Update from Anthony Marsh - 26th June 2014

This is a week to remember for the Trust, as our very first student paramedics take to the road and begin to treat patients across our patch. When I joined EEAST one of the biggest issues we faced the very high number of paramedic vacancies, so this is a moment to celebrate as we continue to turn the Trust around ourselves through our joint determination and hard work. The appetite to join the organisation was huge and I am extremely pleased that we have recruited, trained and equipped this group in such a short space of time, with the second and third groups joining the frontline next month – this is thanks to the hard work of our recruitment and training teams who have really pulled out all the stops to make this happen. I wish all our new student paramedics the best for a safe, long and happy career with the ambulance service and I know I can rely on you all to support and welcome them to your area.

As I mentioned last week, I have set the goal of making significant improvements to our Red 1, Red 2 and A19 performance by September and I hope you have started doing what you can to meet this objective. I have been working closely with our commissioners around how and when we will be delivering a service that meets performance standards and our targets are to be meeting the 75% Red 1 and Red 2 standards regionally by October and the A19 standard by March. I have resolved many of the issues you told me about in January and a lot of the things I said I would do have been done:

• there are 147 new emergency ambulances on the road
• hundreds of student paramedics are being recruited
• stopped recruitment of ECAs
• secured extra funding from commissioners circa £16m
• removed short-term contracts, consultants, agency staff and secondments
• moved HQ to Melbourn to be closer to operations and supporting our staff.

I now need you to pick up the mantle. It is entirely within our gift to deliver a better service and that needs all of us. Our organisation is here to provide a response to patients in need and we all contribute to that, whether you work in IT, in finance, in the control room or on an ambulance etc.

I know it is going to take time to train the number of paramedics we need, but we must do everything possible now to give the best service to patients we can. The whole organisation need to be united and I ask you all to help in doing what you can to improve the Trust we work for.