NEARLY a year since NHS bosses stripped Hartlepool Hospital of critical care services and transferred them to North Tees Hospital a UKIP candidate has launched a fresh campaign to revive its fortunes.

Phillip Broughton, who will fight the Hartlepool seat for UKIP in May, has started a campaign on Facebook to call for acute services, including an accident and emergency department, to be returned to the University Hospital of Hartlepool.

He claims that “virtually everybody I speak to” is concerned about the downgrading of the hospital.

Mr Broughton also doubts whether the long awaited new Wynyard Hospital planned by the North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust will ever get the go-ahead from the Government.

Instead, Mr Broughton said NHS bosses should make the most of the existing hospital in Hartlepool.

“More and more houses are being built in the area and there is also the issue of immigration,” said Mr Broughton.

“Every local hospital should have basic services and A&E is one of them. The extra 20 minutes it takes to get to North Tees could mean the difference between life and death. “

The UKIP candidate urged people to join his campaign at Facebook.com/savehartlepoolhospital

Last October the North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust centralised critical care on the University Hospital of North Tees site.

It followed warnings from senior doctors within the trust that it was becoming increasingly difficult to sustain intensive care on both sites.

As a result 100 additional emergency medical beds were opened at the University Hospital of North Tees .

The trust has said that a new hospital at Wynyard, supported by much more care closer to or in people’s homes and a network of community facilities to support this, is still the right way to meet people’s needs.