I have to say that I read the original post and thought 'I totally agree; I agree with what you say about cultural differences and also about the way that SOME midwives unfortunately behave'. However, some of the comments on here are misinformed and also unhelpful. First, obstetric emergencies are rare and very rarely do you get something that happens with no warning whatsoever. Where there are warning signs at a planned home birth, we transfer. End of story. Or rather, we explain why we want to transfer and the woman decides. Where you hear stories about 'everything was perfect and SUDDENLY me and my baby nearly died', there is usually a catalogue of contributing factors that were either missed entirely or, because the person having that experience is not medical, they don't realise the significance of things like having an epidural and augmented labour, induction, continuous fetal monitoring etc, which can actually increase your risks of certain things, not lower them. Occasionally these freak rare things happen but not USUALLY. Therefore we should not increase the risks for a disproportionate number of women 'just in case'. Also, who do you think looks after women in a hospital? A midwife. Doctors only get involved where there is a problem (at least they do in my unit) and a lot of women will never see a doctor in their pregnancy. Doctors are specialists in the abnormal; midwives are trained in the normal; how to spot it, and keep it that way. I know that not all midwives act like that but my colleagues and I certainly do. Yes, websites like 'homebirth.org.uk' have an agenda but they also have a lot of empowering and positive information, which on the whole will benefit women a lot more than going into labour terrified by scaremongering and horror stories, which will increase fear and stress levels to an extent that it stalls her labour, thus being a self fulfilling prophecy. Looking at overseas studies aren't a fair comparison either, as for instance, the US and Australia follow a very medicalised and not at all holistic model of care. It would be better to look at the stats from somewhere like New Zealand to give a better comparison. As a midwife I am proud of the work I do and also proud that I can help my clients feel able to make their own choices based on the best evidence. I am a practitioner in my own right and as such make clinical decisions; sometimes this means liaising with doctors and sometimes not. Just because some midwives are unhelpful doesn't mean we all are; I've actually met some supremely rude and arrogant EMTs who have been rude to me, abusive and insulting to my colleague, showed no respect to the client etc to the point where a client complained about the crew, but I don't take this as 'all LAS are awful'. So don't judge us all as being the same because I'm sure you wouldn't like it either.