Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. I’d like to thank the Cabinet Secretary for his contribution, and also other members of the committee, and Members who are not members of the committee as well, for their contributions this afternoon.Rhun ap Iorwerth started by referring to the importance of acknowledging that we have to do something about flu and the pressure on social care, the pressure on our beds, and the need to tackle that situation.

Angela Burns, then, also discussing in her own mature, inimitable way, and making very valuable points in terms of the fact that’s recognised by everyone: that different patients appear in the winter and that we should be able to plan for that because the same kind of thing happens winter after winter. We are expecting another winter at the end of this year as well. She also made the point about integrated care.

I’m very grateful for the contributions of Caroline Jones, Janet Finch-Saunders and Gareth Bennett to this debate, because this was a very important report on the NHS’s preparedness for winter pressure. It was a result, of course—a report had been issued previously in 2013-14, and therefore building on those recommendations was the intention, and seeing what kind of improvement there had been in terms of the work that’s being done in this area.

Of course, the overriding conclusion of the committee is that the entire system that we’ve been mentioning—not just the health service, but also the social care system—should be more resilient throughout the year, and therefore in a much better position when additional pressures are applied at those very busy times in the middle of winter, so that the system in its entirety can deal with that in terms of capacity when a great number of patients appear on certain days, as we’ve heard about recently. Of course, we know that the arrangements in place for this winter will be evaluated soon and we look forward eagerly to the findings of that evaluation.

And just to close, and just to echo the thanks of those who have contributed this afternoon in terms of recognising the heroic contribution of the staff in the health service. Naturally, I meet them very often in the workplace, and I felt the emotion and that passion in the different contributions made to the committee inquiry. There is a passionate love towards our health service—yes, from the patients’ side, but also particularly from the staff as well. You can’t put a price on that passion and that commitment to a system that is vital so that we can keep it and develop it to be even more innovative than it is at present.

We’ve been looking at new ways of working, but to do that we have to get over the difference between primary care out there, compared with hospital care. We have to bring those sectors together. We like to see that aspiration that doctors and nurses can work in those hospitals, but also in our communities—a dual approach for the way ahead. We expect to see exciting developments of that nature in the future, not just GPs working in the hospitals, but also hospital specialists increasingly working in our communities. We have to tackle ensuring that every specialist can look at the patient in more general terms—not just at one system that is struggling. We have enough specialists now that just look at the thyroid, diabetes, or the heart, but increasingly we need specialists who can look after the patient as a whole, because we have a growth in the number of older people. The way to cope with that is to have specialists who can look at the patient as a whole, as we used to have. Now, it is only GPs, basically, aside from certain specialists who look after older people, who have the necessary skills to do that. So, we need to look again at that system as well.

So, can I thank from the bottom of my heart the staff in the health service for their contributions—our doctors and nurses, physiotherapists, OTs and so forth? And also, in closing, could I thank the clerks and all the officials who support my work as Chair of the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee for all the support, and for their hard work in ensuring that this inquiry and this significant contribution that you see before you in this report could see the light of day? It means a lot of work behind the scenes to bring this to life in the first place, but I thank everyone for their contributions this afternoon and for their attention. Thank you very much.