Calls to declare health emergency over NHS in Wales rejected
Leading a Tory debate on July 2, the shadow health secretary told the Senedd more than 100,000 people in Wales wait more than 12 hours in A&E each month.
Mr Evans said: 'While they wait, ambulances queue outside, unable to offload patients, tying up paramedics who should be on the road saving lives. The ambulance service has not hit its target for eight-minute response times for life-threatening calls for four years straight.'
He warned GP services are overwhelmed, NHS dentistry is collapsing and mental health services are also in crisis. 'If that's not an emergency, I do not know what is,' he said.
Mabon ap Gwynfor, Plaid Cymru's shadow health secretary, supported the Tory motion, pointing out that his party made calls to declare a health emergency in February 2024.
Describing Labour's record over the past 26 years as unacceptable, Mr ap Gwynfor accused ministers of changing targets on a whim and refusing to admit failure.
The Conservatives' Natasha Asghar criticised 'shameful' treatment times in Wales. She said: 'If anything, things continue to go from bad to worse under Labour's watch and, perhaps more worryingly, failure… to turn things around seems to end in promotion.
'Mark Drakeford, Vaughan Gething and Eluned Morgan all presided over the health brief, failed to deliver successful results and ended up being first minister.'
Jeremy Miles accused the opposition of only seeing the worst in the health service and indulging in their 'favourite sport' of political football, 'kicking the NHS from pillar to post.'
Hitting back at his opposite number, the health secretary said: 'I heard the Conservative health spokesman say… 'if that's not an emergency, I don't know what is'.
'Let me tell him what a health emergency is – it's covid, it's mpox, it's war, it's terrorism."
Senedd members voted 26-24 against the Tory motion before agreeing the Welsh Government's amended version by the same margin.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
BBC News
19 minutes ago
- BBC News
Higham campaigners hope 10-year NHS plan will save GP surgery
Campaigners fighting to save their local GP surgery believe the government's 10-year plan for the NHS will help them Medical Practice in north Kent has applied to close one of the four sites it operates from, in Higham, which it said is financially unsustainable.A campaign and petition have been launched to save practice said closing one surgery was the only way to safeguard its three other sites. On 2 July Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer launched a series of wide ranging reforms to the NHS, to be carried out over the next Angell, who started the petition to save Higham surgery, said: "It mentions communities and villages having direct access to care."I'm hopeful that means, whether the surgery does or does not close, there will be a replacement service." The application to close the surgery will now be considered by the NHS Kent and Medway Integrated Care Board (ICB).Ms Angell said she and fellow campaigners would be lobbying the board."I'm hopeful" she said, "the fight isn't over."I just hope the ICB give us the time we need to be able to express our concerns and take them on board."Highparks also runs surgeries in Cliffe Woods, Cliffe and Wainscott. 'Struggled with challenges' A spokesperson for Highparks Medical Practice said: "All four sites work together as a single practice serving over 15,000 patients, who can be seen at any location regardless of which site is nearest their home."Both this government and the previous one have prioritised general practice at scale. The latest plans focus on large health hubs like the Healthy Living Centres in Medway but do not address how to sustain small rural surgeries like ours."As a partnership, we have struggled with these challenges for years and are saddened by the need to close one site. Despite extensive discussions with the local Integrated Care Board and political representatives, no alternative has been found."Unless the government addresses rural primary care challenges, practices like ours will continue to face difficult decisions. This decision safeguards the future of the practice and the care of over 15,000 patients."
