With this Sunday marking the 10th anniversary since Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board went into special measures, this week, the Welsh Conservatives brought forward a Senedd motion calling on the Welsh Labour Government to initiate a public inquiry into the Health Board. 

Welsh Labour and Plaid Cymru voted against these calls.

Speaking in the debate, Leader of the Welsh Conservatives and Clwyd West MS Darren Millar said that despite the good work of Health Board staff, since being first put in special measures back in 2015, the performance of the Health Board has gone backwards. 

He said: 

“We have read report after report after report by the coroner, by the Health and Safety Executive, by Healthcare Inspectorate Wales, and by independent people who've been brought into North Wales to look at its services, which have identified serious failings.

“Special measures was designed to try to make things better, to improve things, but what have the results of these special measures actually been? Well, I'm afraid the performance of the Health Board has gone backwards on almost every single measure. 

“We just heard the Cabinet Secretary popping the champagne corks again about progress against two-year waiting time targets. The reality is that people in North Wales are being let down because you're 1,460 times more likely to face a two-year wait for treatment in North Wales than you are over the border in England. That is an absolute scandal. 

“The waiting time target was promised to be eliminated by the Welsh Government over two years ago and dealt with, but it hasn't been dealt with. And it's not just the waiting time targets for planned procedures; the emergency departments in North Wales are failing too. Their performance has deteriorated, and they are now the worst in Wales and amongst the worst in the whole of the United Kingdom. 

“One in three patients are waiting in the emergency departments for four hours or more - left languishing - and 17% of patients, by the current figures, are in the emergency departments for more than 12 hours. Again, on both of those counts, they are the worst-performing hospitals in Wales.

“Special measures is not working, and it's not working because in Wales we have a politicised arrangement for special measures, which is not the case in other parts of the United Kingdom. A Health Board cannot go into special measures without the say-so of a Minister. That is unacceptable, because it means that there's pressure around election periods to remove special measures, even when it's not appropriate or prudent to do so, in order to protect the reputation of Ministers in a failing Labour Government, rather than because it is the right thing to do.”

He added:

“The Welsh Government seem completely and utterly incapable of turning the situation around. So, the victims of this mess - and I call them 'victims' deliberately - the patients and the staff are actually getting a worse deal in North Wales than any other part of the country. 

“We owe it to every person who has had a relative who has come to harm and every single person who has lost their relatives or loved ones as a result of this disaster in North Wales to make sure that we get to the bottom of these problems.

“We've got to change the culture, we've got to make sure that we deliver these improvements, and one of the ways that we do that is by having a fully independent public inquiry to get to the bottom of these issues and to make sure that we deliver the change that we need.”

Watch Darren’s contribution in the Welsh Parliament below: