Taxis may be used as ambulances in strikes

Ministers consider block-booking cars to ferry paramedics responding to 999 calls

TAXIS could be used as makeshift ambulances during strikes by paramedics, under plans being considered by ministers.

The Government is looking at proposals on “block-booking” taxis to take patients who have called 999 to hospital when ambulance workers strike on Dec 21 and 28 over calls for a pay rise.

Soldiers have already been drafted in to drive ambulances but Will Quince, a health minister, said further plans to limit disruption could include offering taxi rides to hospital for lower risk patients – known as category 3 and 4 – which often include the elderly who have suffered a fall.

Speaking to MPS, Mr Quince said it was “likely” that the most urgent calls – categories 1 and 2 – would be responded to with an ambulance.

He said: “We are looking at ways we can provide additional support for category 3 and category 4 including things like block-booking taxis and support through community healthcare and local authority fall services.”

Mr Quince raised the proposal as talks last night between Steve Barclay , the Health Secretary, and the Royal College of Nursing over their separate strike ended with no progress, meaning their industrial action on Thursday will almost certainly go ahead.

A source close to Mr Barclay said he refused to move on pay, pointing out that any further pay increase would mean taking money away from frontline services and reducing the 7.1million elective backlog.

Downing Street said soldiers driving ambulances would be unable to jump red lights during next week’s strike, prompting concerns people with serious conditions will be delayed getting to hospital. Armed Forces personnel working during the strikes could be rewarded with a Christmas bonus, a minister suggested.

The Daily Telegraph can also reveal that nurses, teachers and train drivers could be banned from striking unless half of all members of their union vote for the move, under a proposal being considered by Grant Shapps, the Business Secretary. Last night officials were still working on the details of the plan to ferry patients to and from hospitals in taxis.

Potential problems include the difficulty of booking a large number of taxis when many families will want to book them to travel home for Christmas.

Adrian Boyle, president of the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, criticised the plan saying: “Ambulance staff perform an important role in deciding who not to convey to hospital.

“Using taxis for lower category calls will increase demand on an already pressurised emergency care system. The ambulance and nursing industrial action will be very disruptive.”

The Government’s move will evoke memories of the former health secretary Kenneth Clarke who in 1990 said that the majority of ambulance staff had no extended paramedical training.

He said at the time: “They are professional drivers; a worthwhile job but not an exceptional one.” His comment was interpreted as a suggestion that ambulance drivers were no more than “glorified taxi drivers”.

All patients who ring 999 are categorised by risk. A category 3 patient, which is defined as “an urgent problem, such as an uncomplicated diabetic issue, which requires treatment and transport to an acute setting”, would normally be taken to hospital within two hours.

A category 4 patient, defined as having “a non-urgent problem, such as stable clinical cases, which requires transportation to a hospital ward or clinic”, would normally be taken there in three hours.

While it is not known how blockbooked taxis would be deployed during the strike action, they have been used for category 3 calls where a patient requires urgent transport to hospital.

Freedom of Information requests revealed that across Britain between April 2021 and January 2022, there were more than 24,000 journeys where a taxi was sent following a 999 or 111 call. Calls are usually triaged via phone by 999 call handlers and a taxi can then be booked to convey patients to hospital. One taxi

postage date for second class mail, the earliest it has ever been in the service’s history. Union sources last week warned Christmas cards may not arrive until February because of backlogs worsened by strikes.

It comes after thousands of Royal Mail staff gathered for a rally in central London last week to protest against pay and conditions in what they claimed was the biggest postal workers’ demonstration in living memory.

Dave Ward general secretary of the CWU has claimed the “unachievable” conditions proposed, which includes starting work three hours later than usual would “destroy the future of Royal Mail”.

Royal Mail is trying to overhaul the 500-year-old business into a parcels-led company to try and compete against rivals such as Amazon.

They say it is losing £1million a day, making the status quo untenable.

The postal strikes come amid a winter of strike action in the UK, including walkouts planned by nurses, ambulance staff, rail workers, Border Force and National Highways officers.

A DPD spokesman said: “We are experiencing delays in certain depots as a result of the industrial action at the Royal Mail, which has had a huge knock-on effect. The problems are not across our entire network but can mean localised delays of 24 to 48 hours.”