Ref. 12400NORTH Wiltshire MP James Gray blasted the consultation on proposals to close Malmesbury Maternity Unit a disgrace, as health chiefs came under fire for severe cuts to services at the hospital.

Kennet and North Wiltshire Primary Care Trust (PCT) announced at the beginning of last month it wanted to close the maternity unit, transferring midwife led ante natal care, birthing care, and most post natal services to Chippenham.

A packed and angry audience at Malmesbury Town Hall on Monday heard the PCT's director of community services Phil Day argue closing the maternity unit at Malmesbury would save £250,000 to £300,000 for the PCT.

Low birthing rates at the Malmesbury Unit meant the per-birth-cost was higher than at its units at Devizes, Chippenham and Trowbridge, he added.

But Mr Gray was furious the PCT, a month into the three-month consultation period, had not provided evidence to back up the prospective savings.

He said: "It is critical those figures are available. It is making a laughing stock of the whole process."

Responding to Mr Gray's attack, Mr Day said the PCT did not have all the information at the moment to present the figures.

But he added after pressure from Mr Gray: "We will be publishing those figures as a addendum by the end of March."

County and district councillor John Thomson, who is also a member of North Wiltshire District Council's scrutiny committee, called on the consultation to be delayed until those figures were available.

He said: "The consultation should stop and only start when we have all the information."

Coun Thomson said the scrutiny committee had been promised a detailed summary by its meeting last Friday of how the PCT would save the money by closing the unit.

But the day before, Mr Day said the figures were not ready.

Trust chairman Tim Boucher said Coun Thomson's complaints had been noted.

Mothers who had given birth to their children at Malmesbury were also out in force.

Swindon mum Corrinna Mazzotta, who had her first child at Malmesbury, said the PCT had not done enough to publicise the unit in the surrounding areas to increase its birth rate.

She said: "The only way people in my ante natal class found out about Malmesbury was by accident. The publicity about Malmesbury never gets to Swindon. When I mentioned what was offered at Malmesbury unit they all wanted to know more."

Mr Boucher said Swindon PCT was looking at adding a discreet midwife led maternity unit to the Great Western Hospital at Swindon

South Swindon MP Julia Drown, the chair of the Government's, maternity sub-committee and a former NHS accountant, said there were enough births in Swindon and Malmesbury areas combined to support two units

She said: "Malmesbury is the one of the jewels in the crown of the PCT. People come from all over the country to see what you have got here. It should be kept open."

Chair of the Malmesbury branch of the National Childbirth Trust Lisa Byfield-Green said the PCT should consider more than just birth rates when making their decision.

She said: "Your figures counting the number of births in a year do not include the anti or post natal care or the support midwives offer."

At another consultation meeting on Monday the PCT defended it proposals to cut the number of outpatient services at Malmesbury Hospital from its present 27 to just eight.

Acting assistant director of acute commissioning at the PCT, Arthur Belbin, said the services were not being reduced but relocated to Chippenham.

He said many outpatient services provided at Malmesbury were either cancelled by patients or clinicians or had low usage.

The proposals were about improving the efficiency of the services offered while retaining them as locally as possible.

Patients would be able to have the choice of attending weekly clinics in Chippenham rather than monthly appointments at Malmesbury.

But there were many objections from the full public gallery that the proposals would cause severe travelling difficulties.

Dr David Charles of Malmesbury's Gable House Surgery said the proposals would hit the elderly and disabled.

And John Bowen chairman of the project board charged with building a new hospital in Malmesbury said the services that would be left could not be described as a hospital.

He said: "The PCT has done nothing to help this community go forward it is cutting and doing nothing but cutting. It really is not good enough."