Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 2:06 pm on 11 March 2020.
Well, the issues are different in different health boards, and of course I'm disappointed, not just at the failure to meet the target, but about the extent of that failure between different health boards themselves. In Hywel Dda, you'll know that we've undertaken a series of interventions and reports around their challenge and the opportunities for them to improve. It should, though, be said that on a performance end, Hywel Dda have made real improvements over the last few years. So, they are in a better place in performance terms, whereas in Betsi Cadwaladr, they haven't had the requisite grip and the control in terms of both performance and finance. So, whilst Hywel Dda health board can put their performance figures in a positive way, it's not quite the same story in north Wales, and you'll notice that both of the previous finance directors are now no longer in post. There's a recovery director who is having an impact on the financial discipline within the organisation, and, of course, there is now an interim chief executive following the change in leadership. And in terms of Swansea Bay, the disappointment is tempered with some optimism, based in reality about the future, and, again, the list of opportunities they have to improve the financial running.
There is one point that I think I need to make on a general level, and it is that if coronavirus is anything like as significant as we think it is, then the normal way of operating the health service will change significantly. So, the normal way that we want to hold organisations to account within the Government and within this place will have to change. I cannot expect the health service to behave in a radically different way in prioritising significant numbers of really sick people coming through the doors, if I'm then also saying, 'I want you not to lose any sort of progress on referral-to-treatment times, and I want you to try to make sure that money is being spent in a certain way.' Now, there'll be some points about financial discipline and opportunities to save money that will still exist in a way that doesn't harm the service, but there will need to be a sense check about what will really happen, and then what will be the longer term consequences if we do have a significant outbreak, on both resources, the overall pledges the Chancellor has made about the NHS having whatever resources it needs, and what that means in broader performance terms for the health service then to try to recover and catch up on.