Lib Dems welcome figures which reveal best-ever response times for Islington's ambulances

12.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Mon 10th May 2004

Bridget Fox has congratulated improved response times by London ambulances

Bridget Fox has welcomed new figures released by the London Ambulance Service which show that Islington ambulances are getting to serious calls quicker than ever before. Ambulances in Islington well exceeded the Government target of reaching 75 per cent of seriously ill and injured patients within eight minutes, despite a 12 per cent rise in the number of incidents responded to. In 2003/4 ambulances in Islington were reaching 83% of serious patients within eight minutes, up from 76% in 2002/3.

There had been unsubstantiated claims that traffic calming was affecting ambulance response times. However, the recent GLA scrutiny into road humps concluded "The evidence is overwhelming in terms of the success of humps in reducing death and serious injury: humps save lives and that any borough removing humps must replace them with an equal or better alternative."

Lib Dem Bridget Fox, Executive Member for Sustainability, said: "This is a great achievement by the ambulance service and they deserve our thanks for all their hard work. It's good news that ambulances in Islington are among the quickest in London.

"Ambulances in Islington are now answering calls faster than ever before, which should reassure people concerned that traffic calming might be slowing them down. Road deaths in Islington are also falling thanks to our traffic calming schemes. Nobody loves speed humps but they do save lives.

"We will continue to work with the emergency services to make Islington a safer place to live."

The Facts

1) Islington Council and the London Ambulance Service are both members of the Islington Strategic Partnership; the Partnership has adopted the national target to reduce the number of people killed or seriously injured in Great Britain in road accidents by 40%, and the number of children killed or seriously injured by 50% by 2010 compared with the average for 1994-1998.

2) Bridget Fox chairs Islington's Transport Liaison Group which brings together transport operators, the emergency services and transport planners on a regular basis.