A government debate over hundreds of cancelled hospital operations will go ahead tonight in spite of the announcement of the General Election.

Ministers will face a grilling over the problems faced by East Sussex Hospitals NHS Trust which has been under immense pressure this year.

The Leader of the Commons, Peter Hain, said the Government would try to pass as many bills as possible before Parliament is dissolved on Monday.

Eastbourne Tory MP Nigel Waterson had secured the Parliamentary time after the recent disclosure of the scale of operation cancellations at Eastbourne District General Hospital and the Conquest Hospital in St Leonards.

After a surge in admissions over winter, an average of 97 per cent of beds were occupied in the hospitals, well above the nationally-recognised efficiency level of between 82 and 87 per cent.

Operations had to be cancelled, sometimes up to 150 a day, because there were no beds available.

The problem centred on the number of elderly patients waiting to be discharged but who are blocking hospital beds because social services money for nursing home places has not been arranged.

Health minister Rosie Winterton accused East Sussex County Council of making the crisis worse by deliberately keeping patients in hospital, a claim it has angrily denied.

Mr Waterson said that he would use the debate to challenge the minister's claim.

He said: "There is a fundamental underlying problem of underfunding for health and social services in our area. It's all interlinked - the funding doesn't reflect the high proportion of older people in East Sussex."

The council, primary care trusts and Surrey and Sussex Strategic Health Authority held an urgent meeting last month and agreed to release extra money to make places available for residential and nursing care and ease the problems at the hospitals.