• The NSW Select Committee on Birth Trauma was established in June 2023 to investigate and report on birth trauma experience across the state. The Committee came about due to intense public scrutiny over cases of birth trauma and obstetric violence in hospitals around the state.

    One of the key regions in focus was the Illawarra, where Better Births Illawarra played a key role in shining a spotlight on harm being caused to women and families at the hands of a broken maternity care system.

    After the Committee was established, Better Births Illawarra facilitated women and families to share their stories via submissions. Over 4,200 submissions were made to the Committee. Over the course of five hearings, Better Births Illawarra sat with women who shared their stories to the Committee, ensuring the voices of those affected were front and centre.

    These hearings, and the many courageous women who gave evidence, exposed the heart-wrenchingly high rates of birth trauma in NSW.

    In May 2024, the Committee handed down its findings, vindicating the many women who shared their stories of systematic harm in our health system.

    The recommendations now fall to the NSW Health Minister to accept and implement. Will you sign the petition calling on the Minister and the NSW Government to do so without delay?

  • We know how to fix our broken maternity care system and ensure all women have access to empowered births. It requires woman-centred and evidence-based changes be made at every level of governance to ensure respectful maternity care in NSW.

    Our core recommendations include:

    • Universal access to continuity of midwifery carer models offered at all public hospitals

    • Reduced unnecessary medical interventions in the perinatal period

    • Obstetric violence legislation introduced

    • Quality maternity care is delivered that ensures a woman gives true informed consent

    • Publicly funded homebirth in all hospitals

    • All women receive trauma-informed care

    • All First Nations women experience culturally safe and responsive maternity care

    • Specialised support for marginalised communities

    • Timely and tailored access to publicly-funded postnatal support for all

    • Transparency and accountability measures introduced in maternity care

    • Evidence-based birth education tailored to all families

    • All women are supported to access their birth preferences

    • Address midwifery workforce challenges

    • These key changes to our maternity health system must be implemented and funded to ensure women can access empowered births in NSW.

    • Will you sign the petition calling on the NSW Government to act to end birth trauma?

  • Better Births Illawarra is a community group advocating for empowered birth. While our focus is the Illawarra Shoalhaven, it extends across NSW to influence legislative, policy and practice change.

    Our journey began eight years ago when a group of mothers got together to talk about our birth experiences in Dharawal Country/Wollongong. We realised the care one receives during birth can have profound effects throughout one’s life, home, and happiness. We knew from our own experiences and from research that ensuring midwifery-led continuity of care was available to all women and families was at the heart of what needed to change.

    Fast forward to 2024, we continue to dedicate our time to ensuring every woman and their family can access empowered birth through respectful maternity care, freedom of choice and strong support around them. Better Births Illawarra played a key role in ensuring the inquiry centred on the experiences of women birthing in our communities and across the NSW health system. We helped thousands of everyday women and families make often very painful submissions of their own traumatic birth experiences. We sat with women, cried with women, translated for women. We attended every hearing, supporting these women to give evidence alongside supporting the communities affected by birth trauma and the inquiry.

    Now, with the NSW Select Committee on Birth Trauma’s final report released, we will dedicate our collective power to ensuring the NSW Government does everything in its power to end birth trauma in our hospitals and communities – starting with implementing the report’s recommendations without delay.

Our work is conducted on what always was and always will be Aboriginal land — the Countries of the Wodi Wodi, Wandi Wandandian, Dharawal, Yuin of the Yuin Nation. Our work is committed to justice for all people including the sovereignty of First Nations people, knowledge systems and practices. In our work, we commit to reverence, healing, respect, responsibility and reciprocity with all beings, the land, sky, seas and waterways and pay our deepest respect to Elders past, present and emerging.