A LIBERAL Democrat motion submitted to full council to be discussed next week will look again at ‘worrying’ ambulance response times across many parts of Gloucestershire.

The motion will be discussed at full council on Wednesday, December 2 and follows the latest figures showing the South Western Ambulance Service NHS Foundation Trust’s (SWASFT) continuing failure to meet their 75 per cent target in responding to the most urgent calls within eight minutes.

The issue was first brought by the Lib Dems at a council meeting in May 2014 where unanimous cross-party support was given for a motion calling for urgent improvements to ambulance response times in the Cotswolds, Tewkesbury, the Forest of Dean and Stroud.

However, in spite of the fact that the issue of ambulance performance is being monitored by both the Council’s Health and Care Scrutiny Committee (HOSC) and the South Western Ambulance Service Joint Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee improvements have yet to be made.

Cllr Paul Hodgkinson (LD, Bourton-on-the-Water and Northleach) who will for a second time be leading the debate, said: “Our calls for improving ambulance response times made in the council chamber over eighteen months ago appear to have fallen on deaf ears.

“People living in rural areas have for far too long been living with a second rate service in terms of ambulance response times compared to those living in the urban areas of both Cheltenham and Gloucester.”