AN MP has added his voice to protests against charging bedridden hospital patients for using the TV or telephone.

Stockton North MP Frank Cook said the move was an "absolute scandal" and he had "an inadequate vocabulary to describe what I feel about this move".

Patients will have to pay £3.20 a day to watch televisions installed at the end of each bed by private company Patientline after next month. They will also pay 50p a minute for incoming calls.

The University Hospital of North Tees is in Mr Cook's constituency and he said: "It is isn't fair on the hard-pressed people of this area to pay simply to watch television while they are in a hospital bed.

"I wonder if the hospital executives will have to pay to watch the television or to use their reserved car parking spaces."

A spokesman for North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Trust said the move was part of the Government's NHS plan to offer bedside TV and telephone services by the end of next year.

He said the move would allow nurses more time, as they would no longer have to relay telephone messages to patients. TV rooms would remain free and children would not have to pay for the new service.

In addition, anyone who was in hospital for more than two weeks would only have to pay £1.60 a day.