JUST 86 per cent of patients arriving at A&E in Colchester were treated or admitted within four hours last month, new NHS figures have revealed.

NHS England figures show last month was the worst on record for emergency departments across England, where on average just 83.6 per cent of patients were seen within the target timeframe.

The Government target for the average amount of people to be seen within four hours is 95 per cent, which has not been reached across the country since July 2015.

Alison Power, director of operations at Colchester Hospital, said: “Keeping our promises to patients and achieving all the national access standards, including seeing and admitting or discharging 95 per cent of all patients attending the Emergency Department within four hours, at our hospital is very important to us.

“We have worked very closely with all our clinical teams and system partners to make sure that we can see and treat people as quickly as possible both within our Emergency Department and Urgent Treatment Centre.

“We have developed very detailed winter plans to cope with the anticipated increase in the number of patients coming to see us in the winter months.”

Martin Goss, the Lib Dem parliamentary candidate for Colchester, labelled the figures “shameful”.

He said: “For the past four years the Tories have utterly failed to invest properly in our health service, leaving local hospitals underfunded, overstretched and understaffed.

“The Liberal Democrats will stop Brexit and build a brighter future.

“We will invest an extra £35 billion in our NHS through a penny on income tax and develop a national recruitment strategy to ensure we never again suffer shortages of nurses, doctors and other health professionals.”

Conservative candidate Will Quince said if re-elected he would “continue working to ensure the hospital had the resources it needs”.

“I recently helped secure £69m in capital funding for Colchester and Ipswich hospitals, the result of which being a new re-designed and improved A&E and Urgent Treatment Centre at Colchester hospital,” he said.

“Part of the issue with A&E is the pressure on the system placed by inconsistent primary care provision. People shouldn’t have to wait weeks to see their GP.

“That’s why the Prime Minister is recruiting an extra 6,000 doctors and 6,000 nurses, physios and pharmacists. With the extra support, GPs will be able to free up an extra 50 million appointments. Every year.

“This comes on top of the £33.9 billion extra the Government is giving to the NHS. Helping to fund better hospitals and better technology.

Tina McKay, Labour’s candidate for Colchester, said Colchester had been badly affected by NHS waiting time problems.

“NHS workers are desperate for the resources necessary to meet these waiting times targets, swingeing cuts have meant they haven’t been reached since 2015,” she said.

“Labour have a fully costed £40bn plan to rescue our NHS and remove profiteer privatisation. We built our health service and we will save it. Health care must remain free at the point of use for each according to their need.”