THOUSANDS of Gwent mums-to-be will be able to have their babies in multi-million pound facilities at Newport's Royal Gwent Hospital from November 2005.

In January, Assembly health minister Jane Hutt pledged the cash to build new facilities and Gwent's maternity bosses have completed an outline business case.

The scheme will provide a major boost for capacity at the hospital, which last year dealt with more than 3,600 births.

The second of seven options originally considered has been chosen for the scheme, which will extend the main delivery unit on to the roof of the hospital's Belle Vue Restaurant.

Option Two includes two new dedicated operating theatres - built as a twin theatre suite - with post-operative support facilities, high dependency beds and two extra delivery rooms.

The current unit has remained basically unchanged for 20 years. It has a single theatre suite, linked paediatric resuscitation area, and seven delivery rooms, the only ones where high risk births can take place.

But it lacks the facilities that a unit of its size needs to function to maximum affect, like post-operative support beds for women following caesarean section, and a dedicated high dependency area.

In 2001, a Gwent Healthcare Trust report laid out the case for change, warning that the safety of some pregnant women and their babies may be put at risk because of the lack of operating theatres.

The main delivery unit has come under more pressure as births there have increased. Transfer of higher risk cases from Caerphilly District Miners Hospital in February 2002 upped the number of births, and the caesarean rate has risen to one in four.

Subject to the outline and full business cases being approved by the Assembly, work will start on the new unit next April.