Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 5:24 pm on 4 June 2019.
Thank you for the comments and questions. I want to reassure not just the Member but the wider public that special measures are not business as usual. This is about seeing the health board improve and move beyond special measures. And, as I have said repeatedly, I'm not going to set an artificial deadline for special measures to end. That would be an act of convenience for me but absolutely the wrong thing to do for the public and for our staff. Coming out of special measures has to come on the basis of advice that allows me to say it's the right thing to do for the organisation. That advice from the Wales Audit Office, from Healthcare Inspectorate Wales and the NHS Wales chief executive is hugely important, otherwise our escalation process is meaningless, and it's simply about the convenience of action for politicians around electoral cycles rather than what is the right thing to do for the service and the right thing to do for the public.
In terms of the recruitment challenges we face, I've mentioned a number of these within the statement and in the conversation I had with Angela Burns about GP numbers and the work that we're doing. The success of 'Train. Work. Live.', compared to other parts of the UK, on GP numbers is a real positive for us as well. The fact that we're seeing a number of those managed practices that are now ready to go back as independent contractor models as well, that's a real positive—the fact that we're having a recruitment campaign around pharmacy, around nurses and around therapists as part of the allied health professions too, so we're being active in recruiting people, as well as the investment we continue to make in training the next generation of healthcare professionals here in Wales.
In a time of challenge, we continue to invest more in the training of not just doctors, with additional training places in north Wales as well, but in terms of other healthcare professions as well. So, I think we have lots to say, and within the statement, of course, I outlined the additional work that's being done on orthopaedics—the six additional posts that we're funding, the work that we're doing to make sure that there is a plan and not to simply wait for competing interests in north Wales to come up with a plan at some distant point in the future.
So, intervention is taking place. There is more that has happened because of our intervention, and I look forward to seeing more happen at greater pace, because my ambition is for this health board to come out of special measures because it is the right thing to do, because it has made real and sustained progress with and for its staff, and with and for the people of north Wales it serves.