The latest statistics on the state of the Welsh NHS paint a dismal picture of Labour’s record on running health services in our country, writes David Chadwick MP.

The latest statistics for Powys show that 48% of amber ambulance calls are not answered within an hour, despite the category including strokes and heart attacks.

The data also shows a staggering 52% of red calls, which deal with the most life-threatening injuries, are not attended to within the 8-minute target time.

Both statistics mark yet a further deterioration from the month prior and the sight of ambulances queuing outside hospitals in Shropshire, Herefordshire, Merthyr and Swansea is all too familiar a sight for my constituents.

Meanwhile, across Wales, the number of people on an NHS waiting list has reached over 800,000.

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A staggering figure given Wales’s total population is just 3.1 million. The figure, the highest on record, means almost a third of the Welsh population is now languishing on a waiting list.

Within Powys, 1,517 patients have been waiting over a year while 173 patients have been waiting over two years. However, the actual figures are likely to be significantly higher as many Powys residents receive treatment outside of the county.

These statistics are truly shocking and a significant amount of casework I have received since being elected has involved truly awful stories from residents dealing with the consequences. 

None of this is the fault of our hardworking NHS staff, who are doing their best under stretched circumstances. 

Sadly, Labour is still failing to outline clear targets to tackle this mess. Just this month we have seen Labour announce ‘plans’ to reduce waiting lists by treating Welsh patients in England.

Not only did these plans completely ignore border communities in Powys already receiving a large amount of their treatment in English hospitals, but the plans later turned out to be little more than optimistic words by Labour Ministers with no additional funding or implementation plans and were quickly walked back.

The Liberal Democrats are clear, the route to solving the crisis in our NHS lies in fixing access to primary care (GPs) and in fixing social care. It is only by doing these two things we can reduce pressure on accident and emergency departments.