MORE than a quarter of patients admitted to A&E at the Great Western Hospital wait longer than four hours to be seen.

New figures from NHS England revealed 73 per cent of people admitted to the department at Swindon's hospital in December were seen within that timeframe.

That number is below the national average of 79.8 per cent – which in itself is a new record low. The NHS target is 95 per cent.

A spokeswoman for the GWH Trust said: “We do all we can to ensure patients can begin treatment as soon as possible and the majority of patients are admitted, transferred or discharged within the four-hour target.

“We see patients in order of clinical need and, while this means some people have to wait longer than we would like, it does allow our teams to care for the most sick patients, many of who will have a life-threatening illness or injury.”

South Swindon MP Robert Buckland added: “I visited the GWH A&E department once again just before Christmas and know how busy and under pressure it is.

“These statistics emphasise the urgency of the Conservative government’s £30m investment to double the size of our A&E department.

“My cabinet colleague, the health secretary Matt Hancock, visited Swindon to support my general election campaign, and I am working closely with him to ensure that planning work continues to happen at pace and this essential expansion becomes a reality very soon.

“Nationally, the Conservative government is carrying out its plans to add £33.9bn to the NHS budget over the course of this parliament.”

Despite Mr Buckland’s optimism, his Labour opponent Sarah Church believes the Tory government has had enough time to sort the problem.

She said: “This number seems to be getting worse and worse.

“The Conservatives have had nine-and-a-half years in power so there is really no excuse for having failed to invest to address increasing demand before now.

“This has all been predictable and if their investment plans for the NHS had been competent and coherent we would not be in this position now.

“I’m looking forward to seeing some real investment and not just empty election promises. We’ll see.”

NHS England has also released information about how well the trust has performed in the week between December 30 and January 5.

General and acute wards at the Great Western Hospital were 96.9 per cent full on average, which was significantly above the 85 per cent rate the British Medical Association suggests should not be exceeded.

On average, the trust had 582 beds available to use on each day, with only 18 of those being free.

When norovirus, also called the winter vomiting bug, was at its peak at GWH last week, 35 beds were closed.

The previous week, the disease closed up to 40 beds.