PLANS to centralise services such maternity and emergency surgery at Worcestershire Royal Hospital have been branded “utter madness” by a pressure group.

Yesterday the Care Quality Commission released a critical report from an announced inspection at the Royal and Redditch’s Alexandra Hospital in March, highlighting a number of issues such as staffing shortfalls, risks around children’s safety and record keeping.

Following the report campaign group Save the Alex – which believes the will – released a statement saying it believed the CQC’s findings proved the long-delayed project reorganising hospital care in the county should not go ahead.

“It would be all too easy to blame front line staff when the failings are clearly that there just aren't enough front line staff employed in the two county emergency departments,” it said.

“The hospitals are badly run by management and the Worcester Royal site is just not big enough.”

The statement continued it was “utter madness” that the revamp project was still being considered in light of the CQC report.

“This will place an “impossible burden” on Worcester at the Worcestershire Royal site,” it said.

“The centralisation project in Worcestershire has failed and must not be allowed to continue.

“The Worcestershire Royal Hospital was never designed to be the hub hospital for the county.”

The project, which has been in progress since 2012 and was originally planned to be fully completed by the end of 2014, took a major step forward last week when a long-awaited report by the West Midlands Clinical Senate was published, approving many elements of the plan but requiring others, such as the organisation of emergency services, to be reworked.

Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs the three sites, has said it remains committed to the project and it is hoped a public consultation will be launched later this year.

Newly-appointed emergency department consultant Dr Gary Ward is to lead a working group putting together the detail of how emergency services will be delivered in the county and the trust has also confirmed the second stage of the Keogh Review into the failings at Mid Staffordshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, due to be published in the near future, will be taken into account in this stage of the review.

But other groups have been less confident, with the Worcestershire Local Medical Committee, a group representing the interests of GPs, saying it was concerned the proposals would “fatally weaken” the Alex.