Healthcare Inspectorate Wales 'needs more money'

Alun Jones and Dr Kate Chamberlain of Health Inspectorate Wales take questions from AMs

Health inspectors need more money if they are expected to follow up every recommendation or inspection they carry out, the head of the watchdog has said.

Dr Kate Chamberlain, chief executive of Healthcare Inspectorate Wales (HIW), told AMs they "would like to do more" but "did not have the capacity".

She denied failing to tackle Betsi Cadwaladr Health Board over problems which led to special measures.

The board had been unresponsive to the issues raised with them, she said.

When questioned about resources, Dr Chamberlain told AMs on Tuesday the big challenge they had was "resilience".

"Am I adequately resourced? I think the answer to that would have to be no, I would like to do more," she said.

"I think you've quite rightly flagged up that the NHS is a very wide body," she added.

"So if the expectation is that we will be in all of these places regularly and following up on every inspection, then no, we certainly do not have the resources to do that.

"However we need to have that conversation... about what specifically is our remit and our role."

In response to questions about Betsi Cadwaladr, Dr Chamberlain said: "We had concerns about the responsiveness of the health board to the issues being raised with them, the changes they were making and that is a part of the journey we have been on in terms of the governance review and in terms of escalation of the status of the health board to special measures.

"It's really important now that the health board gets itself organised."