The doorman takes your car keys for he will hand them to a lackey who will park your BMW in the secure underground carpark next to the Mercedes-Benzes, Jaguars and a Rolls-Royce, the German-made one that costs a million of whatever currency you are talking about and which belongs to the man you are going to see.

But now your feet encounter the plush red carpet and you are virtually wafted into the foyer through the whispering automatic doors. When you enter the marble-floored entrance, soft classical music assails your ears and there seems to be perfume in the air, something cool yet reassuring, something so distinctly expensive it could even be Chanel.

You approach the solid marble and mahogany-topped reception desk and give your name to the pretty young women in the elegant designer outfits who smile reassuringly. Then you take two steps and you are in a silent, deeply-carpeted lift where more music plays, this time even more ‘classical’ if you like and still there is that wonderful perfume in the air. You smile at your wife who grimaces back.

Meanwhile, just down the road a way, another couple approach a drab brick building. They’ve gone through the car park barrier and collected their parking ticket which will cost them by the hour and now they are looking for a parking space. There are none, not even one small enough for their cheap Ford to fit into, and they drive around for fully half an hour, the husband fretting as his wife starts to get regular contractions.

Eventually they spot a space that someone’s just leaving and they aim for it, only to realise that it is reserved for a doctor. Cursing as the hand of fate continues to slap him about the face, the husband nevertheless parks the rusty Ford in the doctor’s spot and helps his wife out of the car. It starts to rain and by the time they get to the anonymous maternity building they are both soaked through. Fortunately neither of them will see their Ford being clamped. That's a surprise for later.

The soaked couple go into the maternity wing and are assailed by a strange smell which has nothing to do with a French perfumier. There is also a distinct lack of music, restful or otherwise. They are pointed to a lift which never comes and eventually they take to the stairs, the wife now groaning in what the husband believes is an embarassingly loud manner (wait until he gets into the delivery suite. Oh boy, is he in for a shock. But that’s for later; at this stage you will be blissfully unaware of the range of sounds your partner can make).

As they are climbing the stairs, our BMW couple over at what could comfortably pass for a five star hotel, but which is in fact a private hospital, are being shown their individual room which is adorned in the colours they requested when they completed their Birth Plan and ticked the box on the menu marked, ‘personal decor scheme’. They have a plush bed (I say ‘they’  because the husband will be allowed to stay with the wife if he so desires. Frankly, if he has any sense, he will use the three days or so that she launguishes here after the birth of the child to get as much sleep as he can in his own bed, but that’s just my advice...). They have an en suite which is all marble and gold taps and which is about the size of a similarly outiftted room at the Sheraton.

Over at public maternity the Ford couple are still waiting to be seen and this gives hubby the time to wonder why the paint is peeling off the walls and where on earth they managed to get such a colour, the like of which he has never seen in the Dulux catalogue.

When BMW-couple move from the comfort of their room to the birthing suite they can travel by electric cart if they so desire (assuming they have itemised this on their Birth Plan and have paid the premium which enables them to do so) and when they arrive they will discover that the birthing room too has its own shower and a whole range of equipment which would do justice to the average city gym. The piped music can be adjusted and there is a choice of many channels and many CDs and there is even a full colour tv so that if anyone involved in this birth has time they can catch up on a bit of entertainment, though take it from me, there will be entertainment aplenty once the show really gets right on the road.

But for now they relax as much as possible and in walks their very own obstetrician to whom they will pay around one thousand of the folding stuff, even if he just sits in the corner and reads his newspaper which is what he proceeds to do once the greetings have been exchanged.  

In public maternity the Ford driver and his wife are seen by a midwife from a team of midwives. She hooks the mother-to-be up to a monitor and then disappears. The husband ventures into the toilet and discovers the previous inhabitant of this room was none too careful with their bowel movements. In fact, he initially thinks someone has broken in here and spread it around like they sometimes do when they break into your house (I’ve never understood this about home break-ins; the robbers usually have little trouble digging out the hidden jewellery and your passports so surely your toilet can’t be too hard to find, it’s almost always near the bathroom, if not actually in it). Anyway, in public maternity Mr Ford slowly closes the despoiled toilet’s door and decides he can wait.

When the time comes, Mr Ford and wife walk down the long peeling paint corridor to the labour ward. In fairness their birthing room is not altogether different than that in which Herr BMW und Frau find themselves, though there is little gym equipment, no piped music, a phone for which you have to pay, no tv and no ensuite. They do not have their own obstetrician but the midwife begins to make frequent visits as the contractions increase.

After the birth, BMW man and wife go to their luxury room (travelling once again by silently smooth electric cart) while Mr Ford and his wife are taken to a ward - he walks, she gets wheeled in a wheelchair.

On the public maternity ward it’s pot-luck whether the new mum gets a room to herself (it’s not that likely, unless the mother has given birth to twins). More likely she gets to share with another woman and her baby, just a hospital curtain screen between them. They share a toilet and the shower is shared by four. In some public hospitals the wards are even larger.

The big question is this, which is best, public or private?

Well, you might think the answer is clear, especially if you happen to own a BMW. But it isn’t. If you must have the lilac and mint green finished room, the five-star hotel type treatment for the three days that you might stay in hospital after the birth then you have to go private. But hang on a minute - just why are you in there in the first place? Yes, that’s right, to give birth - so perhaps you should be thinking about the type and level of care you’re likely to get?

There are some notable differences between the two offerings, and it’s not just about money and surroundings. But let’s look at the money aspect first. Let’s get the easy one out of the way - if you go public you don’t pay a penny or a cent, it is all free. Okay, you will have been paying taxes which go part of the way to providing the sort of public health service that we have come to take for granted in the western world, but then so have the people who choose to go private.

Opt to go private and firstly there are the monthly health fund payments, payments which go up every year as premiums increase, payments which you will typically have to make for at least a year (sometimes longer) before your partner gets pregnant. Then, absurdly, there is almost always what the funds call ‘the gap’ which I think should be called, ‘and the rest, skipper’.

Amazingly, you have been paying each and every month into one of these funds so they can have some plush city offices (where did you think they got the money for that from?) and pay their people big, fat corporate wages (where did you think they got the money...well, you know what I mean) and it’s still not enough.

So, aside from the restful surroundings what else does your private money buy you? Come on, there must be something! Amazingly, there isn’t. People who go private always point out that they get the services of an obstetrician on call (remember him, he’s the Rolls-Royce owner with the newspaper, sitting there quietly in the corner).

Okay, but the majority of babies are delivered by midwifes, whose job it is, and the obstetrician only gets his hands dirty if something starts to go wrong. Now, the midwives are experienced enough to know when something is going wrong and if it’s something that they cannot handle they immediately get the doctor or an obstetrician in to check it out. This happens in a public hospital as a matter of course. You also have to remember that all public hospitals are equipped with the very latest equipment and amazingly many private hospitals are not. Of course, you don’t know this unless something goes wrong...