The chairman of a community council has stepped into the fight to save one of the Rapid Response Vehicles (RRV) from being removed in the county.

George Edwards, of Llangattock-vibon-avel Community Council has written to Jason Killens, CEO of the Welsh Ambulance Trust to “protest in the strongest possible terms”.

The decision by the Welsh Ambulance Trust to remove one of the RRV from the Monmouth station has provoked outrage within the community of Monmouth and surrounding area.

Writing on behalf of residents, he demanded this decision be reversed saying: “There can be few families living in Monmouth and the surrounding rural area who have not had one of their members’ lives saved by the prompt arrival of emergency medical care, be this the unexpected arrival of a child, an accident at work or an elderly relative taking a turn for the worse.”

With the full support of the other members of the council, he pointed out in the letter that the existing presence of the rapid response vehicles enables patients to receive urgent medical care and their situation to be stabilised while waiting for an actual ambulance to be available, which can sometimes be several hours adding “it may also be that once initial care has been given by a rapid response vehicle, that an ambulance will not be required, so is free to be deployed elsewhere.

“Given the size of Monmouthshire, our rural road network, and distance in time and miles from any fully equipped hospital, it is not feasible that having fewer vehicles, located further away, will even maintain, let alone improve response times and vehicle availability” he said.

A fellow councillor, Graham Edmunds also pointed out that as their council is in the NE corner of Monmouthshire and that it takes 15 minutes from Monmouth, their nearest station, “the rapid response time will be the time to Monmouth plus that and the journey to The Grange must be over 30 minutes, even on a blue light.

“So the ‘golden hour’ will be more than used up in transport time, even before time for medical treatment on site is factored in” he added.