More than 1,000 people have signed a petition calling on the emergency services to scrap plans to remove an ambulance from their town.

Residents in and around Alston have set up a petition asking the North West Ambulance Service to not get rid of the Alston Moor ambulance later this year.

"We had our own ambulance - an agency out of the local garage - for years and years and years," said Alix Martin from the Save Alston Moors ambulance group.

"In 2012 the Care Quality Commission said it wasn't up to standard and that something else needed to happen.

"NWAS at that point were just going to remove our ambulance and give us first responders.

"The community objected to it so much that they came to a meeting in January 2014 and they said that we would have an all singing all dancing ambulance that would come with emergency medical technicians that they would pay for and do it all and it would be as good as anywhere else in the country.

"That never happened. 60 people applied to be the emergency medical technicians but NWAS never really put their money where their mouth was and never really followed through with everything.

"All the way through they've never really put their heart and soul into supporting what they promised us. Consequently its been impossible - we've never had the all singing and dancing ambulance service we were promised. Of the 60 people who applied, very few of them got contacted. Consequently we now only have six EMT's .

In response, the Ambulance Service said the decision had been made following a change to the skill levels needed to train EMT's.

“Due to national changes regarding the skill level and training required for emergency medical technicians (EMTs), NWAS has had no choice but to modify the operational model for the Alston area," said Head of Service for Cumbria and Lancashire at the NWAS, Gene Quinn.

“NWAS has recognised the commitment of the local community team, who currently provide the resource, but the reality is that they are not trained to a high enough standard to be able to maintain a reliable, safe operating model, which puts themselves, patients and NWAS at risk. In the past, the training was offered to the team but due to other commitments, they were unable to take this on."

"We know the area is challenging in terms of accessibility, which is why we have considered a range of options, taking into the account the suggestions from the community, and are working to put in place a safer and more sustainable service.