COUNCILLORS and residents in Chepstow are hitting out against plans to change the opening hours of town's minor injuries unit.

The unit at Chepstow Hospital has previously been open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

But following changes made to a number of units in Gwent by Aneurin Bevan Health Board, the Chepstow service is now only open between 9am and 6pm Monday to Friday and 9am to 1pm on a Saturday. It is not open at all on a Sunday.

The health board said very few people attended the units during the evening or night and that in some cases there is a heavy reliance on agency staff.

But councillors have now voiced their concerns about the effect of the changes, with Councillor Jacqui Sullivan claiming they are 'not practical'.

Cllr Sullivan said she had been contacted by a large number of residents who were turning up at the unit to find it closed because they had not been told about the new opening times.

She said: "It makes absolutely no sense for this important service to be completely closed from lunch time on a Saturday when most minor accidents in the home happen over a weekend."

She added it as not practical to expect residents to travel to Newport's Royal Gwent or Abergavenny's Nevill Hall Hospital.

Fellow Chepstow councillor Armand Watts said he had appealed to the health board to look again at the decision.

He said: "If you look at the times of the day when people are going to interact with one another - sport on a Saturday afternoon, five-a-side football in the evenings - these are the times when this facility will no longer be available. Yet again Chepstow is losing a service."