Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 1:35 pm on 24 March 2021.
Well, I think the Member's points are broadly absurd. When it comes to the position about the referendums and our past, actually Brexit has been and done and we're out of the European Union whether we like it or not. That's the reality of where we are, and it will have an impact on our ability to recruit from current European Union member states. And I don't share the Member's view that this is about plundering other parts of the world. We see people who train here in the UK who go and work in other parts of the world as well. And I should remind not just the Member, but everybody that the NHS has always been an international success story. If we had not recruited people from around the world, then our NHS would not have delivered the breadth of care that it has. It would not be the embodiment of the most popular and trusted public institution in this country. Go into any hospital within Wales and you will find an international cast delivering high-quality healthcare, changing and improving our country, not just as workers, but as friends and community members—people who we live alongside and whose children go to the same schools as ours. I'm very proud of our international links. I look forward to maintaining those international links to both recruit and to help other parts of the world, and I look forward to building on the successful track record of this Government in recruiting, training and retaining more of our staff right across the health service—those nurses, doctors and other therapists and scientists as well that we all have come to rely on even more than usual in this past year.