How messages between two dads helped expose the largest NHS maternity scandal

Left to right: Gary and Sarah Andrews contacted Sarah and Jack Hawkins after reading about their campaign

A WhatsApp message from one grieving father to another, and one question: "Do you want to speak?"

Little did he know, but Gary Andrews's decision to contact Dr Jack Hawkins would prove pivotal, playing a crucial part in prompting the largest maternity scandal of its kind in NHS history.

Donna Ockenden's major review of maternity services at Nottingham University Hospitals (NUH) NHS Trust, published on Wednesday, revealed 260 babies died or were seriously injured as a result of "deep-rooted, systemic and sustained" failings.

Before she presented her long-awaited report, the senior midwife paid tribute to a group of families who "came together in harm and in grief" and determined that "what had happened to them should not happen to anyone else".

Ockenden said her review "owes its very existence" to them - with the list of names she read out including Gary, Jack, Sarah Andrews and Sarah Hawkins.

Watch: During her review presentation, Ockenden paid tribute to the families involved

Jack and Sarah Hawkins's daughter Harriet was stillborn at Nottingham City Hospital in April 2016 after intervention was repeatedly delayed.

An initial hospital review found "no obvious fault" and stated Harriet had died of an infection.

But Sarah and Jack - who both worked for the trust as a senior physiotherapist and consultant doctor respectively - did not accept that, and pushed for answers.

An external review into the circumstances surrounding Harriet's care, published in January 2018, identified 13 failings in care and concluded her death was "almost certainly preventable".

NUH apologised and said major changes would be made.

Ockenden added Harriet's death "was compounded by a systemic cover-up and investigations designed to mislead, which took a profound toll on the couple's wellbeing".

She called Jack and Sarah's campaign "a watershed moment" - and "the patient safety catalyst for the Nottingham maternity review".

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Gary and Sarah Andrews's daughter Wynter died 23 minutes after she was delivered by Caesarean section at the Queen's Medical Centre on 15 September 2019 after repeated warning signs of her being in distress had been missed.

Wynter died from a loss of oxygen flow to the brain - which an inquest found could have been prevented had staff delivered her earlier.

Sarah, 41, had been admitted to hospital on 14 September, six days after initially experiencing contractions.

The inquest heard the maternity unit was "busy" when she arrived, with information on the patient's history not properly handed over to other staff at shift changes.

The inquest found Wynter may have survived if "multiple missed opportunities" had been spotted.

In what would become a recurring theme about warning signs being missed, the coroner cited a 2018 letter from midwives to bosses at the trust, outlining concerns over staffing levels as "the cause of a potential disaster".

"The grim predictions... were indeed realised some 10 months later when Wynter died as a result of the unsafe practices warned about," coroner Laurinda Bower said.

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) prosecuted NUH over her death in January 2023, with the trust pleading guilty to care failures.

The criminal prosecution resulted in NUH being fined £800,000.

It was weeks after Wynter's death that Gary, 38, decided to reach out to Jack, 57.

He had been reading about what happened to Harriet, and it resonated with his wife's treatment.

Sarah Andrews said: "It was like word for word. You could have changed Harriet's name and put Wynter's name in there and it would have been the same story - left in labour for six days, ignored.

"The only difference was that Wynter had taken a breath and Harriet hadn't, so Harriet was classed as stillborn and Wynter was classed as neonatal death.

"And we were like, 'we need to make contact with this family, we need to speak to them because their experience is so similar to what we've been through'."

Jack quickly replied to Gary's message.

The two sets of parents finding each other was a major moment in the push for the truth.

"I think it was big," said Sarah Andrews.

"[The Hawkins] had been fighting for a long time and they'd been, like many families in Nottingham, isolated, told that it was just one of those things and sometimes these things happen, and made to feel like it was just a one-off.

"But they had been fighting, they've been shouting from the rooftops, they had been trying to get people to listen to them and then suddenly Wynter came along.

"I think Harriet needed Wynter to prove that they hadn't learned and I think Wynter needed Harriet to show that we weren't a one-off."

Sarah Hawkins, 43, added: "It definitely changed things because we knew once we found someone else, we built momentum.

"At the time the trust kept on saying 'sorry for this tragic isolated case', which obviously isolates you on your own."

Sarah Andrews (left) and Sarah Hawkins (right) both lost their daughters due to maternity failings

Because of the 23 minutes she was alive, Wynter's death was investigated by the coroner.

But, in UK law, the death of a child that is stillborn is not subject to an inquest - something Sarah Hawkins said was "frustrating".

She added: "The hospital staff did such a bad job that she [Harriet] died inside me.

"If they'd done a slightly better job, she would have taken a breath and then there would have been an inquest."

Jack said Wynter's inquest was "key", and added: "If a baby or young child has died of neglect in the care of their family it's a police matter, it's front page stuff.

"So for the coroner to say that a hospital which is saying that it doesn't have any issues, the death of a baby in their care was contributed by neglect is massive."

Sarah Hawkins and Sarah Andrews combed social and mainstream media for other harmed families

While the CQC's prosecution of NUH pushed ahead, the two couples were working together to make sure more voices were heard.

Sarah Hawkins said: "And then we spent loads of time, Sarah and I, on social media and doing media to try and find other people who were affected.

"We got some and then Kim Errington, who is Teddy's mum, set up a Facebook group and it started off with just a few people and now it's got just shy of 600."

After getting local MPs on board, the group secured a meeting with then-health secretary Sajid Javid.