Conflict over hospital plans.

A CAMPAIGN has been launched by a North East Parliamentary candidate to reverse the decision to build a new emergency care hospital.

Last month, bosses at NHS North of Tyne gave the go-ahead to a pounds 200m investment plan which will dramatically shake up the way health services are provided in Tyneside and Northumberland.

In the new hospital plans, all emergency cases will be treated at a specialist emergency care centre in Cramlington, instead of the nearby general hospitals.

A further pounds 125m will be spent improving Wansbeck and North Tyneside hospitals, while community hospitals in Berwick and Haltwhistle will be rebuilt.

However, Ron Beadle, Liberal Democrat Parliamentary spokesman for Newcastle North, has launched a campaign with other Liberal Democrats to reverse the decision.

He said it could see thousands of residents living in Gosforth, Kingston Park, Hazlerigg, Brunswick and Dinnington taken to Cramlington in an emergency. "It is quite wrong that gravely-ill patients should, in an emergency, be rushed to Cramlington instead of their nearest hospital," he said.

A spokesman for NHS North of Tyne said: "This facility is being developed primarily for the population of Northumberland and North Tyneside.

"In some parts of west Northumberland, some said they preferred to receive emergency care at Newcastle and we have said we will do what we can to facilitate this."