Angela Burns: Just very quickly, do you have the evidence that says that Welsh students are being turned away from being able to train in Welsh medical schools because they’re already full with other people? If you have that evidence, I’d like to hear it.
Angela Burns: Would you take an intervention?
Angela Burns: Thank you. I would just like to make the point that much of my speech has been predicated on the discussions that I’ve had with GPs and with the Royal College of Physicians and with the British Medical Association. So, we are listening to what they have to say. Many of these ideas are their ideas and we would like the Welsh Government to listen to what they say.
Angela Burns: Thank you.
Angela Burns: [Inaudible.]
Angela Burns: Minister, I’d like to understand what your ambition is for the health of the people of Wales. Fifty-one per cent of our population at present are battling with some form of illness. I would like to understand where you would like to see that position by the year 2021. Reading through your ‘Taking Wales Forward’ document, I’ve noticed again that you major on the fact that you’d like...
Angela Burns: Well, Cabinet Secretary, I am pleased that the Welsh Conservative debate of last week has had such a galvanising effect on you, because this statement does actually pretty much cover most of the requirements that we put forward, or suggestions, for what we might do to improve GP recruitment in Wales. I do, however, have a couple of questions to ask you. Let me make it clear that I really...
Angela Burns: 5. Will the Minister outline the Welsh Government’s plans for the financing of local government during the fifth Assembly? OAQ(5)0026(FLG)
Angela Burns: Thank you for that. I did listen to your answer to Gareth Bennett that you set the priorities and local government are charged with implementing them as they see fit in their local area. However, Minister, I would like to understand what ability you have to influence the fair deployment of funding throughout a local authority. One of the cinderella services ends up being enforcement. Local...
Angela Burns: First Minister, I also share the admiration mentioned here for the jobs that our health and social care professionals undertake throughout the country. The multidisciplinary approach provided to patients by doctors working closely with such professionals has proven to be very effective, particularly in the health boards where they have a director of therapy and health sciences on their...
Angela Burns: First Minister, winter pressures haunt us every year: we have these kinds of conversations and it’s always the same groups of people—the elderly, the young and the chronically ill. However, in Pembrokeshire, the community resource teams, which are a joint collaboration between the health board and local government, have been incredibly effective in working together to ensure that people...
Angela Burns: Minister, thank you for this statement. I’m very pleased to welcome both elements of it on behalf of the Welsh Conservatives. I do have a couple of questions to ask, though, and I’d like to turn in the first instance to the new treatment fund that you speak of here. You have said previously that the new treatment fund has been developed from Welsh Government experiences of managing...
Angela Burns: Not yet. Probably shortly, but not quite yet. I’m really pleased by the way you’ve set this up. We’ve had a number of conversations, with Rhun, with Caroline, between us. I’m really pleased with the collaborative manner in which you’ve approached this. I’m really pleased that we’ve been involved. But above all, I’m really pleased about two things. One is the absolute...
Angela Burns: I certainly am. My final comment to him was that I will, certainly—and it may be something other Assembly Members may wish to bear in mind—be furnishing him with a number of case studies, because I think that will be another way of getting the patient voice to be heard loud and clear.
Angela Burns: I’m very pleased to hear this debate being brought forward today by Plaid Cymru because it very much follows on from many of the debates we’ve had—it follows on from our debate last week about workforce planning. We have such a crisis in our workforce planning throughout all strata that I think that this adds to it. We will be supporting this motion. I did think about adding an...
Angela Burns: Yes, and I thought you made some really good points in your contribution, which I think could be easily wound into the inquiry. I have to say that I stop slightly short at the notion of paying a wage to all trainee nurses, because, then, do we pay a wage to trainee doctors and dentists and vets? I think we have to look at what we can do to support people in an equitable and fair way. And, we...
Angela Burns: Will you take an intervention?
Angela Burns: I just wanted to briefly intervene, because you’ve made this comment—David has, I think probably Rhun has, and I’m quite sure the Minister will—but, to be frank, we all buy into devolution, do we not? So, if a devolved nation, i.e. England, chooses to get rid of bursaries, who cares? That’s what they want to do. I don’t agree with that, but I don’t quite get this fact that we...
Angela Burns: [Continues.]—in such as detail as you do there, it would be an absolute waste of our time.
Angela Burns: This has certainly been a curate’s egg of a debate, and I do think that the Welsh Conservatives have managed to snaffle all the good parts, because I do think that most of the other contributions were pretty thin, particularly the Welsh Government, who only managed to find one backbencher to defend their programme. Leader of the house, I understand that the May election result must have...
