HEALTH bosses must publish figures showing how often Blackburn's A and E is overwhelmed, the chairman of Blackburn's Health Scrutiny Committee said.

Patients were treated in ambulances outside the Royal Blackburn Hospital on Monday evening as emer-gency beds filled up, leaving patients arriving by ambulance with nowhere to go.

A spokesman for the hospital told the Lancashire Telegraph that they could not say how frequently crises like these occurred, but said there were measures in place to ensure the best patient care in busy times.

But health committee chairman Roy Davies said the figures needed to be published and analysed urgently, and called for investigations to ensure Blackburn could cope with a major incident.

He said: "There was nothing in particular happening on Monday night.

"It just happened that they were very busy and that meant that they couldn't cope - so what would that mean if, God forbid, we had a terrorist attack or something?

"We now have all the ambulances coming to Blackburn, and that situation needs to be monitored to make sure all the patients really are safe.

"And it becomes even more important that we have highly-skilled paramedics in ambulances with the very best equipment they can afford.

"I'm sure the hospitals work out how many beds they need and have a line somewhere for how many beds and staff they have, but if that line needs to be in a different place, we need to know.

"We want information, good or bad, warts and all.

"Once we have that information, we can know what to do about it, whether that means changes in the ambulance service, the hospital, or both."

Lynda Walker, accident and emergency manager, said there had been unusually high demand on Monday evening, but said the hospital and ambulance service worked hard together throughout the problems to ensure that all patients were treated and sent to speciality beds as quickly as possible.