I agree with you, Muminalice - hospitals DO need to have these, because without some kind of framework things would get unmanageable for staff. Knowing that the parameters of hospital policy are so firm puts me off hospital birth, and lots of women like the idea of it, for various reasons. I agree that complications occur during delivery. What I really believe from many conversations with midwives and birth practitioners, is that those complications present symptoms during labour that IM's tend to pick up on a lot more readily and ahead of time than most hospy midwives, because IM's see a lot more of normal labour and abnormal labour in the earlier phases than hospy ones. Just by virtue of location and not being bound by hospital policy of labouring duration. Most IM's won't wait until the point of delivery to do a transfer in the case of complications. Transfers occur much earlier in the piece than the point of disaster.
Yes, support services ARE better in the UK. This country is a disgrace for birth support services - perinatal support in general.