Dorset County Hospital has confirmed it is in negotiations about renting a warehouse in Poundbury to store medical records.

The plan was confirmed at a meeting of hospital governors after patient governor Derek Julian raised concerns about the move.

Mr Julian was a strong objector over the hospital’s decision to sell the old fire station site it owned in Bridport Road last year and said that space could have been used for the storing of records.

He said: “It was an appalling decision to sell that site and the board should be ashamed.

“We should not need to be paying rent to a third party when we had a space available.”

Dorset County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust director of finance and resourced Bill Boa said: “The Trust is currently in the middle of negotiations with a landlord to rent space to store medical records that are currently stored either in the hospital or at a number of other remote locations.”

Mr Boa added that renting was the best option as hard copies of medical records may well be replaced by electronic back-ups in a few years’ time.