LABOUR ILLUSTRATE WRONG NHS POLICIES
AS THEY ENFORCE ‘GROGAN JUDGEMENT’ COSTS
UPON LOCAL HEALTH BOARDS
A media release by William Graham on 24th January 2008
William Graham (Conservative AM for South Wales East) responding to the Assembly directive that continuing healthcare must be included in end-of-year estimates, plunging Gwent Health Board’s a further £8million into the ‘red’:
“This illustrates how wrong our Labour dominated Assembly Government policies have been with regard to the NHS in Wales”.
“They oversaw the largest hospital waiting lists in the history of Wales, caused by enforcing target after target upon our health services, failing to let them respond to patient care and needs”.
“When the Orthopaedic services at the Royal Gwent Hospital were at crisis point, with people being required to wait over 18 months for treatment, the Labour Assembly Government were ‘panicked’ into calling Professor Brian Edwards of Sheffield University to conduct an urgent review this service”.
“He identified bed blocking are the major contributory factor to the problem. He recommended more orthopaedic beds and efficient discharging of patients to ‘outside’ continuing healthcare agencies”.
“It is almost 2 years since the Assembly Government realised it had to address the issues arising from the ‘Grogan judgement’. They should have incorporated all aspects of the need to meet this judgement before setting the NHS budget – not announcing that Health Boards must meeting these additional costs within the existing annual budget, and after all their resources have been allocated”.
“This Assembly action will have only one result – increased waiting lists”.
“I have requested to be allowed to ask an urgent question during Plenary next week on the impact of the Grogan judgement on NHS services in Wales”.
“I will expect the Minister to respond by announcing additional financial assistance to cover these continuing healthcare costs”.
William Graham JP, AM
CHIEF WHIP, PARTY CHAIRMAN AND EUROPEAN SPOKESMAN
Email – William.Graham@Wales.gov.uk