Powys county councillors will be asked to join the fight to save hospital beds in the county.

At a county council meeting on 8 October, councillors will be asked to back a five-point motion that stresses the need to improve and not cut health services.

This is a response to Powys Teaching Health Board (PTHB) consultation into options that could see beds cut in the future.

The motion is being put before councillors by the council’s anti-poverty champion and long-time healthcare campaigner Cllr Joy Jones who will ask councillors to “note with grave concern the proposals” being brought forward by PTHB.

Cllr Jones said: “Powys does not have too many hospital beds; Powys has too many people travelling too far to access healthcare.

“At a time when the county is already facing significant healthcare challenges, the answer cannot be fewer beds, fewer local services and greater reliance on services that do not yet exist.

“The people of Powys deserve investment, not downgrading. Access, not distance, certainty, not risk.”

“Powys residents are tired of travelling further, waiting longer and seeing essential services moved away from their communities.

“They are tired of seeing financial pressures placed ahead of patient care and of being asked to accept less than communities elsewhere in Wales.

“This council therefore sends a clear message: protect our community hospitals, protect our hospitals and hospital beds, and stop the continued erosion of healthcare services in Powys.

“Powys residents must not be treated as second-class citizens.”

The motion will ask councillors to: “Formally oppose any reduction in community hospital beds within Powys, closure, downgrading, reduction or loss of service at any Powys community hospital or concentration of inpatient care into only two or three locations across the county.”

The PTHB Better Together consultation is expected to run until 10 January.