already carried out and details of ongoing changes. The trust says it has met all targets within set timescales and is on track to improve the FGH labour sweet by December 2017.

UHMBT chief executive, Jackie Daniel, said: “The publication of the Kirkup Report was a watershed moment, not just for the trust but for those families and communities that have been so tragically let down by past failures.

“It was important that we didn’t just treat the recommendations as a ‘checklist’ of actions, because we owed it to everyone involved to demonstrate we would truly learn from it.

“A tremendous amount of work has taken place in all areas to meet the recommendations so far, and I’d like to thank the staff, stakeholders and service users for their support. A special thanks needs to go to those families who lost loved ones that have supported us throughout - your bravery and commitment to helping us to improve things further for the benefit of local people have been inspiring.

“Whilst I am pleased that we have met all the recommendations so far, there is still a lot of work still left to do. Our strategy is one of continual improvement, and I look forward to sharing updates on further progress throughout the year.”