Ambulances fail time test

One in 11 ambulances failed to meet the response times set by the Patient's Charter, and 80 per cent of ambulances called by GPs failed to get patients to hospitals within an agreed time, according to a report by the Consumer Association magazine, Which?.

Only six out of 37 ambulance services in England met all the response time targets last year, but another six - Avon, Bedfordshire, Hertfordshire, Kent, Leicestershire, London and Yorkshire - failed to meet any of their targets. The best performances were in Staffordshire (98.9 per cent target), Humberside Lancashire, and Northumbria (all 98 per cent). Liz Hunt