Hundreds of women every year give birth in accident and emergency departments, corridors and on their way to hospital, figures out today showed.

Data obtained by the Tories found almost 4,000 women in England gave birth in a location other than a hospital labour bed in 2008, excluding planned home births. This is up 15 per cent from almost 3,500 in 2007.

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While some of these births will have been genuine emergencies and unavoidable, many are because services are overstretched, the Conservatives said.

The 2008 figures revealed 1,548 unplanned home births, 38 births in an ambulance, 333 in transit to the hospital, 63 in A&E and 171 in an antenatal ward or area.

A total of 26 occurred on a postnatal ward, 11 in a maternity reception, 34 in a maternity ward other than a designated labour ward and 52 in other wards.

A total of 22 births occurred in other parts of the hospital, one in a corridor and eight in a car park.

The data was obtained under the Freedom of Information Act from 117 of the 147 trusts in England that provide maternity services.

Shropshire’s maternity services are run by the Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust, which did not respond to the FOI request but were rated as “best performing” in the most recent independent assessment by the Care Quality Commission.

Cathy Smith, the trust’s head of midwifery, said: “Th-ere will always be occasions when a women starts to deliver more quickly than expec-ted, including at home, on their journey to hospital or even in other parts of the hospital.

“If mum finds herself giving birth unexpectedly, then if possible we try to discuss how she wants to proceed, but sometimes it will happen very quickly and there is simply no choice but to complete the delivery there and then, rather than risking problems by transferring mum to the delivery suite.”

Andrew Lansley, shadow health secretary, said new mothers should not be put through the trauma of having to give birth in “inappropriate places”.

Phil Hope, care services minister, said Britain’s maternity services were among the safest in the world.

By Dave Morris