NHS maternity care 'is in crisis'

Fears over the standard of NHS services for expectant mothers were heightened last night after it emerged that the number of maternity beds has fallen by up to 40% in some regions - reports the Daily Telegraph.

The information, obtained from a parliamentary answer, said that since Labour came to power in 1997, there had been an 18% reduction in the number of maternity beds for every 100,000 people - equivalent to almost 2,000 beds in the past 10 years.

But in some strategic health authority areas, the drop was much more dramatic with reductions of 40% in north-west London and South Yorkshire.

There were 35% fewer maternity beds in the Leicestershire, Northants and Rutland area as well in the South-West Peninsula authority area since 1997.

Even in the County Durham and Tees Valley, where until recently Tony Blair had his constituency, the decline was 32%.

A Tory spokesman insisted that Labour could not claim that home births made up for the decline as Government figures showed that only 2% of women gave birth at home in 2006/07.

The answer also highlighted the relative lack of midwives, confirming that their numbers are not keeping pace with the number of live births.

Since 2001, the number of live births had risen by 12.5% but the number of midwives rose by 4.5%.