HEALTH chiefs have insisted they are cutting the millions of pounds spent on private ambulances to answer 999 calls.

South Central Ambulance Service said it has cut its use of private firms and is using cash saved to take on more in-house staff.

The authority was spending £38,000 a week in 2008, but the figure soared to £194,000 last year.

It said 8,532 out of 119,664 emergency calls in Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire were dealt with by private ambulances from April 2010 to March 2011 – about seven per cent.

But a recent check showed this has now been cut to 1,347 – under three per cent – out of a total of 50,924 calls from April to August in Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire.

Service spokesman James Keating-Wilkes said: “Rel-iance on private providers is reducing dramatically.”

The service took on an extra 150 staff last year and is taking on the same number this year, he said.

A partnership with Oxford Brookes University was bringing in new recruits.

And fewer ambulances are being sent out because medically trained call handlers have been recruited to screen out calls that do not need a 999 response, he said.

He stressed private firms provided the same quality of care as the NHS, with most staffed by former NHS paramedics.

Mr Keating-Wilkes said: “We have stringent and rigid control arrangements in place.”

The ambulance service has struggled with a rise in demand and used private firms to meet Government targets.

County health watchdog boss Dr Peter Skolar said this had improved “dismal” response times, particularly in rural areas, but he branded the use of private firms to achieve this “a waste of money.”

The service is now hitting a key target, to reach 75 per cent of the most serious calls in eight minutes.

The Oxford Mail revealed in February that the service had only been meeting the target in 30 per cent of call outs in some rural areas like Bampton and Burford.