1. Will the Minister make a statement on the Welsh Ambulance Trust? OAQ(5)0027(HWS)

Thank you for the question. I’m pleased with the significant progress made by the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust in implementing the organisational changes to the service recommended by the McClelland review. In May, the target for responses to the red category of the most life-threatening emergencies had been met or exceeded for the eighth month in a row with 75.5 per cent being answered within the target time.

Thank you, Cabinet Secretary. A matter that has come to light recently, certainly in my own Constituency, is the nature of the questions asked by call handlers when first dialling 999, when somebody is calling an ambulance on behalf of someone not personally known to them. It’s happened to me twice in recent weeks where I haven’t known the person, but they’ve fallen outside my office. The series of questions leading to some serious delays have been found problematic, simply because you cannot, often, answer the type of questions that you’re asked if you don’t know the person. Only recently, a local shopkeeper has been left in shock after being unable to answer such questions, and the individual concerned was actually rapidly deteriorating before his very eyes. He felt quite helpless and worried by the delay, and sadly the individual has since passed away.

A recent Wales Audit Office report highlighted concerns about call handling and classifications, and a recent freedom of information request submitted by us showed communication and attitude as an issue for many making complaints to the ambulance trust. I’m really quite unsure as to how the emergency call handling system works on behalf of each different emergency service. Cabinet Secretary, having raised my really serious concerns on this here with you today, will you assure me that you will work with the trust to ensure that call handlers are more sensitively taking into account an individual calling an ambulance in the first instance? This should be considered as an urgent priority.

Thank you for the question. I think it is important to try and understand how best to deal with concerns people raise when ringing call handlers. I can’t speak for every other emergency service and the way they deal with matters—of course, one of them is not currently devolved—but I do expect that, in examining all the information of the ambulance quality indicators and looking at the review of the new model that we have that will come up this autumn, there is a proper opportunity to look again and to review to see if we have appropriate questions being asked to make sure that people are then dealt with sensitively as well. If people do feel that they have constituents who have not been handled in a sensitive manner, I’d be happy to receive those comments and questions if you haven’t already taken them up with the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust.

The Cabinet Secretary will be aware of the developments of the Choose Well campaign, which has been promoted jointly by a number of health boards, the ambulance trust, Welsh Government, trade unions and other organisations, as you know. The campaign encourages the public to stop and think before calling an ambulance for non-emergency or life-threatening conditions, or before turning up to A&E with relatively minor complaints and ailments. Instead, the public are encouraged to refer to pharmacists, GPs, NHS Direct and other alternative care pathways, thus freeing up ambulances to respond to red 1 calls and relieve pressure on A&E.

Does the Cabinet Secretary agree with me that this campaign has been a contributory factor in alleviating some of the pressures, but the marginal increase in the overall number of emergency calls being received by the ambulance service highlights the need for continued widespread support and publicity in the drive to educate the public on the appropriate use of emergency services?

Yes. Thank you for the question. You make a completely fair point about how we encourage and equip the public to make more informed choices, to access healthcare appropriately so that if you don’t need the precious resource of an emergency ambulance response, there are other alternatives available to you and how you access those is easily understood and available. So, there is more work that we need to do to make sure that that information is available, as well as wanting the public to engage in that information. I’m grateful to all of the key stakeholders, including your former employer, for actually trying to positively highlight the Choose Well service and the information that is available so that people can make that properly informed choice.

How many times in the eight months that you were talking about, Cabinet Secretary, have the targets been met in the Hywel Dda health board area? And, who’s responsible for that failure?

I expect to see further improvements in response times in every single health board area—

How many times?

And I expect, when we see the next series of quality indicators in the next quarterly report at the end of July, that you’ll see I’m optimistic that Hywel Dda will have hit its response times, because it hasn’t always done so at the start of the pilot.

This was part of the recognition of where we are. Across the whole of Wales, we’re hitting the target. The challenge is, in those areas where we’re not doing so, what could we and should we do about it? That is ‘we’ in its broader sense. It’s about what the ambulance service does; it’s about what the commissioners of the service do and it’s also, actually, about understanding what community first responders do as well, because it isn’t just an issue for rural Wales and, often, community first responders are the first port of call in getting someone the help they need initially, on the scene. That’s especially relevant in rural Wales, so I’m really pleased to see that the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust are working with St John’s Ambulance to develop a new pathway and a new model for community first responders and the service that they can provide.

I actually think that if you bear with us, you’ll see further improvements in Hywel Dda and other parts of Wales, that I’m sure will better serve you and your constituents.