Tom Griffin (London, The Green Ribbon): A report from the Commons Welsh Affairs Committee looked at one of the most sensitive aspects of devolution this week, the impact on NHS services that have traditionally straddled the English/Welsh border.
As a consequence of the tensions over diverging funding regimes in Wales and England, evidence suggests that there is a perception that the English NHS is subsidising the Welsh NHS. Evidence also suggests that Welsh patients perceive that they are being treated as second-class citizens within the National Health Service. Both suggestions should be addressed immediately by the Department of Health, the Welsh ssembly Government and health service providers to ensure that patients receiving treatment on both sides of the Welsh-English border are treated fairly and equally, and that they believe this to be the case.
In evidence to the Committee, First Minister Rhodri Morgan explained why North Wales in particular is still heavily reliant on specialist services based in England:
The population of North Wales is one thirteenth of the population of the North-West of England, therefore the relationship with even the small/medium centres, like Chester, but certainly with Merseyside and Greater Manchester in the provision of health services is totally different from the relationship between South Wales, which as two million people, and the greater Bristol areas, which would also have about two million people.
