Plaid Cymru's health spokesperson Mabon Ap Gwynfor set out his party's policies for the NHS
The NHS was born in Wales. But on its 75th year, our precious health system, the greatest socio-political achievement of the post-war era, is in a state of existential crisis. As waiting lists soar, hardworking but undervalued staff are stretched to breaking point and patients are let down by prolonged treatment delays, without radical surgery the NHS we know and love will not survive another 75 years.
It is undeniable that fourteen years of Tory-driven austerity has had a devastating impact on public health in our society, which has exacerbated what were already serious pressures on health services. It has also entrenched deep rooted health inequalities that costs the Welsh NHS approximately £322m each year.
Part of the remedy for the NHS’ malaise therefore must include consigning the dogma of austerity to the dustbin of history. And yet Keir Starmer’s Labour Party, once the party of Nye Bevan, has fully embraced a Tory fiscal framework that virtually guarantees swingeing public spending cuts for years to come. The impact on Wales could be as much as £935m. Labour’s agenda for government is also predicated on enthusiastically opening the door for private companies to profit from our NHS. A changed party indeed.
But Westminster’s neglect of Welsh priorities extends far beyond the here and now. The clear case for replacing the outdated Barnett funding model that leaves Wales shortchanged year-on-year has consistently fallen on deaf years amongst both major parties. This is despite the fact that we have a population that is aging faster than the rest of the UK, and higher rates of long-term sickness.
A 20th century sticking plaster solution has therefore been the basis of our funding arrangements from Westminster for over four decades – in which time we have experienced the ravages of the pandemic and the depredations of austerity.
That is why Plaid Cymru have made the fight for economic fairness for Wales a central pillar of our election campaign. Without a fair funding deal that fully reflects the needs of our population, we cannot hope to place the NHS on sustainable foundations, appropriately equipped to deal with the challenges of the 21st century.
While Westminster’s failings deserve to be called out, the Welsh Labour Government’s record on health also makes for sorry reading. Approximately 1 in 5 of the entire Welsh population are currently stuck on waiting lists. Treatment targets for conditions such as cancer, vascular diseases and orthopaedics have slipped so frequently as to be virtually meaningless. Dysfunction at the managerial level of health boards, exemplified by the ongoing issues at Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board, has been allowed to fester for many years.
The approach of Welsh Labour to healthcare has been a combination of panic and denial.
They have thrown ever increasing portions of the Welsh budget towards frontline services, without any major improvements in standards – as resources for vital and cost-effective preventative programmes have withered on the vine.
Their failure to get to grips with deep-rooted retention issues in the workforce has generated eye-watering bills on agency staff, while their negotiations with striking nurses and junior doctors have been characterised by unhelpful belligerence and opaqueness.
Most damningly of all, the fact that Labour’s election pledges for Wales include a commitment to ‘reduce NHS waiting times’, despite health having been devolved to the Welsh Labour Government for a quarter of a century, typifies both their innate complacency towards Welsh voters and their pathological aversion to taking responsibility.
Wales deserves better – and as such our priorities for health will always put the needs of its people first.
Plaid Cymru firmly believes that the NHS is nothing without its legions of dedicated and diligent staff. That is why we are committed to delivering full pay restoration across the workforce – reversing a decade and a half of eroded wages.
We will also heal the broken bonds of community healthcare by creating 500 new GPs, underpinned by the restoration of general practice funding to its historic level of 8.7% of the Welsh budget. We will also build on the groundwork we have already laid in delivering a National Care Service for Wales, that fully integrates the health and social care sectors. This will be instrumental in tackling perennial issues around delayed transfers of care and ‘bed-blocking’. As a first step in aligning the respective workforces, we will uplift the real living wage by £1 for social care workers in Wales.
The need for robust and transparent mechanisms of accountability at the heart of the relationship between the public and the NHS has never been greater. We are therefore calling for full and independent inquiries into the Covid pandemic in Wales and into maternity services at Swansea Bay Health Board.
Boosting public trust in the health service also entails giving patients the confidence that they can access urgent treatment in a timely and efficient manner. We will therefore create a new ‘cancer contract’ for Wales, to ensure that more cancers are caught and treated earlier.
It is abundantly clear that money is only part of the solution when it comes to delivering an NHS that is fit for the future. Welsh Labour’s reckless profligacy on healthcare is a cautionary tale in this respect.
We will therefore undertake a comprehensive review of governance arrangements across Wales’ health boards, with the aim of spearheading overdue culture change at executive level and reforming the escalation framework to ensure that health boards are not taken out of special measures for political reasons.
Most importantly of all, we will always protect the NHS as a public institution that is free at the point of need, and oppose the spectre of privatisation at all times.
In this UK General Election, voters are crying out for a party that unashamedly champions the NHS in all its glory. In Wales, Plaid Cymru is that party.
Mabon Ap Gwynfor is the Member of the Senedd for Dwyfor Meirionnydd. He is Plaid Cymru’s health spokesperson.
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