THE Tories have thrown the election race in Bexley into uproar, after promising a Conservative government would keep Queen Mary’s Sidcup, as an acute hospital.

Old Bexley and Sidcup constituency Conservative candidate, James Brokenshire says local Tories have extracted the promise after talks with the shadow health secretary Andrew Lansley about the future of the hospital and the planned A Picture of Health (APOH) changes.

But the announcement has angered Mr Brokenshire’s opponents.

Mr Brokenshire says a Tory government would immediately freeze plans to strip the Sidcup hospital of its A&E department in September.

It would also freeze APOH proposals to transfer Queen Mary’s maternity and paediatric in-patient services.

Mr Brokenshire says if GPs and local people want to see Queen Mary’s keep all of its emergency services, there would be no forced closures.

But Labour candidate for Old Bexley and Sidcup, Rick Everitt reacted with scepticism to the promise.

He said: “The Tories have had many months to make commitments about the future of Queen Mary’s, so why have they waited until a week before polling day to say this, and what precisely does it mean?”

Mr Everitt added: “It is not a water-tight guarantee and it appears to conflict with advice from the Royal College of Surgeons about the size of catchment area required to provide the full range of A&E services.”

Liberal Democrat Duncan Borrowman said: “James Brokenshire and Bexley Conservatives seem desperate to say anything about Queen Mary's to cheat people out of their votes.

“A leaflet distributed by them this week claimed they were the only party to campaign to save services, which is an outright lie.

“Now they insult the intelligence of local residents by suggesting that overnight George Osborn will find the money to completely overhaul the funding structure of the NHS.”

John Hemming-Clark, standing on a platform of Independents to Save Queen Mary's Hospital added: “It's all well and good for the Tories to say they will halt the closures at Queen Mary's if they win, the problem is they probably won't win.

“Furthermore, those of us with memories of the last time the Tories were in power, will recall they closed the A&E at Orpington Hospital against the wishes of the local people.”

But in a joint statement Mr Brokenshire and the Conservative candidates for Bexleyheath and Crayford, Erith and Thamesmead and three other nearby constituencies in Eltham, Bromley and Orpington, said: “In our view, the impact of such changes (APOH) would undermine the viability of the hospital and lead to its closure and disposal, to shore up local NHS finances.”

They added: “We believe that the hospital can have a viable and positive future serving local residents in this area.

“That’s why we need to put an immediate stop to further changes at the hospital which will reduce facilities, and go back to the public and local GPs on the services that should be provided from Queen Mary’s.”

South London Healthcare NHS Trust which runs Queen Mary’s, declined to comment.