Campaigner hits out over ambulance figures

A Llangollen health services campaigner has commented on new figures which show that ambulance response times for the most urgent calls in Wales are the worst on record.

The proportion of ambulances hitting the target response time of eight minutes for the most urgent calls fell well below half in December.

The target for responding to Category A calls is 65% - but in December it was just 42.6%.

It was down from 51.0% in November 2014 and from 57.6% from December 2013.

Martin Crumpton, who campaigned the save Llangollen Cottage Hospital from the axe, said:

"Today’s release of the appalling figures for Welsh Ambulance targets, the worst on record, comes as no surprise – it was entirely predictable, as certain as cold weather and influenza in Winter.

 

"The real surprise is the use of politician-speak in the media today which overtly blames the bed shortage but without actually using those words.

 

"The BBC is also reluctant to translate them into plain English (or plain Welsh). The current politically-correct phrase is ‘handovers at A&E are exceeding their 15-minute target times, tying-up ambulances and their crews.

 

"This collective sin of omission translates directly into the bed crisis caused directly by losing over three-hundred beds since the infamous North Wales Health Is Changing scam, and what a scam it was.

 

"I’ve asked for a statement from BCUHB about announcing the reopening of cottage hospitals – the only viable solution, regardless of the waffle, excuses and downright dishonesty.

 

"I get responses two months late and not from all the bBoard members, only a well-prepared, hands-off, minimalist dance around the facts as an act of collective responsibility – a political deice used to suppress individual honesty, conscience and integrity.

 

"They have lost sight of who they serve – not the Minster, not me, not us – the frontline clinicians, technicians and nurses over whom they wield their strangling bureaucracy.

 

"My eyes go to Cardiff and the elusive and evasive Health Minister, of a cabal so committed to social engineering it thinks too great a demand can be met by persuading patients to reduce their needs. It is Cardiff which shields Betsi Cadwaladr from accountability."