Tony Lloyd MP: Ambulance service overstretched and underfunded

Tony Lloyd, MP for Rochdale

Tony Lloyd, Labour MP for Rochdale, will lead a debate in the House of Commons to call on the government to provide greater investment for the North West Ambulance Service NHS Trust (NWAS).

Over the last six years, there has been an upsurge of nearly 50% in the demand for ambulances, due to pressures on GP surgeries and NHS Direct, and the closure of A&E departments.

Following the closure of Rochdale A&E, Ambulance Service Trust leaders promised to include a paramedic on every ambulance. This promise is simply not being met. Reports show that 25% of ambulance responses to the most urgent calls last year did not have a paramedic on board.

This is no fault of the ambulance crews, whose services are in higher demand than ever before. Hospitals are unable to cope, so ambulance queues for patient transfer outside A&E are longer than ever.

NHS figures show that, across the North West region, 115,372 patients were brought to hospital by ambulance. Of these, 24% were waiting for longer than 30 minutes to be transferred from ambulance to A&E. Over 11,000 people, or nearly one in ten, waited for more than an hour, leaving ambulance crews unable to do the job they want and are trained to do.

A better system is needed urgently for transferring patients from the ambulances outside into the hospitals, and more – and more accessible – training for new paramedics and those NHS staff who wish to re-train.

Mr Lloyd said: “The complete incompetence of health ministers and a conspiracy of silence by Ambulance Trust leaders are putting lives in danger on a daily basis. The word crisis may be overused but it is unfortunately all too real. This is not a winter crisis; this is a 52 weeks of the year crisis, and the government must take action to stop it from getting worse.”