The idea that the military SAR will allow themselves to enter into the NHS market and allocate a large proportion of their budget to serving the needs of the NHS is totally wrong, this can be seen from the Scottish experience , where in the past the SAR service was much as it is today in the rest of the UK,but once the Scottish Ambulance service got a proper EMS service provided by a combination of Fixed and rotary wing aircraft back in the early ninety's (instead of the previous Loganair Positioning Service which had existed )then things rapidly changed . The miltary commanders became aware that they were only used for out of hours work, island transfers and other expensive non essential operations that were outside the restricted operating hours of the Scottish Air Ambulance Service. This came to a head very quickly and the Air Force and Navy refused to fly outer island patients beyond the Oban or Fort William hospitals, which was the nearest hospital . Once their, they demanded that the Scottish ambulance service took back responsibility and either transferred the patient by road or waited until the next day when the air ambulance would be back on 8-5 duty
The old charge rate to the SAS of 1200 pounds per hour was abolished and all tranfers were charged at full rate of nearly 5000 pounds per hour.
Dont be decieved for one moment into beleiving that the Military officials in Whitehall will pick up the tab for ambulance service failings
And remember the main reason that most of the ambulance services want a helicopter is that without it they cannot possibly meet the ORCON (Call out)requirements to which they are bound and as a final thought, there is only one person making money fron the Yorkshire ambulance helicopter and that is the company who lease the aircraft to them and provide pilots and maintenance, where is their charity? ( Police/ Medical Aviation Services )