A FIVE-point plan to reverse community ambulance station closures including the setting up of a Community Ambulance Fund and intensive recruitment, according to its candidate for North Shropshire.

Helen Morgan has called on the government to set up a new Community Ambulance Fund to reverse ambulance station closures as the latest figures reveal waiting times are more than double government targets.

The proposal forms part of an emergency five-point plan to tackle the growing crisis of ambulance delays that is leaving seriously ill patients across North Shropshire waiting hours to be treated.

The Liberal Democrats are calling on government to take five urgent actions to tackle this crisis including, as well as the fund and recruitment, passing MP Daisy Cooper's ambulance waiting times bill, an inquiry into delays and the use of the military.

Ms Cooper, the party’s Health and Care spokesman, has also written to the chair of the Care and Quality Commission, urging him to launch an inspection into deadly ambulance service delays.

Mrs Morgan said: “Next Thursday residents in our area have the golden chance to vote to demand better for our local health services that have been taken for granted for far too long.

“If elected to be our area's next MP, I have a plan for tackling the ambulance crisis we face. This would be my number one priority.

"We need change.

“After decades of neglect, it's clearer than ever that the Conservatives here have run our services into the ground. We need to send a message that this failure is not good enough.”

New official figures published reveal that ambulance response times to emergency 999 calls in the West Midlands are exceeding government pledges.

In November, the average response time for local Category 2 calls (emergency calls involving a serious condition that may require rapid assessment and/or urgent transport, such as a stroke or chest pain) was 39 minutes and 25 seconds – more than double the 18-minute target.