Diolch, Llywydd. As Members are already aware, this week marks the seventieth anniversary of our health service. This is a particularly proud landmark for us here in Wales, given that its founding father was of course our very own Aneurin Bevan. The son of a Tredegar miner who left school at the age of 13 and seemed to be set for a life working underground. Had it not been for a trade union movement committed to self-improvement and mutual support he would not have had the education and opportunities that ultimately set him on a career path into politics.

Of course, Bevan’s formative experiences indelibly shaped his political views: the absence of a universal healthcare service, a patchwork of local arrangements based largely on the Victorian Poor Law where those who could pay got care, and those who could not usually did not. The disparities and hardships that created and perpetuated are unimaginable to those of us brought up with the NHS. However, as we know, the local Tredegar Medical Aid Society offered Bevan a glimpse of what was possible when individuals took action collectively for the common good.

The battles that Bevan fought to establish the NHS are well documented, and his reputation as a firebrand was certainly one of the reasons why Attlee chose him for the task. In the face of ferocious and highly personal criticism, he succeeded in delivering a healthcare system with three fundamental principles that still hold true today in Wales: services are free at the point of use, they're financed from central taxation, and everyone is eligible.   

The achievements of the service that he delivered, and the positive impact this has had on our society, are too numerous to list. Yet it is far too easy to take for granted the extent to which we all rely on our health and care services from cradle to grave. Every single one of us has benefited from the eradication of diseases that in the past would have debilitated or taken the lives of people in their hundreds every year. We are now able to treat or cure illnesses and conditions that, even 20 years ago, would have seemed impossible. As a result, of course, more of us are living longer.