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Huge battle launched to return A&E to Burnley
"WE want our hospital back" is the impassioned plea of campaigners who have launched a fresh fight to bring services back to Burnley.
More than 40 leading Liberal Democrats from Burnley and around East Lancashire have met to draw up plans for a new campaign demanding life-saving services are returned to Burnley and money invested in our hospital.
The summit heard a series of "horror stories" which have occurred since the transfer of "blue light" accident and emergency services to the Royal Blackburn and other changes.
Burnley Council leader Coun. Gordon Birtwistle, who backed an Express campaign to save services at the hospital, said the new push would be "the biggest campaign that has ever been seen".
He said his counterparts in Blackburn feel the Royal Blackburn Hospital has reached "melting point" after taking on services from Burnley.
Campaigners plan to:
compile a dossier on people's experiences at the Royal Blackburn and Burnley General Hospitals including comments from patients and staff;
march from a meeting point in Blackburn to the Royal Blackburn Hospital and present the dossier to East Lancashire Hospitals Trust board.
Under the Meeting Patients' Needs plan, emergency services were moved from Burnley and its emergency department downgraded to an "urgent care centre".
Coun. Birtwistle said: "The whole affair of moving emergency services to Blackburn has been an utter shambles. We told them 18 months ago it would not work and recent incidents have proved that.
"We are launching a campaign to demand emergency blue light services are returned to Burnley so patients are not put at risk on long ambulance journeys. We also want money investing in the hospital. The Trust should hold its hands up and admit it made a monumental mistake."
The meeting was chaired by Pendle councillor Lord Tony Greaves who said: "It is obvious to everyone that very urgent action is needed – the system is bust, patients are not getting the service they deserve and some are dying as a result of the incompetence of the top bureaucrats. Staff are doing their best but both patients and staff have had enough – the time for urgent action is now."
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Saturday 04 February 2012
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