THOUSANDS of pounds have been pledged to provide a national network of sites to help bereaved parents, thanks to Colchester’s MP.

Will Quince has campaigned tirelessly for more support to parents after his own baby loss in 2014.

Along with MP Antoinette Sandbach, Mr Quince established and co-chairs the Baby Loss All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG).

Now the Government has confirmed £106,000 for a 'Bereavement Care Pathway' to be rolled out at hospital maternity units across England, after it was supported by Mr Quince.

It follows a £50,000 Government-funded pilot project of the scheme at 11 hospitals.

Colchester’s maternity unit will be included in the next round of pathway sites, set to be introduced in October.

The pathway has been developed by a number of baby loss charities, royal colleges and professional organisations with the support of the Department of Health and Social Care and the APPG.

It is designed to improve the quality of bereavement care experienced by parents and families at all stages of pregnancy and baby loss up to 12 months.

The pathway provides a practical framework in the form of documents and training packages, for all those healthcare and other professionals involved.

It has been informed and led by the views of bereaved parents at every stage of its development.

Mr Quince said the pathway aimed to set out what “world class care” would look like to parents affected by baby loss.

He added: “It means you can have access in every hospital.

“At the moment every hospital is doing it differently.

“This is about ensuring every parent that goes through parental tragedy gets the same level of high quality, consistent and passionate care.”

In addition to the 11 pilot pathway sites, 21 more had already been confirmed last week, before the funding was made available for the national rollout.

Conservative Mr Quince added: “We have got to work up the plans between now and October so we can launch the network. We know it is making a difference which is the main thing.”

A report from Sands baby loss charity in 2016 found that only 46 per cent of trusts with maternity units provided mandatory bereavement care training for maternity unit staff.

Of those who did provide the training, 86 per cent provided their staff with just one hour or less of training each year.

A separate report by baby charity Bliss found that 41 per cent of units had no access to trained mental health workers and that while some units had dedicated bereavement facilities, many relied on normal accommodation or quiet rooms.

Mr Quince added: “In the case of 50 per cent of bereaved mothers, care after their baby had died was considered poor enough to have affected their psychosocial wellbeing and any plans that they might have for a future baby.

“We should therefore be ensuring that parents who suffer the loss of a child receive the best possible care wherever they are in the country, and that is exactly what the bereavement care pathway does.”

Confirming the funding on Tuesday, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State at the Department of Health, Jackie Doyle-Price said: “The funding comes following recognition of the great strides forward that the pathway project is making in ensuring that all bereaved are offered the right high-quality care at a time of enormous tragedy.”

Mr Quince and his wife, Elinor, suffered the loss of their son, Robert, who had Edward’s Syndrome and was stillborn in 2014.

In 2009, Ms Sandbach went through the experience of losing her five-day-old son Sam to sudden infant death syndrome.

The APPG has kept the pressure on the Government to put stillbirth and neo-natal death high on the health agenda and kept the Government focussed on the commitment to a reduction in stillbirth of 20 per cent by 2020 and 50 per cent by 2030.

The APPG has campaigned for bereavement suites in every hospital, more bereavement midwives, better education for professionals and parents, improving maternity care, smoking cessation support and increased fetal monitoring.

Mr Quince has campaigned for Statutory Parental Bereavement Leave which would enshrine in law paid leave for parents who sadly lose a child, and introduced a Bill to enable this in the previous Parliament.

The Bill now has cross-party support along with the support of the Government and looks set to become law within this Parliament.