AMBULANCES have been banned from going under height-restricted bridges because radio antennas make them too tall.

The East of England Ambulance Service introduced the policy preventing their drivers taking ambulances under low bridges in the county after vital radio antennas, on top of the vehicles, became damaged.

The new policy has been heavily criticised by the TaxPayers’ Alliance. A spokesman said: “It is crazy to have built ambulances that don’t fit under bridges that are really quite common. Not only is this damage creating a bill for taxpayers, the delays caused by ambulances forced to take the scenic route are risking lives.

“It’s one of those things that suggests there wasn’t enough thought given to the problem in the first place. When you’re dealing with life-saving services, that just isn’t good enough.”

The decision was defended by the ambulance trust, where a spokesman explained: “In December 2008, a trust-wide policy was introduced barring ambulances from going under low or height-restricted bridges.

“The policy is in place to avoid damage to the radio antennae that allow ambulance crews to carry out vital communication with the health and emergency operations centre as well as partner clinicians.”

She added: “Staff in our control rooms have state-of- -the-art technology allowing them to quickly plan ambulance journeys, avoiding bridges that may pose a problem.

“Ambulances and their on-board communication systems and other equipment have been designed with safe patient care as our top priority.

“We believe they work very effectively for the good of patients, and at present we have no plans to change them.”