The scandal of police cars being seconded to do the work of overstretched ambulance staff has been revealed in a leaked log of incidents compiled from around the country.

Officers have had to step in after being told on bank holidays of a seven-hour wait for ambulances, according to the document compiled by officers. Some officers forced to ferry critically ill people to hospital because of a lack of ambulances have faced internal inquiries or Independent Police Complaints Commission investigations after their passengers died, the document says.

The log notes a growing concern among officers that they were becoming responsible for the health of people who have attempted suicide, been badly hurt in road crashes or become ill on the street or in their homes.

One entry made by an officer in the north-east of England in April this year reports: "Good Friday weekend we were told [there] is a seven-hour waiting time for an ambulance so don't call one as you won't get one". Another entry from July this year from the same area says: "Ambulance control requested police attend a report of 14-year-old girl having taken an overdose (police requested 'because of her age and as she was home alone'). On police arrival an ambulance failed to attend and the response was downgraded as there was no ambulance available. The injured person had to be taken to hospital by police and the ambulance cancelled. The child was 14 years old and there was no requirement for police in this circumstance."

Another officer mentions an incident in the south-east: "Female was very ill and the first car on scene decided to take her to hospital. The control room said no. No ambulance was nearby. The officer took the female to hospital where she collapsed and died (they got her back). The inspector reported the officer in respect of misconduct for breaching a direct order."

Shadow health secretary Andy Burnham said a major cause of the shortage of ambulances was the fact that they have to wait at hospitals to release patients into A&E departments that are already full. Earlier this year it was reported that the number of patients forced to wait at least two hours parked outside A&E had risen by two-thirds in one year. Figures from eight of England's 10 ambulance trusts showed that 3,424 patients waited more than two hours before handover to hospital staff during 2012-13, against 2,061 such patients in the previous year.

Hospitals have been battling to deal efficiently with a huge influx of emergency patients, with senior doctors comparing A&E units to "war zones" and the head of the NHS watchdog saying the situation was "out of control".

The prime minister says the pressure is caused by an extra one million people visiting A&E compared with three years ago. However, Labour blames the scrapping of the NHS Direct advice line, nursing cuts and health service shakeup. Burnham said: "Jeremy Hunt has failed to grasp the urgency of the A&E crisis. The chaos is now spreading to other emergency services. The alarming fact that police cars are now doubling as makeshift ambulances is a clear sign of how bad things have got on his watch."

Steve White, vice-chairman of the Police Federation, warned against the police being asked to plug the gaps where the other emergency services were feeling the strain. He said: "Police officers are already stretched beyond the limit and cannot and should not be expected to plug the gaps those cuts have left across other areas of the public sector."