The ambulance service which covers Watford has been set a lower target to reach life-threatening calls.

The East of England Ambulance Service previously had to reach 75 per cent of top-level emergency calls within eight minutes – this has now been lowered to 68.5 per cent.

However Kevin Brown, of the East of England Ambulance Service, said this did not mean patients would wait longer.

“In fact they are waiting less time than they had previously,” he said.

“We’ve got 7,500 square miles and trying to get to every single patient in that ‘Red One’ situation is very challenging.

“We focus on getting to our patients more quickly, more often than we have.”

The revised target was announced just a day before it was revealed that overcrowded hospitals had been forced to turn away nearly 500 ambulances over the course of the winter - double the number from each of the last three winters.