HEALTH chiefs have come under fire after announcing that more than 40 beds closed last year on a "temporary" basis will shut for good next week.

The 17 and 24 bed wards at Rossendale and Pendle hospitals, shut last year to halt a staffing crisis, will be classed as permanently closed from April 1.

They will be in addition to 16 beds already shut at Queen's Hospital, Blackburn, and 10 at Burnley General Hospital.

The Rossendale and Pendle closures, for patients needing rehabilitation after treatment, come despite NHS bosses insisting last year that the beds would return.

East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust chief executive Jo Cubbon said last June that there would be "a temporary reduction in the number of rehabilitation beds" to fill empty nursing posts throughout Burnley, Pendle and Rossendale.

Coun Alan Davies, leader of Pendle Council, said today: "It is a deplorable way to do things. It is no great surprise considering the way that the local health authority has been treating people."

David Hancock, Labour leader on Rossendale Council and a founding member of a pressure group formed last month to press for better services at the hospital, said: "This could have been done better and I think people would have felt more comfortable if the Trust said the beds were going to close in the first place. People would have known where they were."

The closures are the first of a massive 267-bed reduction programme set to roll out across all the Trust's hospitals by next April, with 417 beds going by 2009.

The remainder of the initial 267 beds will hit wards at Queen's Park and Burnley General.

Trust chief operating officer Dena Marshall said: "Originally a decision was made to close these beds on temporary basis. However we have done a great deal of work subsequent to this decision to improve our efficiency, particularly by reducing the average length of a patient's stay in hospital."

She went on: "While we appreciate that the public have real concerns about any bed reductions we are confident that, with the changes we are putting in place, this decision will not have a negative impact on patient care."

The other permanent closures are nine rehabilitation and seven obstetric beds at Queen's Park and 10 general surgery beds at Burnley General.

The trust launched a 16-week consultation this week on the future of all its services.

This promised a "new build for Rossendale, probably on the existing site", perhaps with the return of maternity services.

And it said Pendle should play a "vital role in the future" of the trust.

Rossendale and Darwen MP Janet Anderson said: "I am confident the outcome of the consultation will mean a better service for the people of Rossendale."