NHS ‘is in need of a permanent funding solution’
THE Welsh NHS is being disadvantaged by the “outdated” Barnett Formula which is used to allocate funds to the devolved nations, a senior doctor has warned.
Dr David Bailey, chairman of the British Medical Association’s Welsh Council, said our health system needs a permanent funding solution rather than emergency cash boosts from the Welsh Government each winter.
The Welsh NHS has been under intense pressure in recent weeks. A rise in flu cases and the winter vomiting bug norovirus have led to increased demand on both primary and secondary care and the cancellation of non-urgent operations in some health boards.
Last week, the Welsh Government announced an additional £10m to support health boards, the ambulance service and social care services across Wales.
Dr Bailey said the responsibility for making sure Wales’ NHS is suitably funded to provide high-quality healthcare must lie with the Treasury’s Barnett Formula.
He said: “The current pressures in the system come as no surprise to us. BMA Cymru Wales has consistently said that the whole system is under strain, with both primary and secondary care being forced to try and cope with inadequate resources, an unsustainable workload and a workforce under considerable strain across the whole of Wales.
“There is constant pressure impacting significantly on emergency departments, generating severe challenges in bed access throughout hospitals.
“This is further compounded by cuts to social care creating difficulties in getting people out of hospital and back into their own environments.
“The Barnett Formula is used to determine the amount of funding Wales receives. BMA Cymru Wales continues to believe that the formula is outdated and disadvantages Wales.
“The Welsh Government announced £10m extra funding to address winter pressures on Friday.
“This is welcomed but a permanent funding solution across the entire NHS needs to be implemented and investment must keep up with demand in every part of the system.”
Royal College of Nursing Wales director Tina Donnelly claims there needs to be an “honest conversation” on how the NHS across the UK is funded.
She said one of the solutions would be the introduction of an “NHS tax” which could bring in the “billions” the service needs.
She told BBC Wales: “There are no quick fixes here, 49% of the budget given to the Welsh Government already goes to the NHS.
“If the public still demands a free NHS, then we have to have an honest public conversation and say we cannot afford it under current financial arrangements.
“It is not rocket science. Maybe we could have an NHS tax, an increase by a penny in every pound for all the working population. It would bring in billions.”
Ms Donnelly has called for this to be done at a UK Government level and said it should have cross-party agreement, describing getting rid of the NHS as “political suicide”.
Last month, the Welsh Conservatives’ health spokeswoman Angela Burns said the argument over the funding allocation for Wales was “growing more threadbare”.
She said: “I participated in an Assembly debate [in December] where Members took it in their turn to scrutinise the spending priorities proposed by Welsh Government for 2018-19.
“Here I took the opportunity to question the Cabinet Secretary for Finance Mark Drakeford AM how – at such a desperate time for the health service, with four health boards facing multi-million-pound deficits and only a real-terms 0.5% budget increase to the Welsh NHS – the situation can improve.
“Surely, I put it to the Cabinet Secretary, this paltry rise in spending was barely enough to keep the wheels of the health service from falling off.
“As expected, the ghost of austerity was resurrected several times throughout the debate by Labour Members, who in a collective state of amnesia ignored the fact that for every £1 spent on NHS users in England, the UK Government has made available £1.20 for their equivalents here in Wales, in my view putting to bed once and for all the decades-old complaint of underfunding.”