I would like to thank the Welsh Conservatives for bringing forward this debate today. So far, winter 2016-17 has been a mild one and apart from the north-east of Wales, there haven’t been any major outbreaks of influenza-type illnesses. However, this hasn’t reduced pressures on our NHS. According to the Royal College of Nursing, our hospitals are so full all year round that the system cannot cope with a seasonal spike in demand. I fear that if we do see a seasonal spike in demand this winter, our NHS may not be able to cope.

At this point, I would like to put on record my thanks to our dedicated health and social care staff who work incredibly hard all year round, but even more so at this time of year, to ensure that patients receive excellent care despite the pressures. In fact, if our health and social care staff weren’t so dedicated and hard-working, our healthcare system would have broken down a long time ago.

The NHS and the social care sector investment has not kept pace with the demands on the system, and has been made worse by poor strategic planning by successive governments. One of the worst decisions affecting the NHS has been the reduction of bed capacity over the last two decades and the closure of cottage hospitals. This has been compounded by a lack of investment in the social care sector. Traditionally, the solution to winter pressures has been to increase capacity by cancelling non-urgent operations. This is short-termism at its worst. It only leads to increased misery for those on waiting lists and only delays the problem, rather than fixing it. The investment put up by the Welsh Government to tackle winter pressures is welcome, but will only be a short-term fix unless we address the underfunding of social care and increase the capacity of our hospitals.

We have a growing and ageing population, so unless we take radical action now, the strain our NHS is under will reach breaking point. Diolch yn fawr.