A THIRD of all babies born in York in the last year had their births registered in a city supermarket.

A pilot scheme launched by York Register Office and Asda at Monks Cross has been so successful that just over 1,000 births have been recorded at the store since November 2002 - a third of the 3,000 births registered in the city every year.

The scheme is due to be reviewed in January and could be repeated at Asda supermarkets across the country. A spokeswoman for the register office, based at the De Grey Rooms in St Leonard's Place during a refurbishment of the Bootham office, said the scheme offered parents more choice and prevented unnecessary car journeys into the city centre.

She said: "Other register offices register births in hospitals and perhaps have outstations in other public buildings, but we were the first to go into a supermarket.

"Asda at Monks Cross is very baby friendly and they offered us the space."

Asda spokeswoman Marie Edgar said: "It (the scheme) came about by chance when we were approached by the council and asked if we were interested in running an outreach centre from the site."

Updated: 10:43 Friday, December 05, 2003