Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 2:02 pm on 20 January 2021.
In direct conversations I've had with the health board—and I'm sure the Member has engaged in the regular briefings that the Aneurin Bevan University Health Board provides—the provision and the early completion of the Grange hospital is a key part of the practical COVID response. It allows for much easier and greater isolation, because of the single rooms that are provided throughout the facility. It allows much greater space than the former infrastructure that existed in the Royal Gwent, and the hospital in Abergavenny that I know that many of the Member's constituents will have gone to, and it's where, of course, my own father passed away as well. So, this isn't to criticise those hospitals or that infrastructure—it's a recognition that it needed to be updated. That's why the Member, and indeed other Members from across the political spectrum, including, of course, Lynne Neagle—I should mention her—were campaigning for the completion of the Clinical Futures vision, with the Grange at its centre. We didn't know at the time that I made that choice to go ahead with that hospital within this term that it would play such a key part in the pandemic response. It's also, of course, provided a much better place for emergency care to be delivered as well. So, I think that the decision to complete the Grange University Hospital, to accelerate its completion, has already stood the test of time, and I'm sure, as you do, if you listen to the voices of staff who work in that hospital, then they will say it has been a real benefit to them and the people they serve and care for to have it as part of our healthcare infrastructure.