HOSPITAL bosses have insisted Burnley’s £31million maternity unit will be delivered on time and on budget.

Campaigners have voiced fears that a planned land-sale combined with the credit crunch would leave East Lancashire patients waiting for the flagship centre.

Last month, top brass at East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs the Burnley General and Royal Blackburn hospitals, admitted they would have to sell older parts of the Burnley site and Rossendale Hospital for housing to fund the unit.

But now they have moved to allay fears that the housing slump will make it difficult to open the centre by 2010 for £31million.

Director of estates and facilities Chris Hodgson said: “A proportion of the capital received from the sale of all of the Rossendale Hospital site as well as the Burnley General Hospital partial land sale will go towards the women’s and children’s unit which will be located on the Burnley General Hospital site.

“The current underlying economic downturn will have no detrimental effect on the building of the new unit, as contingency plans have been made, if necessary, to ensure that the unit is completed in 2010.

“This new facility will be for women across East Lancashire, who need consultant-led care and have a higher risk pregnancy.”

However, the pledge was viewed sceptically by Burnley Council leader Gordon Birtwistle who opposes the sale of the hospital land for housing.