Part of 2. 2. Questions to the Cabinet Secretary for Health, Well-being and Sport – in the Senedd at 2:34 pm on 9 November 2016.
It’s part of the challenge that we have about ensuring that we have a consistent grade—[Interruption.] You’re getting an honest answer.
[Continues.]—that we have a consistent grade of a medical workforce, and those other professionals who support them, to make sure that we do deliver high-quality care. That does mean that we need to move to a model that will allow us to recruit permanent high-quality staff across all those particular grades. As to the consultant cover is being provided, if you look again at the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health’s review, they indicate it’s for an integrated team, based at Glangwili, to provide that cover, but it does not mean that there is no paediatric service within Withybush; it’s one that meets demand and meets need. And if I lived in and around the Withybush area, I would want to know that the service that is being provided is one that is based on the very best clinical evidence and advice. And that is a challenge. Trying to run a service that meets the needs of local politicians and ignores the requirements of evidence and reliable clinical advice is the wrong thing to do for citizens, either in Withybush or in any other part of the country.