“The thing to remember is that if the air ambulance moves from Caernarfon, the entirety of the Llŷn Peninsula, Meirionnydd, and other areas will be outside of the 20 minute reach time for the air ambulance.”

Those words, from Liz Saville Roberts, the MP for Dwyfor Meirionnydd and spoken at a public meeting in Pwllheli’s Glan y Môr school on Friday evening, sum up the fears of many residents livening across the region if the proposed reorganisation of Welsh Air Ambulance Service goes ahead as planned.

At present, Wales has four air ambulance bases — in Welshpool, Caernarfon, Llanelli and Cardiff — but the proposed plans would see the bases in Welshpool and Caernarfon closed, with the helicopters moving to Rhuddlan in Denbighshire. 

The meeting, organised by local MS Mabon ap Gwynfor and the MP, was the latest in a series to voice concerns over a reorganisation plan proposed by the restructuring. Others have been held across mid Wales in recent weeks.

Some of those who attended a meeting on the future of the Welsh Air Ambulance Service in Pwllheli on Friday evening

Alongside the MP and MS were Powys county councillor Elwyn Vaughan, Tom Brooks from the community health council, as well as deputy mayor of Pwllheli Cllr Michael Parry, who began the meeting reading a speech made by Andy O’Regan, a prominent member of the campaign against the reorganisation.

Mrs Saville-Roberts said: “We can’t forget the needs of our own communities. Mabon and I have heard heartbreaking stories of how hard it is to get an ambulance to our rural communities. We have heard of patients who have had to wait hours.

“We’re completely supportive of the staff, it’s the service we don’t have. 

“We suffer from a weak ambulance service here. For us who are let down by the ambulance service, who are now seeing the air ambulance move further away from us — it is important for us to remember that it is us who are losing this service. The fact we live in rural areas doesn’t mean we should be deprived of the right to have services in our area. If we don’t make a statement we will lose this service.” 

Mr ap Gwynfor said: “We are all friends of the air ambulance charity. Over the years, all rural communities in Dwyfor and Meirionnydd have raised thousands towards it. We all know someone who’s made use of the air ambulance. We all want to see the air ambulance developing the best policy to provide the best service which responds to all communities.”­ 

“We know they want to save more lives, and that’s what justifies this change, but I question whether this will be overall, for all rural communities across the Llŷn Peninsula, Dwyfor and Meirionnydd. I’m sure if it is moved to the north-east it will reach more lives, there are more people living there. On paper I’m sure they will feel like they save more lives. But in these areas, the national air ambulance can reach them, the air ambulance in Lancashire can reach them too. We need the air ambulance here now more than ever. 

“ What is clear to me is that there is no consistency in the information I have had. The data used – how many people need the service,how many people have used it, how many will use it, and when people use it – this data is not complete, if not potentially wrong. I say this because the software they used to create this data was programmed for the needs of people in cities, and not for people in rural communities. So it stands to reason that the data won’t represent our needs in rural areas.”