SAM ROWLANDS, Member of the Welsh Parliament for North Wales, demands long term plan to fix the persistent issues in the NHS in North Wales.
Mr Rowlands, Shadow Health Minister, was speaking in the Senedd during a discussion on the new special measures framework at Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board.
He said: “For far too long, people in North Wales have been badly served by this Welsh Government, in particular in its oversight of the Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board, which for context, has been completely unacceptable, and we see it day in, day out in the casework that myself and colleagues receive in our inbox.
“Imagine the exasperation by constituents of mine and others in this room when instead of weeks like this and in recent weeks, instead of straining every sinew to fix those long-running issues, we have this chaos of backstabbing and in-fighting of the Labour Party here in the Senedd, seemingly having a complete lack of regard for the suffering that people in North Wales are facing.
“Whilst it is welcome to see a framework in place, I certainly share my colleagues’ concerns that it seems as though there’s an expected standard of conditions in North Wales that is much further below that for other people here in Wales, and I think that is frankly unacceptable.
“I’m not convinced it’s going to serve our residents in the best possible way—we also need to see a sustainable long-term plan to get Betsi out of the mess that it continues to be in. This includes writing and implementing a workforce plan to boost those staffing numbers, in addition to spending every penny available to it through the Barnett consequential on health services.”
Mr Rowlands asked the Health Minister, Eluned Morgan, for a date when BCUHB would be taken out of special measures now that the framework was in place and did this framework guarantee that it would not be plunged back into special measures.
The Minister said the over-all decision to come out of special measures would be up to the NHS and civil servants giving her advice, in general, on whether they were in the right place and they were confident they would not go backwards.
Mr Rowlands added: “I remain unconvinced that the Labour Welsh Government have a plan to fix the longstanding issues in the NHS in North Wales.
“We need a sustainable long-term plan to get Betsi out of the mess it is in and we can start by boosting staffing numbers and spending the full Barnett allocation for health on the Welsh NHS, which Labour still does not.”
