Part of 1. Questions to the First Minister – in the Senedd at 1:48 pm on 2 July 2019.
Well, this is another health board, First Minister, which is not doing very well, because the accident and emergency waiting times for the health board are 19 per cent below your target—once again, one that has never been met—and complaints about the health board have risen by 29 per cent in 2018. What I find shocking, First Minister, is that Andrew Davies talks about the constant focus on short-term targets, micromanaging by Welsh Government officials, with, as Mr Davies puts it, a degree of scrutiny that is
'not actually helping them get on sorting out the problem'.
Now, in our previous discussions, your health Minister has dismissed the idea of setting targets to get Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board out of special measures, and he's made clear that he won't set arbitrary targets to improve services for local people. So, why, First Minister, is your Government micromanaging one health board but letting another one struggle on? Is it the case that your Deputy Minister for Economy was correct—your Government doesn't know what it's doing?