Part of 1. Questions to the Minister for Health and Social Services – in the Senedd at 2:06 pm on 24 March 2021.
Well, on the specific issues around Black and Asian origin communities here in Wales, we've done quite a lot in recognising our need to improve our services, whether that's mental health or physical health. We've learnt even more and are doing even more work through the pandemic—for example, the work of Professor Emmanuel Ogbonna in understanding more about those inequalities, the work of Professor Keshav Singhal in undertaking the risk-assessment work, a first within the UK that's being rolled out to other parts of the private sector, but also in the vaccination roll-out as well. And it's perhaps appropriate to mention, given that John Griffiths asked the initial question, the work that John Griffiths and Jayne Bryant have done together with Newport City Council, with the health board, on encouraging more people to undertake not just their vaccinations, but the broader re-engagement of the health service and our broader care systems with different communities that aren't always as close to other parts of the country when it comes to accessing good quality healthcare. So, progress is being made not just on a single issue, but to take that forward more generally.
When it comes, though, to the challenges of healthcare inequalities, I would say to the Member, and any other Conservative who wants to try to claim they have no responsibility in this area, that every objective analysis shows that the Conservative policies of austerity and the attacks on benefits and support for working-age people, including in-work benefits, have had a serious impact on increasing poverty and inequality, especially on the reductions in the gains made over the first part of the last 20 years in reducing child poverty, which have all been lost thanks to choices made by her party. So, perhaps some self-reflection on the role of Conservative policies and the reality that we have had to fight back to undo the damage that her party has chosen to cause.