keep The South Western Ambulance Service National Health Service Trust (Establishment) Order 2006
Establishes the South Western Ambulance Service NHS Trust as a statutory body under the NHS and Community Care Act 1990. Sets governance structure (6 non-executive and 5 executive directors), defines functions as providing ambulance/transport services and community health services, with operational date 1 July 2006 and accounting date 31 March.
This Order simply establishes an NHS trust to provide essential emergency ambulance services. Unlike regulatory instruments that restrict competition or impose compliance burdens, this merely creates a legal entity to deliver time-critical medical services. Deleting it would leave no formal body responsible for emergency ambulance provision in the South West, causing potential life-threatening gaps in emergency coverage. While the ideological preference is for market competition in healthcare, emergency ambulance services have natural monopoly characteristics and genuine public good aspects where market failure would be severe. The governance structure here is also lightweight administrative setup rather than regulatory burden.