A LONG-awaited independent report into an extensive review of hospital services will not be released until after May’s General Election, it has been revealed.

The project, which will rearrange which services are delivered at Redditch's Alexandra Hospital, has been in progress since 2012 and was originally planned to be fully complete by the end of last year.

But the revamp, which also affects the county’s other acute hospitals, Worcestershire Royal and Kidderminster Hospital, has been plagued by delays including the announcement last year that the West Midlands Clinical Senate was to examine the plans and put together an independent report.

Although it was previously planned this report would be presented in February, in a letter to Redditch Borough Council chief executive Kevin Dicks dated Thursday, March 19 the clinical senate’s chairman Dr David Hegarty confirmed it would now not be released until after the pre-election purdah period.

In the letter Dr Hegarty said he and his colleagues considered it would be “inappropriate” to publish the report while purdah was in place.

“The purpose of the report is to offer independent advice to the Future of Acute Hospital Services in Worcestershire Programme Board on the developing proposals for future service models,” he wrote.

“Any final proposals that the Programme Board chooses to make will be subject to public consultation.

“We recognise that this unavoidable delay may be disappointing.

“We look forward to the Future of Acute Hospital Services in Worcestershire Programme Board publishing the findings of the review once the purdah period, for both the local and national elections, has ended."

Purdah is the period immediately before an election during which civil servants and politicians are restricted from making long-term decisions which may be reversed by the following government.

Although the pre-General Election purdah period does not begin until Monday, March 30, notice of local election in Redditch and Bromsgrove was posted on Monday, March 16, meaning the period in the district began this month.

Neal Stote, from the Save the Alex campaign, has written to Dr Hagerty questioning the use of purdah as an excuse and has requested that conclusions into the clinical model known as modified option 1 (recommended by the independent clinical review panel in January 2014) be made public.

Mr Stote said: “The sustainability of services are increasingly being brought into question, a further delay is not only disappointing but could be critical to the future service retention at the Alexandra Hospital. "For faceless bureaucrats in the offices of NHS England to block publication of this report can only mean one thing, that West Midlands Clinical Senate have concluded modified option 1 does not work.

"In which case the option for another provider or providers to take over and run hospitals in Worcestershire is back on the table, an option which should never been ruled out in the first place.”

The project is intended to allow Worcestershire Acute Hospitals Trust to continue to offer the best quality care to as many patients as possible in the face of increased lifespans, falling budgets and increased demand.

The modified version of option 1 involves the creation of a networked emergency centre at the Alex Hospital, the centralisation of maternity services at Worcestershire Royal Hospital and paediatric inpatients would be centralised in Worcester but a day-time consultant-led paediatric assessment unit at the Alex would accept referrals from GPs and other professionals.

Option 2, the one preferred by campaigners and local MPS, would have seen another provider, one consideration being University Hospitals Birmingham, take over services at the Alex Hospital.

Last year it was announced a public consultation into the plans, previously slated for September 2014, would also not be held until after the General Election.