Health Minister Eluned Morgan has announced that Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board will be put into special measures because of serious concerns about performance, leadership and culture.
The Chair, Vice Chair and independent members of the Board have agreed they will step aside. New independent members will be appointed to the Board to lead the organisation as it continues to rebuild its services following the pandemic.
Health and Social Services Minister Eluned Morgan said: “I have serious concerns around the performance of the health board and I have not seen the improvement in services I expect for the people of north Wales. I have therefore decided to take action to rectify this.
“I have informed the Board that I am putting the organisation back into Special Measures with immediate effect. This significant decision is made in line with the escalation framework. It reflects serious concerns about the performance of the organisation, about its governance, and issues with leadership and culture that are holding back progress.
“I recognise that the health board has had significant challenges for a number of years and has worked hard to overcome these challenges. But now is the time for new leadership to deliver the improvements that are needed.”
A number of direct appointments to the Board have been made by the Minister to ensure stability. The non-executive team will be led by Dyfed Edwards as the new Chair of the Betsi Cadwaladr Health Board, a former leader of Gwynedd Council and the deputy chair of the Welsh Revenue Authority.
The new Chair will focus on renewing the leadership and culture of the Health Board which will support its workforce to provide safe and effective services for the people of north Wales.
Dyfed will be supported by Gareth Williams, Karen Balmer and Rhian Watcyn Jones as interim independent members of the Board.
Further direct appointments will follow in the next few weeks. A campaign to recruit new independent members to the Board who will take the organisation forward beyond this initial period of stabilisation will commence later this year.
Key to developing and building a sustainable organisation will be the appointment of the substantive chief executive. The recruitment process for this post is about to start.
The health board will also be supported by an intervention and support team.
Health and Social Services Minister Eluned Morgan added: “Every day thousands of people are receiving good care from the NHS in north Wales but there is a large degree of inconsistency in safety, performance and quality across the region, addressing this inconsistency will be the focus of the new board. Whilst special measures will apply to the organisation, I wish to reassure both patients and communities served by the Health Board, as well as the staff working for it, that day to day services and activities will continue, with an increased focus on quality and safety.”
Responding to the news that Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board (BCUHB) has been put back into special measures, Plaid Cymru spokesperson for health and care, Rhun ap Iorwerth MS said:
“A little over two years since the ill-fated decision to take Betsi Cadwaladr prematurely out of special measures – conveniently before the 2021 Senedd elections – and we now hear that the health board is being put back into special measures, and members of the Independent Board have been made scapegoats.
“Rather than pointing the finger of blame at the Board, Welsh Government should be looking closer to home. This is as much a failure of ministerial leadership as it is leadership within Betsi Cadwaladr. This all happened on Labour’s watch.
“The people in the north of Wales have witnessed damning report after damning report about their health service. They’re the ones that have been suffering under this dysfunction, incompetence and chaotic mess at hands of Labour Welsh Government.
“The patients and staff of Betsi Cadwaladr deserve better from their government. The least they deserve is an apology, but what we all need is the government to step up and take responsibility for this mess. The question is what will it take for the Health Minister consider her own position in the matter?”
Welsh Liberal Democrat Leader Jane Dodds said: “This is the right decision, but Labour should never have allowed the situation to deteriorate to this point in the first place.
“It is clear that the Health Board shouldn’t have been taken out of special measures in 2020 and we now need to understand why that happened prematurely if the problems are still so extensive.
“People in North Wales cannot continue to pay the price for Welsh Government inaction.”
