Ambulance unions have insisted that "cynical and indefensible" plans to close 12 out of Essex's 31 ambulance stations will mean a poorer service for residents.

Option Five: Saving the Essex Ambulance Service, which was published last week by the public service union Unison in response to Essex Ambulance Service NHS Trust's plans, claims that the changes could result in patients facing longer journeys to hospital.

Under the proposals, ambulance response times would be improved by relying primarily on 11 key cover stations located near to the county's main areas of population, including Brentwood and Wickford.

But the report concludes: "For many people the response times will be worse than they are now. That is not defensible. And of course it is doubly worse in the remoter areas because the emergency hospital is further away as well.

"What the report amounts to is a means of playing with the statistics of average response times.

"The implementation of the report is a cynical attempt to massage response time figures to improve the average at the expense of others."

It goes on to demand that the closures be abandoned and a review of the service be launched to calculate the staffing levels and vehicle numbers needed to meet the Government's response time targets and find funding for them.

Responding on behalf of Essex Ambulance Service, trust chief executive Gron Roberts said: "At first reading the report regrettably seems more concerned with attacking the proposals put forward by the trust rather than with coming up with any realistic alternatives.

"That said, we will be examining very carefully the various points it makes over the next few weeks and they will be considered by the trust alongside many other comments and suggestions which we have received on these proposals."

Meanwhile, David Kendall, Brentwood borough councillor and Liberal Democrat parliamentary spokesman for Brentwood and Ongar, has accused the trust of snubbing him after it refused to receive the Save Ongar Ambulance petition from him in person and insisted he post it instead.

Cllr Kendall said: "I am very disappointed with the trust's attitude. However over 1,800 residents from Ongar and the surrounding villages have signed our petition.

"I believe they are going to find it hard to ignore the strength of feeling that exists among local residents."

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