Welsh NHS Confederation response to the Finance Committee consultation on the draft budget
Key points
In our response to the to the Senedd Finance Committee Consultation, we highlighted the following key priorities for our members, NHS leaders in Wales, and asked that the Welsh Government Budget for 2025-26 supports the following areas:
Introduce longer-term funding cycles to ensure financial certainty: Move from short-term to long-term thinking and budget setting to give sectors some long-term financial certainty.
Capital: Increase capital funding and develop a ten-year investment plan for service change to reshape NHS estates and infrastructure. This includes examining how fiscal rules might be amended to allow for the recycling of capital.
Revenue: Provide funding to cover inflationary and demand pressures to address the backlog in elective care, the increased acuity of patients’ post-pandemic and support the maintenance of NHS estates and infrastructure, including digital.
Workforce: Support the development of an overarching long-term workforce plan and sustainably increase investment in the NHS workforce, so we continue to see an increase in the number of students and trainees across a range of professional groups.
Social care: Increase funding for local authorities to ensure the sustainability of the social care sector. Ring-fenced funding should have clearly defined outcomes to ensure spend drives the change needed.
Tackling inequalities through prevention and health in all policies: Shift funding to better resource the wider determinants of health and publish a delivery plan outlining the resources, funding, priorities, and actions taken across all government departments to tackle inequalities.
Digital investment: Adequately invest in digital infrastructure to underpin ambitions to maximise the potential of digital advancements in the NHS.
NHS and the economy: Recognise the NHS’s role as a key driver of economic activity and employment when allocating budgets. A well-resourced NHS is vital to the running of the economy, including supporting people to get work.
