Angela Burns: I just want to talk about the fit for the future paper in its generality. You talk about the fact that it’s bringing together everything and it’s going to bring forward a new method of governance, et cetera. So, can you tell me, Cabinet Secretary, why does it make only, I think, one mention of the regional partnership boards and why is there absolutely no mention of how GP clusters should...
Angela Burns: Will you take an intervention?
Angela Burns: I’m very pleased, as a member of this committee, to have a chance to speak in support of this report, and I’d like to put on record my thanks to all those who came to give evidence before us, and to the clerking teams that support us so ably. Medical recruitment and workforce planning are two of the most important issues affecting our NHS going forward, and we need to ensure that we find...
Angela Burns: Thank you for that very disappointing answer, I have to say. The All Wales Medicines Strategy Group does estimate that each year around 50 cervical cancer patients in Wales will receive a terminal diagnosis who could require Avastin treatment. But given your endorsement of their recommendation, I find it very hard to understand the process going forward for these patients. Cervical cancer...
Angela Burns: Will the Cabinet Secretary make a statement on the All-Wales Medicines Strategy Group’s decision not to make Avastin, a potentially life-prolonging cancer drug, routinely available on the Welsh NHS? (TAQ0041)
Angela Burns: It’s not just the service that’s in crisis; some of the foster carers and the children that they care for are in crisis. Cabinet Secretary, what assurances can you give us that looked-after children will be able to access emergency support services, such as child and adolescent mental health services, if they are placed in foster placements that are outside the local authority that is...
Angela Burns: I’m very glad that Joyce Watson asked that question because you and I have discussed this issue on a number of occasions. I wonder if, Minister or Cabinet Secretary, you would look at how we might improve the planning application process, in particular for super farms, to ensure that drainage and adequate slurry storage is really taken into account, because when a farm grows from 600 or 700...
Angela Burns: The Welsh Conservatives will support today’s motion to note the interim report by the parliamentary review of health and social care. The interim report makes for thought-provoking reading. It lays out, with a degree of frankness not often allowed, the scale of the challenge that faces our country in terms of how we sustain and renew both the Welsh national health service and the care...
Angela Burns: Minister, thank you for your statement today. I welcome the delivery plan. I’m pleased that it continues to set out a number of ambitious targets to cut smoking rates. I think it does remain shocking that up to two thirds of long-term smokers will die from smoking-related diseases, and I think it is worth reminding ourselves that the US Food and Drug Administration actually summed it up by...
Angela Burns: Indeed, Cabinet Secretary, you’re talking to one of the politicians who suffered so only last May. I had a very bad bite on my hand, thanks to a random dog, and had outstanding service at Withybush hospital A&E, who performed a lengthy but significant operation to repair my hand. But above all, I was able to return home and, for the rest of the week, I received treatment three times a day...
Angela Burns: I think that the parliamentary review interim report is very clear on the direction of travel, and my understanding is it has buy-in from not just the health and social care sectors, but also political buy-in in terms of that direction of travel. The question I actually asked you was: is there some kind of oversight going on to ensure that any structural reforms that are currently being...
Angela Burns: Business process re-engineering is never easy to deliver, but the tactics of nudge and leading and culture change are very well evidenced and have been used successfully in the private and public sectors. And I would urge the Cabinet Secretary to engage with organisations like that, because we can all learn, and there are good practices to learn from these kinds of organisations. Whilst the...
Angela Burns: Diolch, Llywydd. Cabinet Secretary, the interim parliamentary review on health and social care has highlighted that there remain significant barriers for good ideas and policies to translate fully throughout the whole of the NHS due to cultural resistance and a fear of failure. There’s a recognition, evidence based, that a significant proportion of the public sector are often doing things...
Angela Burns: Thank you for that, Cabinet Secretary. As you will know, the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park covers vast swathes of my constituency, and the decisions taken by them can have major impacts on businesses operating either wholly within the park or partly park and partly the rest of Pembrokeshire. Whilst I understand the need for consideration to be offered to the park’s overriding...
Angela Burns: 2. Will the Cabinet Secretary outline the Welsh Government’s plans to promote economic development in west Wales during the fifth Assembly? OAQ(5)0201(EI)
Angela Burns: Will the Cabinet Secretary provide an update on the use of radium 223 in the Welsh NHS?
Angela Burns: Will you take an intervention?
Angela Burns: I’m very grateful to you, Cabinet Secretary, for taking a quick intervention. I’m delighted to hear the strands of work that you’re bringing together. Could you just quickly touch upon the case of undiagnosed young people? Because this deals with those who we know have it, and about them getting the service. I think a number of people who took part in this debate raised the numbers of...
Angela Burns: I’m very delighted to be able to speak in today’s debate. It must be very hard, Cabinet Secretary, because I know that money is not infinite, but, as David Melding says, this is not a marginal issue, and these young people have every right to access the quality of treatment that we would expect throughout the entire NHS. The long and the short of it is that Wales should have a...
Angela Burns: Cabinet Secretary, I too would like to thank the campaigners and Julie Morgan and the cross-party group for their tenaciousness and determination in following this subject to this conclusion. ‘One of the biggest treatment disasters in the history of the NHS’, and that was the motion passed in the House of Commons in 2016, and I think it sums up the scale of this scandal exactly. What I...
