‘Here’s how the Tories could learn from Wales’ NHS – if they stop attacking it’

Wales was the birthplace of the NHS. 75 years on, Aneurin Bevan would be proud to know that in his home country, the vast majority of people are more than happy with the service they receive.

The pressures on the NHS are unrelenting in every part of the UK. In Wales, we have an older, poorer and sicker population and we don’t, as a rule, use private healthcare – we rely on the services the NHS provides. Every month, the NHS’ many services have more than two million contacts with people across Wales, not bad for a population of just over three million people. 

The pandemic had a huge impact on the NHS. This is most visible in the longer waiting lists and waiting times, which unfortunately built up.

The Tories would have you believe that waiting times in Wales are the worst in the UK. The truth is that long waiting times are coming down every month thanks to the hard work and dedication of all those in the NHS and extra investment – even in these most difficult of times. And the overall waiting list in Wales is growing at a slower rate than in England; it’s grown by 1.5% over the last 12 months, compared to 6.8% in England.

Much of UK Labour’s health policy is already being delivered in Wales

We all know how hard our fantastic @WelshAmbulance staff work, particularly at this time of year. 🚑@Eluned_Morgan recently spent the day with some of our front line workers, to see what can be done to support staff and to say diolch for all they do. 💙 pic.twitter.com/DL40GRUZl1

— Welsh Government Health and Social Care (@WGHealthandCare) January 5, 2024

Despite waiting list challenges, which are common to all parts of the NHS in the UK, there’s so much we can be proud of in Wales, and so many of the health commitments being made by Labour are already being delivered in Wales. 

We’ve transformed the GP contract so people don’t have to do battle with the 8am bottleneck to get an appointment. There are now more ways to access appointments and advice without having to make repeated phone calls, and the number of GPs working in Wales has increased. 

Our whole health strategy centres on supporting and treating people as close to their home, in their local communities, as possible, with a focus on prevention and early intervention. 

99% of our pharmacies offer a common ailments scheme, and we have the first nationally commissioned community pharmacy prescribing service in the UK, helping to relieve pressure on our hard-pressed surgeries. 

We’ve changed the law in relation to ophthalmology care so people can get treatment for a range of common conditions – including glaucoma, age-related macular degeneration, diabetic retinopathy and retinal vein occlusions – locally instead of going into hospital. 

There is no tax on illness in Wales – prescriptions in Wales are free, as is parking at all NHS hospitals.

We spend more on mental health than any other condition

When it comes to mental health, funding is ring-fenced and we spend more on mental health than any other condition in the NHS, moving to a system of genuine parity with physical wellbeing. 

We have rolled out our nationwide 111 press 2 service for mental health support. More than half of people who have used it said they didn’t need any further support after receiving advice, and 99% of callers said their distress levels were lower following the call.

Mental health support is available in every secondary school in Wales; mental health youth hubs have been set up in each health board area and wraparound mental health care is available in communities.

We’ve modernised cancer treatment and improved access to dentistry

We modernised the cancer pathway four years ago. Instead of having different targets and ways into the NHS, we have one streamlined system: the clock starts from the moment someone is suspected of having cancer and stops at the point treatment starts. When you’re in the eye of the cancer storm, you want to know if you have cancer that the support is there, and treatment will start as soon as possible.

We’ve worked really hard to improve cancer care in Wales, including developing rapid diagnostic cancer centres in local communities, which mean every month, some 14,000 people are given the good news that they don’t have cancer.

The noise around dental treatment has been much louder in England than it has been here in Wales. An incoming Labour government is welcome to pick up on our well-established Design to Smile scheme that targets toothbrushing and dental hygiene in primary schools and the Gwen am Byth (Smile for life) project in care homes.

We’ve also made some changes to the dental contract, which has enabled almost 250,000 people who previously couldn’t access NHS dental care to get an appointment. 

We’ve invested in hospitals and spent more on social care than England

Boris Johnson famously said he’d build 40 new hospitals in England – if we use his definition of a “new hospital”, we’re on course to build six times more, proportionately. And while we’re determined to move as much care as we can into local communities, closer to people’s homes, we have retained hospital beds – 280 per 100,000 population compared to England’s 183. 

We’ve rolled out new services to support emergency departments including same-day emergency centres and urgent primary care units, additional 111 and ambulance services. They’ve really helped make a difference this winter.

Addressing existing health issues and improving health is not just the responsibility of the NHS and my health department. That’s why Wales will be one of the first countries in the world to ensure there’s a health impact assessment on every Welsh government proposed action or decision. We want children to get the best start in life, which is why primary schools offer a healthy free school breakfast and lunch.

We spend 9% more on health services compared to England but a massive 43% more on social care, which is fundamental to supporting the NHS and helping people to live independent lives. Some of this additional funding goes towards paying the Real Living Wage to every care worker in Wales.

We’ve created a £144m fund to integrate health and care and there’s a £100 cap on the weekly payment for domiciliary care in Wales compared to the limitless amounts that can be charged in England. 

Health Minister Eluned Morgan on a visit to the Delta Wellbeing and Home First team in Llanelli. She heard about how they help residents receive the care they need at home. Find out more https://t.co/V4csX5syOZ pic.twitter.com/CBbSE5Ciai

— Hywel Dda UHB (@HywelDdaHB) December 13, 2023

Our funding settlement from the UK government is not sufficient

But despite all these initiatives, the pressure on health and care services is intense, and the workforce is as frustrated as we are. We have a pioneering social partnership approach, which is now statutory, but we have seen NHS strikes over pay – with more to come. 

The sad truth is that our settlement, which comes largely in the form of a block grant from the UK government, is not sufficient to recognise the significant financial pressures on the NHS, which include unfunded pay rises.

When Labour was last in power in Westminster, health spending had just about reached the European average by 2008 but between 2010 and 2019 under the Tories, it rose by just 15% while in Germany it rose by 39%.

Over the last 13 years the NHS – like other public services – has had to contend with austerity, the impact of a botched Brexit, the pandemic, record levels of inflation and rising demand. It is not difficult to work out why it is so challenged across the whole of the UK. 

We are committed in Wales to Bevan’s founding principle of healthcare free at the point of need, but it would be so much easier to deliver quality services with a Labour government in Westminster which is as serious as we are about delivering a reformed and sustainable service with the funding the NHS needs to thrive.