First soldiers on the streets to drive ambulances and run testing centres

Soldiers will today start driving ambulances in Scotland to ease the pressure on the buckling emergency service.

The Ministry of Defence is providing 114 troops to carry out non-emergency driving work and a further 111 to help run mobile Covid testing centres.

Around two-thirds of the Army staff will work around Glasgow with most of the rest in Edinburgh. Troops will provide support to the Scottish Ambulance Service for an initial two months.

Liaison officers and military planners will also be placed in the service’s regional hubs. Further drivers will also be provided by the fire service, the British Red Cross and taxi firms.

Military support was announced following a request from the Scottish Government and comes after warnings from health professionals and opposition politicians of a crisis within the ambulance service, with reports of patients facing lengthy waits for help.

A number of harrowing reports emerged of patients waiting hours, sometimes days, for an ambulance.

MSPS heard last week how dad Gerard Brown, 65, died at home in Glasgow, 40 hours after his family called 999.

And the trade union Unite revealed how one crew arrived at a hospital with a patient at 3.50pm and didn’t manage to hand them over until 1.20am the following morning – a wait of nineand-a-half hours.

Col Anthony Phillips, deputy joint military commander in Scotland, said: “This group of individuals, from 68 Squadron from 7 Regiment Royal Logistics Corps, have been doing this task in the east of England and north-east of England already. So there’s a good degree of experience of this pandemic in amongst this bunch now going to support the Scottish Ambulance Service.”

The MOD added personnel from 2 Scots, The Royal Highland Fusiliers, would also be among those carrying out the work.

Health Secretary Humza Yousaf said: “I expect the package of actions, supported by £20m in additional investment I announced at parliament on Tuesday, to have an important impact in improving response times for patients.”

Pauline Howie, chief executive of the Scottish Ambulance Service, said: “As lockdown restrictions eased, we’ve seen demand start to rise. In the latest wave, unfortunately more of our staff have contracted Covid-19 again so we’ve lost some internal capability and that’s been the case across all health and social care staff.”