TRADE unionists have won a three-year campaign against centralising NHS laboratory services in north-west England to prepare them for potential privatisation.

But they said that £6 million in taxpayers’ cash had been squandered on business consultants who drew up the plan.

Four NHS trusts in Lancashire and South Cumbria — Blackpool Teaching Hospitals, East Lancashire Teaching Hospitals, Lancashire Teaching Hospitals and University Hospitals Morecambe Bay — were considering plans to centralise their laboratory services into a single “hub.”

The single laboratory would serve an area covering 500,000 people.

Unite opposed the plan, saying the lab would be remote from GPs and hospitals, would cause delays in analysing patients’ samples, and that half the staff would leave.

Individual workers lodged objections to being transferred and Unite also warned that centralisation was a means to prepare the service for privatisation.

The trusts have now put the plan on hold.

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Thanks to our members’ dedication, this senseless plan has been seen off. 

“Unite will always defend our NHS services and campaign against the prospect of them being snapped up by the private sector.

“It is shameful that this process has allowed consultants to walk off with £6 million of the public’s money at a time when the NHS is stretched to breaking point. 

“The people who were in charge must be held accountable for this flagrant waste of time and money.”

Unite regional officer Keith Hutson said: “Unite was proud to have spearheaded this campaign which involved in taking on four NHS trusts.”