Questions Without Notice from Party Spokespeople

Part of 2. Questions to the Minister for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 2:38 pm on 1 May 2019.

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Photo of Vaughan Gething Vaughan Gething Labour 2:38, 1 May 2019

Well, I'd like to thank the Member for her latest interesting take and bring her back to reality. The undeniable challenges on social care exist right across the United Kingdom, including here in Wales. Within the significant reductions made to our budget by the UK Conservative Government that she supports and has campaigned for, we have made honest choices about the share in resources between health, local government and all other public services and money we spend on supporting the economy. If the Conservatives in the United Kingdom Government were really serious about fixing this issue, they would have done something about it. We've been promised a Green Paper, not a paper by Damian Green, to understand what the UK Government are going to do on this. It has been delayed again and again and again.

The Dilnot commission that was supposed to help take this matter forward was buried by the Conservative Government in the last term. The reality is we could have made more progress right across the United Kingdom if the UK Government had been a straight and honest dealer in this and actually taken action rather than kicking the can down the road. Here in Wales, we do have an inter-ministerial group that I chair on looking at the future payment for social care, and looking at how we generate more money to go into our social care system. And that is not a consequence of free choice to make at all, and if we want more resources to go in, there are difficult choices about where that money comes from and if we're prepared to fund that in a variety of different ways. 

I suggest that rather than just looking at it, the UK Government needs to recognise that they are responsible for the position on social care funding, and it comes back again to the choice on austerity. End austerity—there are different choices that every Government within the United Kingdom can make. End austerity, and your Conservative colleagues who run councils in England will have a different settlement, because don't take my word for it, but the choices that your Government across the United Kingdom has made have had even more serious consequences in England than any other part of the UK. They look on the way Welsh local government has been treated and they recognise there is a much better deal available for local government here because there is a Welsh Labour Government that has balanced our resources and prioritised local services.