I'll never stop fighting for A&E's future - MP

Telford MP Shaun Davies will hold a cross-party meeting in the new year to discuss the NHS locally

The MP for Telford has pledged to hold a cross-party meeting in the new year to discuss the future of the NHS in Shropshire and Telford and Wrekin.

Labour's Shaun Davies said he was concerned the county's hospitals were unsafe and would continue to push for emergency care to be returned to Telford's Princess Royal Hospital (PRH).

"Every league table that you look at, every kind of stat that you look at, the PRH and our NHS more generally in Telford and Wrekin and Shropshire, is performing very, very badly," he said.

The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospitals NHS Trust said it recognised too many patients were waiting too long for treatment and it was working hard to make improvements.

Building work is under way that will result in specialised emergency care at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital as well as changes in care plans at the PRH.

The £312m transformation programme, known as Future Fit, was first proposed in 2013.

In September, Davies used one of his first House of Commons speeches to call on his own government to reverse the decision to close Telford's A&E.

However, health minister Karin Smyth said contracts agreed by the Conservative government for an Urgent Treatment Centre (UTC) to replace the A&E would cost millions of pounds to reverse.

Royal Shrewsbury Hospital has a temporary entrance, as work to create an emergency care unit on the site is taking place

But the former leader of Telford and Wrekin Council has made his stance clear.

"What I very clearly said at the time was I will never stop fighting," he said.

"Those are the services that my family, my town and myself rely on. I’ll never stop fighting."

The meeting will be with all of Shropshire's MPs, regardless of their political party.

"I’m really concerned about clinical safety at the hospital," Davies said.

"They’ve got a new chief executive, another one... a new chair of the board of directors, another one.

"This is a hospital trust that is in crisis, and we need to fix it."

'Reducing waiting times'

Davies said he aims to work with the government to return children and women's services and emergency care to Telford, and bolster services at the UTC.

"I’ve done more on that hospital, which is not in my constituency - it’s in the Wrekin constituency - than my predecessors ever did," he said.

"I will continue to bring services back to the PRH and importantly, make sure that the NHS here is something we can be proud of."

Ned Hobbs, chief operating officer at The Shrewsbury and Telford Hospital NHS Trust, said work was being done to "accelerate improvements".

"[This involves] our most challenged services, which continue to face significant pressures," he explained.

"Following additional investment in recent weeks, we are reducing waiting times for cancer care and seeing improvements in some parts of our urgent and emergency care services."

Mr Hobbs added the trust's hospital transformation programme, led by clinicians, would address pressing challenges and reduce waiting times.