Workington MP Sue Hayman has met with senior Government health bosses. 

Mrs Hayman met with Ben Gummer, hospitals minister, on Tuesday and Department of Health officials to discuss the plight of the West Cumberland Hospital in Whitehaven and Carlisle's Cumberland Infirmary.

Four years ago, a a takeover deal for the two hospitals was announced. 

It still shows no signs of being concluded.

The hospitals are in special measures and have major staffing shortages and huge debts.

A possible £64 million overspend is predicted this year, with bosses blaming the high cost of agency staff.

Mrs Hayman, who attended the meeting with Copeland's Jamie Reed and Carlisle's John Stevenson, said the Government was committed to tackling the deep-rooted problems in the local health system.

Health service problems across north Cumbria are currently being explored by the NHS's Success Regime.

Mrs Hayman said: "Mr Gummer is absolutely determined that we need to start making progress now.

"He said he understood the problems facing north and West Cumbria and maybe we need to start looking at delivering services differently to ensure we have the services we need.

"I think they now accept that we have some really key problems that need addressing.

"They seem to understand the importance of maintaining the West Cumberland Hospital."

The transfer of some services from Whitehaven to Carlisle in recent years, and questions over the future of maternity services in West Cumbria, have led to a campaign to save the newly-redeveloped West Cumberland Hospital.

Mrs Hayman said: "Department of Health bosses understand the need to maintain as many services at West Cumberland Hospital as they possibly can.

"To do that they need to improve the resilience and the quality of those services.

"Jamie and I both pressed them on the fact that, in the case of maternity, local women want to have their babies locally.

"I think the recent floods have helped our argument by highlighting the travel problems and poor road and public transport links."

Improving recruitment and staff retention, Mrs Hayman said, would be the key to the success of the whole project.

She added: "The strategy looks great on paper but they'll keep coming up against a brick wall of recruitment if they don't sort that out."

North Cumbria University Hospitals NHS Trust this week announced the appointment of 10 new consultants, addressing some of the 55 full-time-equivalent vacancies that existed in September.

Mrs Hayman said: "Hopefully that shows that some of the new ways they're using to get people to come and work with us are starting to work."

The MPs held a meeting with the health bosses in the summer.

Mrs Hayman said: "When we met in July they were talking about quick wins and getting some things in place in six months. We were a little cynical.

"I think they now realise there are some real problems in Cumbria with delivering the health services and we are not looking at quick wins. We're looking at long term strategy that is going to build the kind of services we want for the long term."