A SCHEME to get patients to ring and book into A&E has seen Crewe Town Council field a request from a former Cheshire East Council deputy leader who believes "walk-ins" at Leighton Hospital are now under threat.

National newspaper reports suggest an appointment system, where people ring the NHS 111 service before arriving at an emergency department, could be in place across the country before December.

Patients will not be turned away if they don't, but health bosses, who revealed the plans at a recent NHS England board meeting, hope the system will reduce lengthy waiting times.

It has been described as a "profound change" by Lord Prior of Brampton, chairman of NHS England, and Brian Silvester says the scheme will be disastrous for Leighton Hospital, where attendance at A&E fell sharply in April after the lockdown was imposed.

Numbers attending dropped by almost a third (compared to March) to 4,343 and although figures have risen to 6,262 in June they are still below average.

Mr Silvester wrote to Crewe Town Council asking them to back his campaign to safeguard services at Leighton.

He says the NHS has failed to consult on the major A&E change and added: "What this means is that by the end of the year residents of Crewe and Nantwich will be banned from walking into the A&E at Leighton Hospital. Around 65 per cent of those who access A&E are walk-in patients."

Crewe Town Council says it needs time to consider Mr Silvester's request - which was made at its full council meeting last Tuesday - and Town Mayor Cllr Ben Minshall added: "My own understanding of the situation is that this is not a ban, but an alternative method of waiting.

"It allows patients to wait at home rather than go straight to A&E following advice from the 111 service."

The "call before you walk" system is currently being piloted in hospitals in London, Portsmouth and Cornwall, although when it was first mooted two years ago NHS bosses said they would not back it and urged people without life-threatening injuries to seek treatment at out-of-hours GP services.

Cllr Silvester, who serves on Minshull Vernon Parish Council, has struck a controversial note during the pandemic using his large Twitter following to promote the view the lockdown has been an overreaction to the Covid-19 crisis.

The former Conservative councillor has transferred his allegiances in recent years, standing in local elections last year as a candidate for the right-wing For Britain Movement and this year as an independent in the Crewe South by-election. He has now registered his own party, Putting Crewe First, with the Electoral Commission.

He added: "It's true that a small minority of thoughtless people abuse the A&E facility, but the vast majority who don't shouldn't be punished. Wherever you look, NHS services are being eroded. We are experiencing the gradual privatisation of the NHS under the false cover of COVID."

He submitted a Freedom of Information Request to the Mid-Cheshire Hospitals Trust, which runs Leighton Hospital, and was told in reply that "no formal discussions" had taken place at the trust "regarding the closure of Leighton Hospital's A&E to walk-ins".

A spokesman for Mid-Cheshire Hospitals Trust told Nub News: "It would be wholly inaccurate to suggest any patient will be turned away from the emergency department if they attend and need care."