NHS Oxfordshire’s board has criticised a body set up to secure services at The Horton Hospital, in Banbury.

The Better Healthcare Programme drew up a paper looking at the best way to keep paediatric and maternity services at the hospital.

But NHS Oxfordshire board member Bryan Thompson said people’s hopes had been raised without establishing whether proposals to provide consultant-led services at the hospital for children and pregnant women were affordable.

At a meeting today, he said: “This paper is a disappointment to me. After one-and-a-half years, there's not one figure on it.”