CAMPAIGNERS who fought the closure of inpatient beds at Ashburton and Buckfastleigh Hospital have won a national award.

The Community Hospitals Association, an organisation recognised by the Department of Health, has decided the protest coordinated by the Ashburton and Buckfastleigh Hospital Action Group is worthy of its Innovations and Best Practice Awards 2013.

Last November the Torbay and Southern Devon Health and Care Trust claimed transferring the beds to Newton Abbot would benefit patients by providing up-to-date facilities at a central point.

But bosses also conceded they had to obtain value for money for the £2.4 million spent each year on paying for the privately financed but half empty facility which opened in 2009.