The leader of Staffordshire Moorlands District Council (SMDC) has said lives will be put at risk due to a decision to close the district's two ambulance stations on 3rd October.

SMDC leader Cllr Sybil Ralphs said: "While I appreciate there is increasing and unprecedented demand on the NHS and ambulance services across the board, I am concerned that the people of Leek and Staffordshire Moorlands will be failed by not receiving the service they deserve."

When the bases close, the nearest ambulance base will be a central hub in Stoke, around 12 miles away.

Cllr Ralphs said the average driving time, using blue lights, from the Stoke hub to Leek town centre is 20-25 minutes, and some rural areas require an additional 25-45 minutes due to their remote location.

These estimates, she said, assume favourable weather conditions, a vehicle ready to despatch and roads clear of congestion.

West Midlands Ambulance Service (WMAS) plans to close its remaining community ambulance stations (CAS) and move to central hubs, with three of these across Staffordshire – in Stoke, Stafford and Lichfield.

The Stoke hub will take over the role of the bases due to close in Leek and Biddulph.

The idea is to operate fewer ambulance stations across the region, and invest the savings from this into future service provision.

Bosses claim the new hubs are more capable in terms of preparing a vehicle than the smaller bases.

The move coincides with a reduction of rapid response vehicles (RRV).

A briefing report from WMAS explained there was a network of RRVs that worked from the community ambulance stations, but that these weren't necessarily suitably equipped.

It said: "A good example of this would be a stroke patient; an RRV would get there in under eight minutes but, if the patient was FAST positive, what they actually needed was an ambulance to take them to a hyper-acute stroke unit for immediate care – we aren't able to transport patients by car. Doing so can make a huge difference to the life of the patient going forward."

The target response time for a cardiac arrest and other life-threatening emergencies (category one) is eight minutes.

Cllr Ralphs said: "With a driving time of 20-25 minutes from the city this is well outside the target time and will be detrimental to patient survival."

There is a fear that ambulances are often being held up at Royal Stoke Hospital due to delays at the patient transfer stage, and this means they are unavailable when called upon.

Staffordshire Moorlands district councillors say this unfairly disadvantages people living in the area and they believe removing a dedicated station exacerbates existing problems.

WMAS figures show that almost 7,000 patients across the West Midlands waited more than an hour to be handed over in July.

The figure was 6,500 in August, and many of these had to be kept in the back of the ambulance for a number of hours.

WMAS communications director Murray MacGregor said: "Not only was this poor for patients it put an intolerable strain on our staff with many regularly finishing their shift late, often to the tune of three hours on top of a 12 hour shift.

"No other NHS staff face such situations."

This year, the trust operated under REAP 4 (the highest level of concern) for the first time in its history.

Cllr Ralph believes that if the ambulance stations stayed open and the ambulances remained in the Moorlands area, crews would be available to deal with emergencies locally.

A spokesperson for WMAS responded: "There are spare ambulances at the hubs, but not at CAS sites.

"So if the crew are delayed at hospital, which happens, it means the crew that are coming on to relieve them don't have an ambulance to use so we lose that crew for however long the delay is.

"It is not unheard for us to lose the CAS site ambulance for three hours every day, which cannot make sense. You don't lose that with ambulances based at the hubs.

"So by closing the CAS sites we are actually increasing the amount of ambulance time available to respond in the area."

Another concern is that ambulances allocated to the Moorlands are being dispatched to calls in other areas – potentially as far afield as Shropshire, Birmingham, Coventry or Warwickshire.

Cllr Ralphs said this leaves communities vulnerable and worsens response times.

She said: "The trust has also decided to remove all rapid response vehicles from rural communities, these vehicles were manned by paramedics who could be despatched to all emergency calls to provide rapid interventions and lifesaving treatments to vulnerable patients."

The trust said: "Crews literally go from one emergency to the next, 24 hours a day; they are no longer sat on a station anywhere in the region waiting for a call.

"Therefore, one of the questions we are duty bound to consider is whether it is appropriate for the trust to spend precious funds on buildings that are rarely used when these could instead be spent on additional staff and vehicles; the things that save lives?"

Cllr Ralphs said: "Whilst the majority of other ambulance trusts have invested in increasing their fleet of rapid response vehicles manned by advanced paramedics as well as continuing to maintain rural outposts, West Midlands Ambulance Service has instead removed all of these community services and are now intent on closing community ambulance stations which will leave these communities particularly vulnerable."

Meanwhile, Moorlands MP Karen Bradley said she also took part in a meeting with other Staffordshire MPs and Anthony Marsh, CEO of West Midlands Ambulance Service.

She said: "I know there is great concern about the review of ambulance services in the area by West Midlands Ambulance Service. I took part in a meeting with the CEO Anthony Marsh and impressed on him the need to retain a presence in the towns of Biddulph and Leek. We need to have the right services for the area, reflecting our topography and demographics. Ultimately the decisions will be made by WMAS but I will make sure that your strong views are heard by the leaders who are employed to make these decisions."