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What is happening?

In November 2025 Gloucestershire NHS suspended their home birth service.

From April 20th, changes to postnatal services have been implemented across Gloucestershire. Instead of home visits by midwives who have often been supporting people throughout their pregnancy, mothers will be required to attend clinic-based appointments with maternity support workers who they may never have met before. These changes were introduced without full consultation, comprehensive risk assessment or any statement to the public, and with just three days' notice for staff.

And local NHS bosses have told staff - but not the public - about plans for a single on-call team of up to four midwives to cover all home births and community birth units across Gloucestershire.

These proposals represent a dismantling of community midwifery across Gloucestershire and effective closure of Stroud Maternity Unit by stealth. This is an untested maternity staffing model that will remove community birth as a real choice.

These changes will reduce maternal choice and put women, birthing people, babies and midwives at risk. When a woman chooses a community option she will have a 50/50 chance of there being staffed services to care for her, but she won't know until she is in labour!

Achieving equality of provision across Gloucestershire by making provision substandard for all is unacceptable - these proposals are not a workable solution to the suspension of support for homebirth, or the closure of the Cheltenham birth unit.

Gloucestershire Maternity Action Group is calling for:

• An immediate halt to the proposed changes

• A moratorium on restructuring until senior maternity leadership is in place

• Full consultation with staff and the community

• Reinstatement of postnatal services and genuine choice in place of birth