PRESS RELEASE : Welsh Conservatives respond to RCN strike decision [November 2022]

The press release issued by the Welsh Conservatives on 9 November 2022.

The Royal College of Nursing have voted to strike across six health boards in Labour-run Wales.

Nurses in all but one health board (Aneurin Bevan UHB covering Gwent) will go on strike on various days in the coming months.

Welsh Ambulance Service NHS Trust Headquarters, Velindre NHS Trust, Public Health Wales, NHS Shared Services Partnership, and Digital Health and Care Wales have also met the required threshold for strike action.

Commenting, Welsh Conservative Shadow Health Minister Russell George MS said:

“It is highly regrettable that nurses have decided to go on strike, with all the implications for patients who depend on NHS services, but let there be no doubt that nursing pay and conditions are the responsibility of the Labour Government in Cardiff Bay.

“This will only compound the problems facing the UK’s worst-run NHS as, under Labour, Wales has the longest treatment waiting lists, A&E waiting times, and ambulance response times in the country.

“I would stress that we cannot make the NHS permanently dependent on agency nurses but, in Labour-run Wales, it is already the case, with nurse vacancies going up by a thousand in just the last year, with £134m spent on agency workers.

“I hope the Minister finally engages with the Royal College of Nursing to bring this dispute to an end as swiftly as possible – it is disgraceful that she has avoided doing this so far to the detriment of patients and staff across Wales.”