Angela Burns: Oh dear, oh dear, Llywydd, I think I rest my case. Rhun ap Iorwerth made a very good point about the fact that these kinds of bodies are the ones that often are the first to lose their funding when times are tight, and, basically, the Minister's reason for not wanting to ensure that—. No, Rhun ap Iorwerth said that. The Minister's main case for not wanting to make sure that there's enough...
Angela Burns: Excellent point, Helen Mary, and well made. We need to ensure that this body can do what it's supposed to do. We do not want it to be hamstrung by a lack of funding. We do not want it, in the years to come, to suffer a slow death by a thousand cuts. It's here to represent the citizen. It is their one and only true voice that belongs to them. You need to fund it, Minister, and you need to make...
Angela Burns: Formally, Llywydd.
Angela Burns: Merely to say that the Welsh Conservatives support this amendment.
Angela Burns: Diolch, Llywydd. I'd like to formally move amendments 40, 19 and 20. This comes to the nub, to the heart, of the citizen voice body. If you talk to the citizen, they want a voice body, they want a representative body that's local to them, understands their local issues, understands their local health board, somebody they can access easily—and, of course, it's not just health boards now,...
Angela Burns: Thank you very much, Presiding Officer. Let me just deal with this by picking out little bits of it. I want to put to bed the 'hosted by Powys' argument, because I think, actually, that's disingenuous; smoke and mirrors, if you like. Powys doesn't have any hospitals—[Interruption.] I haven't finished my sentence, Kirsty Williams, I know that you like to defend Powys at all accounts, I was...
Angela Burns: I did not say, at any point during my contributions, that they should not be independent of Powys. I do not think it is a primary reason for making these changes to the citizen voice body. My personal view is that a lot of the changes to the citizen voice body could be construed—in fact, I do construe it—as a bit of a muzzling exercise: let's get them on board. I want to make sure that...
Angela Burns: Formally, Llywydd.
Angela Burns: Thank you, Llywydd. I'd like to formally move amendments 41 and 42, tabled in my name. This issue was first raised, or amendment 42 was first raised, at Stage 2 by Plaid Cymru spokesperson Helen Mary Jones with my full support. It's in line with committee recommendation 13 at Stage 1. During our evidence sessions, it became very apparent that the body should be able to make representations to...
Angela Burns: Thank you very much indeed. There is a bit of an issue here, really, isn't there? I didn't just sort of sit down and knock out these amendments in the dark one night; I actually had a lawyer team who worked on it. So when you stand there and say, as you have done a couple of times throughout this, 'This isn't written very well, this isn't in the right terminology, this says this, that or the...
Angela Burns: Yes, but you don't have to put their name, their address, their rank and serial number. So I think you are being a tad disingenuous here. And that's what the guidance can lay out. And this is taking legal advice; all opposition parties work with teams of lawyers—it isn't just the Government that has these guys who know what they're talking about. So that's my first observation on this. My...
Angela Burns: Formally, Llywydd.
Angela Burns: Formally, Llywydd.
Angela Burns: Thank you, Llywydd. I'd like to formally move the amendments 43 and 47, tabled in my name. Amendment 43, Minister, is a probing amendment and it relates to requiring NHS bodies and local authorities to work together where a complaint is raised, which relates to both of them, and amendment 47 is consequential to amendment 43. Now, these amendments are based on evidence submitted by the...
Angela Burns: You have disappointed me, because we did talk about anticipatory amendments, and because I am worried that it will get kicked into the long grass, or it'll be allowed to drag on and on. I've been an Assembly Member for 10 years and one of the first cases I ever had to deal with was of a young man who had been run over by a car and was paralysed from his neck down, and he had healthcare...
Angela Burns: Welsh Conservatives will be supporting this amendment.
Angela Burns: As the Minister said, my amendment 45 relates to the right of entry or access to premises via the citizen voice body, and, again, it's based on the committee's recommendation 12 at Stage 1. It's also in line with the views of the current board of CHCs, who do not wish entry to premises to be consigned to a code of practice. We would reject the Minister's amendment 3 on the basis that a duty...
Angela Burns: We also need to remember that, for example, Social Care Wales recommended the Welsh Government revisit their decision, explaining that the power of access fills the gaps of provider capture and situational capture, i.e., it's tilted in favour of the provider. And this is what is encountered during inspection powers. The older people's commissioner said that this function could be flexible,...
Angela Burns: I'd like to move amendment 46, tabled in my name, and I will be opposing the Government amendment 4 in order to get to my amendment, because it's an amendment that's intended to ensure there's a duty to co-operate between NHS bodies, local authorities and the citizen voice body under recommendation 17 of the committee Stage 1 report. This has been brought forward from Stage 2, as we agree...
Angela Burns: Diolch. Amendment 44, the duty to provide information, advice and training to volunteers, is my only amendment in this group. It's because, during our evidence session with community health councils, it was quite clear that community health councils currently undertake training with their members, as do their equivalents in England, namely Healthwatch, and we want this to continue. You might...
