Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Well, thanks. Listen, we've put in stretching targets; I'm confident that we are going to meet the target in many areas of specialisms and obviously, we're going to be pushing everybody to try. But we always said that orthopaedics in particular would be a particular challenge. I think you've got to just understand that, actually, when your capital budget has been cut, effectively, which is...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Well, 'Happy Christmas' to you as well, Russell. [Laughter.] And I'm very pleased that that was your last question this year. Look, I've had better years, if I'm honest, and obviously, there are a lot of things that I wish that we'd seen improvements on and I wish we'd gone faster with some areas. Because for me, the key thing is to keep an eye on what is it that the public needs, and what...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Well, it's clear that we spend a great deal of time preparing for winter—we know that there will be pressures during the winter months. They've already started—we've seen how much pressure there was on the services over the past weekend. It doesn't help when we see rates of scarlet fever increasing—we didn't expect to see that. So, there are things arising that we don't expect to see....
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Well, look, first of all, I think it's important that I set on record once again that we understand the strength of feeling felt by those people who feel like they've got no other option but to take industrial action. We believe that all our public sector workers should be fairly rewarded, and we think that the chaos that has been created by the Tory Government, and the increases that we've...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Intake numbers for the Bangor medical school have been approved, and funding has also approved for 140 students per year once the school reaches optimum capacity. A letter of assurance was sent to General Medical Council colleagues in November to allow Bangor University to continue their forward momentum through the accreditation process. Thank you.
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thank you very much. May I say that I was delighted to have met Professor Mike Larvin recently, just to ensure that we are making progress with developments in the university? We are highly aware that we do need to be cognisant of how much recruitment there will be in terms of the numbers that are Welsh speaking, and I know that a particular focus has been placed on that, with work currently...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thank you. Well, I'm sure you will understand that, actually, we are very keen to get this under way as soon as possible. We are very aware that we need to increase the numbers of people in training to become medics, but, of course, we have to work within the confines that are set by the GMC. So, it's not up to us to say 'Right, switch it on'; we have to work with the GMC, which gives...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Welsh Government funding has enabled the Welsh ambulance service to deliver a range of actions to improve ambulance performance, including the recruitment of 100 additional staff, reformed rota arrangements, reductions in sickness absence, and new investment in technology to support clinical decision making.
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thanks very much. You're absolutely right to highlight the incredible pressure on the emergency services at the moment. As you say, we've seen, this October, the number of red immediately life-threatening calls the highest on record—77 per cent more than in October 2019. This is huge compared to what we've seen before. We have done a huge amount of investment, we've put huge support in...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: I am pleased to see that the longest waiting times for treatment at Betsi Cadwaladr have fallen and are 21 per cent lower than they were in March 2022. As part of targeted intervention, they are receiving support from the planned care recovery and improvement team to ensure that they are able to plan their elective care effectively.
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thank you. Of course, I understand why people might feel that that is a system—
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thank you. We understand that people are fed up in having to wait so long. Carpal tunnel syndrome is something that an orthopaedic surgeon has to be involved in. I think that it is important that we monitor how much work the orthopaedic surgeons do. It's very important that we continue with this work. We had another meeting recently with the British specialist in orthopaedic surgery to ensure...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thanks very much. I think that what's really important is that we keep on remembering how many people are actually helped on a monthly basis. What's really interesting for me—. Obviously, I get a lot of people coming up to me and complaining about their waiting times. But I also get a lot of people coming up to me saying what an absolutely magnificent job the NHS is doing for them. And I...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: I need the answer. [Laughter.] Thank you. I expect the cancer services action plan—the NHS’s response to our policy expectations set out in 'The quality statement for cancer'—to be published at the end of January in the run-up to World Cancer Day.
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thanks very much, Huw, and can I thank you for the work that you and the CPG are doing on this really important area? Because one of the key things that we are conscious of all of the time in relation to health is inequality. So, why is it that some people are getting very different treatment? And obviously there's a link with deprivation, and we need to make sure that we're addressing that....
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thanks very much, Altaf. I think I've responded to a letter from you on this, so I'm surprised that you haven't received that yet, so I'll chase that up immediately after this. But I think what was important for some of the things that came out of that cancer summit meeting was the need to make sure we do a lot more straight to test, so you cut out some of the waiting time, because,...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Ambulance response time performance is not where we, the NHS or the public would like it to be. We have a national ambulance improvement plan in place, supported by over £3 million of Welsh Government funding. This features national and local actions to support improvement, including in Dwyfor Meirionnydd.
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: I think there are different models that are appropriate to different areas of Wales. So, one of the things that I saw when I visited Hwb Iechyd Eifionydd was very good work by paramedics. So, what they did was to send local paramedics in—advanced paramedics—and they could help very many patients, which meant that they then didn't need to go hospital. So, the most important thing for me is...
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: The steps taken to reduce waiting time in A&E and to reduce ambulance response times include creating more ambulance capacity, delivering clinical streaming services, using virtual ward models and enhancement of same-day emergency care services.
Baroness Mair Eluned Morgan: Thank you. I'm sure that Adam Price will have understood by now that part of the problem in getting people into the hospital is that we can't get them out. So, there are over 1,000 people in our hospitals who shouldn't be there. Part of the problem is because people can't be recruited in local government to work in the care services. So, that inter-relationship is something that everyone...
