Oral Answers to Questions Debate

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Department: Northern Ireland Office

Oral Answers to Questions

Glyn Davies Excerpts
Wednesday 29th October 2014

(9 years, 6 months ago)

Commons Chamber
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Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton Portrait The Prime Minister
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I know what I said about the Barnett formula, and I will not go away from that. What we need to see in Wales is a real debate about what I call a double yes—yes to another referendum on tax-raising powers and yes to those powers so that the Welsh Assembly takes greater responsibility for raising and spending more of its own money. That is the right pathway.

Glyn Davies Portrait Glyn Davies (Montgomeryshire) (Con)
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Q6. As there has never been a major hospital in Montgomeryshire, my Welsh constituents have always accessed treatment in England. They have to wait a minimum of 26 weeks for treatment. Their close neighbours living over the border wait a maximum of only 18 weeks. Does the Prime Minister think that that is fair?

Lord Cameron of Chipping Norton Portrait The Prime Minister
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I know that there are some real issues of fairness here, and that there are many more patients travelling from Wales to England than there are from England to Wales. Waiting times are quite different. For example, the typical average waiting time for a hip replacement in England is 70 days, but in Wales it is 170 days. That is not right. The Opposition cannot have it both ways. They want to blame the politicians in England for the NHS, but they take absolutely no blame for the appalling state of the NHS in Wales.