A PETITION demanding REDDITCH get a GP-led urgent care centre is off to a flying start, says the town's MP.

The Advertiser revealed that the Member of Parliament for Redditch Rachel Maclean launched the Parliamentary Petition at the end of February, urging the promised GP-led urgent care centre to be delivered at the town's Alexandra Hospital as soon as possible.

The MP says that a care centre was promised to Redditch as part of the heavily criticised consultation into acute services in Worcestershire which concluded last year.

The consultation involved a shake-up of health services across Worcestershire, with areas like obstetrics, gynaecology, paediatrics and acute surgery transferring from Redditch to Worcester in an attempt to save Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust millions.

Mrs Maclean said: “I am delighted at the response so far.

"Constituents have really taken this on board and the paper petitions have started coming into the office already. There’s still plenty of time though as we’ve now set the deadline at April 13 to give residents the Easter holiday to organise their return to me.”

She added that some constituents have asked why the petition cannot be signed on-line.

This is because it has been set up as a Parliamentary Petition that will be presented to Parliament personally by the MP.

One of the stipulations is that all signatures must be on plain paper and must be original signatures and not photocopies or electronic.

And as it is a petition raised by the residents of Redditch County to be presented by their Member of Parliament, all signatories must be from the constituency to be valid.

A Freepost address has been set up so people can submit their petition forms free of postage. Simply place them in an envelope, write on the front the words ‘Freepost RACHEL MACLEAN MP’ and then put into any post box and they will be returned to her constituency office.

No stamp is required and no other wording is needed on the envelope.

Mrs Maclean added: “I wanted to ensure it was as easy as possible for residents to be able to return the petition forms to me, so hopefully this will be a great help to constituents.”