LAST year the North West Ambulance Service was praised by the Government’s health watchdog, as the body upgraded the organisation’s rating from “Requires improvement” to “Good”.

According to their report, published in November 2018, the Care Quality Commission (CQC) recognised improvements made by NWAS, but did note that the organisation was, on occasion, failing to meet national targets.

In respect to emergency response times, inspectors found that “The service responded to incidents that may be immediately life threatening and should receive an emergency response within eight minutes in 75 per cent of cases.”

However they added: “The service performance did not meet national targets at times, although we did see an improving picture in some areas.”

At the time Michael Forrest, interim chief executive at NWAS, said: “There’s still a lot of work to do to achieve our aim of becoming the best ambulance service in the country, but this rating assures us, and the people we serve in the North West, that we’re heading in the right direction.”