BBC News
19 minutes ago
- BBC News
Health secretary won't give timing for dental contract reform
The health secretary has refused to set out a timetable to fulfil one of Labour's main manifesto election promises on the part of the election campaign, the government had said it would reform the dental contract - the framework which pays NHS beginning talks with the British Dental Association (BDA) a year ago, Wes Streeting told the BBC during a visit to Bedfordshire that "unless I am 100% certain I can achieve the promise, I don't make it".Pam Widdison, from Norfolk, said she was in pain for months because she did not have an NHS dentist and was "sick of MPs promising the earth" then failing to deliver. The dental contract was recently highlighted by the Public Accounts Committee as one of the main reasons for the NHS dentistry access crisisSpeaking on a visit to a GP surgery in Leighton Buzzard, Streeting told the BBC he was "hesitant to make specific promises about dates and deadlines" unless he knew he could fulfil them."There's one thing that is in even shorter supply than dentists and money in this country and that's trust in politicians," he government's newly published 10-year health plan said by 2035 a new dental contract would be at the heart of a "transformed" NHS Streeting said in the short term it would concentrate efforts on creating urgent dental appointments for people without a dentist and rolling out tooth brushing in stressed that the NHS was the "standout" winner in the recent spending review, giving the health department "a bit of extra capacity".But he admitted the situation was "challenging" and said he was looking at existing budgets to see how he could release money that was being "wasted".To reduce what it called "bureaucracy", the government has decided to abolish NHS England. Forty-two integrated care boards across the country have also been told to reduce their running costs by 50% by the end of the year and thousands of support roles are going at NHS trusts including hospitals. Counties such as Norfolk have been labelled "dental deserts" because of the shortage of NHS Widdison, a retired teacher from Watton, said she was in pain for seven months. She managed to get an emergency appointment for a tooth extraction but had to travel 20 miles to King's Lynn and still did not have an NHS dentist. "It's a two-tier system in this country," she said. "I'm sick of MP's promising us the earth... why should we have to suffer? We've got an increased population where I live, there should be equality of care. "I do not want anyone to experience what I have been through."She said she believed dentistry was a "vital infrastructure" and could not understand why the NHS was paying for weight loss injections while her town did not have an NHS dentist. To improve access, the University of East Anglia (UEA) in Norwich has been lobbying for the first dental training school in the east of for medicine, Prof Philip Baker, admitted it would not solve everything overnight but would be "one contributor to really make a difference". The nearest dental school to Norwich is 100 miles away in London. The UEA had its course approved by the General Dental Council but needed the government to rubber-stamp its 10-year-plan said that newly-qualified dentists could be required to practice in the NHS for a minimum period of three Baker said the UEA would do all it could to convince trainees to stay in the NHS permanently."Our dental graduates will understand the needs of their communities, understand how important having an NHS dental service is to the region."I guess we really want to instil that pride and that loyalty to the community."Streeting said he "would consider the case very carefully." Follow East of England news on X, Instagram and Facebook: BBC Beds, Herts & Bucks, BBC Cambridgeshire, BBC Essex, BBC Norfolk, BBC Northamptonshire or BBC Suffolk.
Scotsman
28 minutes ago
- Scotsman
Almost £2bn spent on temporary nurses and midwives over five years
Scottish Labour said the figures are 'unsustainable' Sign up to our Politics newsletter Sign up Thank you for signing up! Did you know with a Digital Subscription to The Scotsman, you can get unlimited access to the website including our premium content, as well as benefiting from fewer ads, loyalty rewards and much more. Learn More Sorry, there seem to be some issues. Please try again later. Submitting... SNP ministers have been accused of 'failing Scotland's health service' after it emerged nearly £2 billion has been spent on agency and bank nurses and midwives over the past five years. Figures highlighted by Scottish Labour show a bill of £1,904,286,884.04 was racked up between April 2020 and March 2025. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad The spending was accumulated across all of Scotland's 14 health boards, as well as in specialist services including the Scottish Ambulance Service, NHS 24, the State Hospital and the National Waiting Times Centre. Staff on an NHS hospital ward | PA Despite improving on the previous year, the annual cost of agency and bank nurses in 2024/25 was still more than double the cost in 2018/19 and close to triple the cost in 2014/15, Scottish Labour said. The party's health spokeswoman Jackie Baillie said the figures are 'unsustainable'. She said: 'The SNP has spent almost two decades mismanaging our health service, opting for short-term fixes, rather than coming up with a solution to address long-term challenges. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'The use of temporary staff is an expensive sticking plaster and cannot be a substitute for a proper plan aimed at tackling the significant problems facing the NHS. 'This is an unsustainable way of managing our health service and ministers must listen to calls for a workforce plan to meet recruitment needs.' The total bill rose from £235,881,479 in the year ending March 31, 2021, to a height of £489,997,556 in the year to March 31, 2024, before falling in 2025, according to the analysis. Of the 14 Scottish health boards, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde - the largest in Scotland - spent the most, followed by NHS Lothian. But NHS 24 was the biggest spender of any individual service. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad Scottish Labour has repeatedly highlighted the level of spend on agency nurses and locum doctors, arguing it shows the NHS is 'haemorrhaging money because of the SNP's failure to recruit and retain frontline staff'. Ten-year plan The party has said it will ensure the NHS has a ten-year workforce plan that 'creates domestic medical and nursing training places, values nurses, doctors and all NHS staff, and meets the needs of future generations of patients'. The state of the health service is expected to be a key battleground in the run-up to the Holyrood election next year. A Scottish Government spokesperson said: 'NHS Scotland's overall workforce, including nursing and midwifery staffing, has increased over the last year, whilst the latest workforce statistics show a 62 per cent reduction in nurse agency usage and spend across 2024/25, decreasing for the second year in a row. Advertisement Hide Ad Advertisement Hide Ad 'These figures show the progress being made to reduce NHS Scotland's reliance on agency workers and focus resources on frontline services, which has enabled boards to re-invest upwards of £94 million in the delivery of those services most valued by the Scottish public.
