Midwives 'disappointed with broken government pledge'

The Royal College of Midwives general secretary Cathy Warwick has said the government has not delivered a pre-election pledge to increase midwife numbers in England.

Ms Warwick said there are too few to cope with a rising birth rate and increasingly complex births and mothers and babies will suffer unless the 3,000 extra midwives it says were promised are delivered by 2014.

The government said the rise was now not needed as the birth rate was stable.