• Economic vandalism leaves Britain on the edge of recession
• Lack of further energy bill support “heartless” – Davey
• One in 20 waiting five minutes or more for 999 calls to be answered

Economic vandalism leaves Britain on the edge of recession

Responding to the latest ONS figures which see the UK economy narrowly avoiding recession, Liberal Democrat Treasury Spokesperson Sarah Olney MP said:

Britain is dangling on over the edge of a recession after months of economic vandalism and chaos in Government. The blame for these gloomy figures lies squarely with the Government, who have botched budgets, failed to tackle inflation and have no plan for growth.

The Conservative party hasn’t a shred of economic competence left. This Government has hiked taxes to record levels and done nothing to stimulate economic growth. Businesses are now drowning in mountains of red-tape because of failed trade deals which has stifled all hope of an economic recovery after the pandemic. Gross incompetence and mismanagement of the country’s finances has led to this point.

Lack of further energy bill support “heartless” – Davey

Responding to the news that Jeremy Hunt has ruled out further energy support, Liberal Democrat Leader Ed Davey MP said:

This Conservative government either doesn’t care or doesn’t understand the struggles of millions of families and pensioners. The British people deserve better.

Jeremy Hunt needs to urgently bring in a proper windfall tax on oil and gas profits, and cancel April’s energy bill rise.

Anything less than real action from the Conservatives will be heartlessly condemning millions of people to more energy misery.

One in 20 waiting five minutes or more for 999 calls to be answered

• People calling 999 for an ambulance can now expect to spend an average of nearly 90 seconds on hold, an almost 15-fold increase since 2018

• One in 20 are waiting five minutes or longer for someone to pick up the phone in an emergency

• In some regions 999 callers are waiting 10 minutes or more to get through

One in 20 of those calling 999 for an ambulance in England are now waiting five minutes or more for their call to be answered, shocking new figures uncovered by the Liberal Democrats have revealed.

The average hold time for 999 ambulance calls in December was close to 90 seconds, a record high and an almost 15-fold increase since four years ago.

For the bottom five percent of calls, the average wait was 316 seconds or more than five minutes. This means some callers were waiting almost the same amount of time as the 7-minute target for ambulances to arrive at the scene for life-threatening Category 1 calls.

The research was commissioned by the Liberal Democrats from the House of Commons Library. It shows that every region in England has seen a staggering rise in delays to answer 999 ambulance calls in recent years.

In the South East Coast region, the worst hit part of the country, desperate 999 callers needing an ambulance are waiting an average of almost three minutes before getting through. One in twenty callers in the region are waiting on hold for a shocking 10 minutes, longer than the time ambulances are meant to respond to life-threatening emergencies.

After the South East Coast, the regions facing the worst average call response times were London (2 minutes 30 seconds), the South West (two minutes and six seconds) and Yorkshire (one minute 57 seconds). In London, one in twenty of those calling 999 for an ambulance waited 8 minutes and 43 seconds to get through.

The Liberal Democrats are calling for an urgent rescue plan to reduce pressure on ambulance services, including recruiting more GPs and fixing the crisis in social care. The party is also calling on the government to launch a recruitment drive of NHS 999 call handlers where they are needed, including encouraging retired and former staff to return.

As part of this the party is calling for measures to improve social care, free up hospital beds and stop ambulances waiting outside hospitals.

Wera Hobhouse, Liberal Democrat MP for Bath, commented:

It is devastating that some people are having to wait 10 minutes or more to get through to 999 in a medical emergency.

I cannot imagine the feelings of distressed parents and patients as they are panicking, just waiting for someone to pick up the phone.

We know that every precious minute lost in life-threatening situations can be critical. People need to know that in an emergency, 999 calls will be answered straight away and an ambulance sent as quickly as possible.

Every part of our emergency care system is suffering from years of neglect under this Conservative government. Ministers must urgently act to reduce these record delays that are causing harm to patients and huge stress to our hard-working paramedics and call handlers.