MarkFisher MP

Teenage pregnancies in Stoke-on-Trent have soared to become the highest in England outside inner-city London.

Despite huge sums of money spent on tackling the problem, the number of young expectant mothers rose by 4.3 per cent over the same decade that the Government ordered the city to slash the figure by 55 per cent.

In previous years, it h as been kept off the bottom spot in an annual Department of Health league table by a handful of other provincial cities.

Outside the capital, Blackpool, Manchester, Hull and Nottingham had worse figures in 2006.

But with 329 local girls aged 15 to 17 becoming pregnant in 2007, it has sunk to the basement. For every 1,000 15-to-17-year-olds living in the city in 2007, 71.4 fell pregnant.

Only the London boroughs of Southwark and Lambeth had a worse rate than Stoke-on-Trent.

Stoke-on-Trent Central's MP Mark Fisher, pictured below, said: "These are disturbing figures and suggest that however much we are doing in schools and social services, we are not doing enough.

"What we are doing we need to do more of, and we need to do it more effectively.

"The most effective way of fighting this has to be through good factual education - that is what evidence from other countries shows is most effective.

"We need to take deep a look and work out if we are doing that here."

The 2007 data was the worst for at least 10 years and more than a third of the girls - 125 in total - had abortions.

The previous year's rate was 66 pregnancies per 1,000 15 to 17-year-olds and in 1998 it was 68.5.

In the rest of Staffordshire there were 681 teen pregnancies in 2007 - a rate of 42 per 1,000 15 to 17-year-olds.

That figure represented a rise from the previous year's rate of 40.2 although it fell 2.8 per cent over the decade.

The rate in Cheshire was 39.3, a 41 per cent increase over the decade.

Stoke-on-Trent Primary Care Trust revealed last summer that 80 girls aged under-15 had become pregnant.

The PCT announced a range of new initiatives including:

Improved relationship and sexual health education in schools;

Allowing young people to attend 17 family planning clinics for contraceptives without appointments;

Securing pledges from the city's 50 schools to teach safe sex;

A pilot scheme for eight pharmacies to give teenagers free condoms;

Nurses visiting youth centres to give out contraception;

A network of peer mentors - youngsters who encourage their friends to use the services.

Officials were confident these measures would start to turn the problem round and bring significant improvements later this year.

Public Health director Dr Giri Rajaratnam said: "We recognise that the teenage pregnancy rate is one of the highest in the country and we are working closely with schools and Stoke-on-Trent City Council to help tackle this.

"These figures relate to 2007 and following a major review a whole host of measures have since been brought in to help reduce the numbers.

"We would hope the figures for 2008 will reflect the measures we have bought in.

"Research shows that teenage pregnancy rates are more common in areas of deprivation and we are working closely with the council to help improve achievements in schools. "