The chief executive of an NHS trust at the centre of a maternity scandal where there were at least seven preventable baby deaths has warned staff to prepare for a “harrowing report” into what happened.
In an email seen by Sky News, East Kent Hospitals University NHS Foundation Trust chief executive Tracey Fletcher told her staff to expect a “harrowing report which will have a profound and significant impact on families and colleagues, particularly those working in maternity services”.
An independent investigation into the trust, stretching back over a decade, will be published next week and is expected to expose a catalogue of serious failings.
It is also expected to say the avoidable baby deaths happened because recommendations that were made following reports into other NHS maternity scandals were not implemented.
The East Kent review is led by obstetrician Dr Bill Kirkup, who also chaired the investigation into mother and baby deaths in Morecambe in 2015.
The report was delayed following the Queen’s death, prolonging the agony for grieving parents who are desperate to learn the truth about their children’s deaths.
Dawn Powell’s newborn son Archie died in February 2019 aged four days.
In an emotional interview, Mrs Powell told Sky News she will never get over the loss of her son, who would be alive today if she or Archie had been given a routine antibiotic.
“For families like us, where your child has been taken away, you have forever got that hole in your life that you will never heal,” Mrs Powell said.
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Image: A delay in treating Archie’s infection led to multiple organ failure
Archie and his twin sister Evalene were born at the Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother hospital in Margate, Kent.
Archie became ill shortly after birth. Medics treating him failed to spot he was suffering from a common infection, group B streptococcus, despite showing all the symptoms.
His mother said: “We now know it was completely avoidable, that people weren’t picking up the signs, common signs that any trained nurse, midwife and doctors would spot through the grunting, being unable to maintain body temperature, irritability and other factors. Clear signs.”
Image: Archie and his twin sister Evalene
Archie was eventually rushed to St Thomas’ hospital in London to receive expert care. But the delay in treating his infection caused catastrophic brain damage, leading to multiple organ failure.
“I sat next to him and held his hand, and he was actually opening his eyes. And I was talking to him and just felt the lightest squeeze on my finger. But then from that day, they said he never opened his eyes again,” Mrs Powell said.
“Having to go through the process of him being taken off life support, our daughters helping him to do his handprints and footprints because it’s the only thing that we’re going to have left.
“It was just me and my husband in the room when they finally took him off the last bit of life support and then me holding him once he went.”
Mrs Powell added: “I held a lot of guilt at the beginning because I thought it was partly my fault for what happened because I was the one carrying the group B strep that he first caught and I’ve always held a lot of guilt for that, but that just grows into anger towards people that didn’t do their jobs.
“They have put us in this situation for the rest of our lives.”
The Kirkup report will be published on Wednesday 19 October.
Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) has said it will “pause” shipments to the US as the British car firm works to “address the new trading terms” of Donald Trump’s tariffs.
The US president has introduced a 25% levy on all foreign cars imported into the country, which came into force on Thursday.
JLR, one of the country’s biggest carmakers, exported about 38,000 cars to the US in the third quarter of 2024 – almost equal to the amount sold to the UK and the EU combined.
In a statement on Saturday, a spokesperson for the company behind the Jaguar, Land Rover and Range Rover brands said: “The USA is an important market for JLR’s luxury brands.
“As we work to address the new trading terms with our business partners, we are taking some short-term actions including a shipment pause in April, as we develop our mid- to longer-term plans.”
The company released a statement last week before Mr Trump announced a “baseline” 10% tariff on goods from around the world, which kicked in on Saturday morning, on what he called “liberation day”.
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JLR reassured customers its business was “resilient” and “accustomed to changing market conditions”.
“Our priorities now are delivering for our clients around the world and addressing these new US trading terms,” the firm said.
Trading across the world has been hit by Mr Trump’s tariff announcement at the White House on Wednesday.
All but one stock on the FTSE 100 fell on Friday – with Rolls-Royce, banks and miners among those to suffer the sharpest losses.
Cars are the top product exported from the UK to the US, with exports worth £8.3bn in the year to the end of September 2024, according to data from the Office for National Statistics.
For UK carmakers, the US is the second largest export market behind the European Union.
Industry groups have previously warned the tariffs will force firms to rethink where they trade, while a report by thinktank the Institute for Public Policy Research said more than 25,000 car manufacturing jobs in the UK could be at risk.
Two people have died following a fire at a caravan site near Skegness, Lincolnshire Police have said.
In a statement, officers said they were called at 3.53am on Saturday to a report of a blaze at Golden Beach Holiday Park in the village of Ingoldmells.
Fire and rescue crews attended the scene, and two people were found to have died.
They were reported to be a 10-year-old girl and a 48-year-old man.
The force said the victims’ next of kin have been informed and will be supported by specially trained officers.
Officers are trying to establish the exact cause of the blaze.
“We are at the very early stages of our investigation and as such we are keeping an open mind,” the force said.
A 15-year-old boy has died after “getting into difficulty” in a lake in southeast London, police say.
Officers and paramedics were called shortly after 3pm on Friday to Beckenham Place Park in Lewisham.
The Metropolitan Police said a boy “was recovered from the lake” at around 10.42pm the same day.
“He was taken to hospital where he was sadly pronounced dead. His death is being treated as unexpected but not believed to be suspicious,” according to the force.
The boy’s family has been told and are being supported by specialist officers.
The force originally said the child was 16 years old, but has since confirmed his age as 15.
In the earlier statement, officers said emergency services carried out a search and the park was evacuated.
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Image: Emergency teams were called to Beckenham Place Park on Friday afternoon
Beckenham Place Park, which borders the London borough of Bromley, covers around 240 acres, according to the park’s website.
The lake is described as 285 metres long, reaching depths of up to 3.5 metres.
It is designed as a swimming lake for open-water swimming and paddle boarding.
A London Ambulance Service spokesperson said on Friday: “We were called at 3.02pm this afternoon to reports of a person in the water.
“We sent resources to the scene, including an ambulance crew, an incident response officer and members of our hazardous area response team.”
Emergency teams have not explained how the boy entered the water, or whether he was accompanied by others.