NHS Winter Pressures

Liz Saville Roberts Excerpts

Monday 9th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Steve Barclay]

Let me first congratulate my right hon. Friend—along with the whole House, I am sure—on the knighthood that he received from His Majesty.

According to the analysis we have received, the variant in China is the same as the one in the United Kingdom. On the other hand, the data shared by China is often not as clear as we would like. That is why, over the Christmas period, my right hon. Friends the Prime Minister and the Secretary of State for Transport announced proportionate measures involving covid tests for travellers and, in particular, sequence variant testing for those coming into the UK, in order to identify any new variant quickly.

[Liz Saville Roberts (Dwyfor Meirionnydd) (PC)]

Strikes by nurses and ambulance workers are a last resort for overworked staff, who fear that patient safety is suffering as a result of increased demand and staff shortages. Instead of providing proper pay increases, the Labour Welsh Government have responded by offering Welsh health service staff tokenistic one-off payments, and, reportedly, the right hon. Gentleman’s Government are considering doing the same in England. Can he guarantee that if that approach is taken, one-off payments will be recognised as support with the cost of living crisis rather than proper pay increases, and will be treated as such for tax and benefit purposes?