Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 3:22 pm on 15 February 2022.
Minister, thank you for your statement this afternoon on COVID-19, and I, like my colleagues here, welcome the easing of restrictions across Wales. Minister, as you know, COVID-19 put huge pressure on our A&E departments, and on Sunday evening there were approximately 17 ambulances queueing up outside Morriston Hospital, waiting for patients to be admitted and seen. In A&E and over the weekend, I've been advised by a front-line paramedic that residents in Brecon and Radnorshire are routinely waiting eight hours for a category 1 ambulance response. And over the weekend, a lady with chest pains waited over five hours for an ambulance to arrive, and there were no ambulances at all in my constituency. Minister, I have raised this on a number of occasions, we've debated it here a number of times, but I want to know what new measures have you put in, and the Welsh ambulance service put in, to try and get ambulance waiting times under control. Because people waiting eight hours plus is just simply not good enough, and I'm sure you'll agree with me on that. Diolch, Llywydd.