A GROUP of councillors will travel to Westminster next month in a bid to revive a town's campaign for a new hospital.

Town councillors from Malvern will meet Shadow Secretary of State for Health Andrew Lansley and ask him to support the case by putting pressure on the Government. Council chairman Michael Selby, Councillors Paul Tuthill, Ralph Madden and John Wilcox, together with clerk Richard Chapman, will meet Mr Lansley on Tuesday, March 6.

Coun Madden, a member of Malvern Hospital Project Board, said: "We want to get the timetable moving. We are going through a procedure that is taking a very long time. We have been trying to get a new hospital in Malvern for about 30 years.

"Every time we appear to get a situation where a hospital is approved for Malvern we get a reorganisation of health services in Worcestershire.

"As each year goes by the current hospital gets older. It has been there since 1911 and it does not have the space that new hospitals have. We are trying to get an allocation for Malvern out of the funding announced by the Prime Minster for replacing community hospitals. There is £750 million over five years.

"The primary care trust did try to make an application for that grant last year but it wasn't successful. But the new financial year starts in April."

Coun Madden said they hoped Mr Lansley would press the case for a new community hospital in Malvern with the Government and help to set up a meeting for them with Patricia Hewitt, Secretary of State for Health.

Mr Chapman said: "It is quite unusual they have needed to take this action.

"There is no hospital being built and the council has not received satisfactory answers to the questions it has been asking the PCT. The council is getting a bit impatient with the health service."