REDDITCH MP Rachel Maclean has said "disappointed is an understatement" after finding out the town's Alex Hospital will not benefit from Boris Johnson's £850 million spending pledge.

The Prime Minister will make the commitment as part of his £1.8 billion cash injection for the health service.

Redditch MP Rachel Maclean, who has pushed for services to be returned to the embattled hospital, said: "In the time I had I did all I could to ensure the Alex was on the list of hospital upgrades."

She added: “Although we didn’t get the outcome we wanted, the Prime Minister has also announced a £1 billion boost to NHS capital spending, allowing existing upgrade programmes to proceed and tackling the most urgent infrastructure projects.

“I’ve already had conversations with the Chancellor, Sajid Javid, about this and how our hospitals can access this money, as well as making the case once again for services to be returned to the Alex. I look forward to working with my constituency neighbour on this.

“What we need to see now is the acute trust submitting its final business case for the rest of the £29million it was promised before I was elected.

“I’ve lobbied hard and the trust has received almost half of this funding, but the trust now needs to get on and submit its final business case for the rest of this cash.

“I’ll be writing to the acute trust to find out when this business case will be submitted. As we’ve seen with previous business cases, once submitted the Department for Health & Social Care has approved the Trust’s bids within a matter of weeks.

“I will continue to work with the Government & local health bosses to ensure my constituents get the first-class healthcare services they deserve.”

On Prime Minister Johnson’s first full day in office Mrs Maclean used her first question to the new PM to press him on the Alexandra Hospital.

Mrs Maclean asked him to add the Alex and Worcestershire Royal Hospital to his list of 20 hospitals to upgrade.