Plaid say Mark Drakeford humiliated after clarifying Betsi comments

Plaid Cymru, whose leader Adam Price is pictured centre, accused Mark Drakeford, pictured to the left, of being humiliated

Plaid Cymru says Mark Drakeford has been humiliated after the first minister clarified comments he made about north Wales' health board.

Mr Drakeford told the Senedd that the Auditor General, Adrian Crompton, had given advice to bring Betsi Cadwaladr out of special measures in 2020.

But in a letter Mr Drakeford said Audit Wales "did not... advise ministers directly on these matters".

Mr Drakeford said he was "keen to make sure people have the clearest account".

Plaid's Rhun ap Iorwerth, the party's health spokesman, said the Welsh public "would have preferred ministers to just be honest".

Mr ap Iorwerth made the comments shortly before his own party leader embarked on a joint visit with the first minister as part of the Welsh government-Plaid Cymru co-operation deal.

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Last week Plaid Cymru revealed that Mr Crompton had said he had not given advice to bring Betsi Cadwaladr out of special measures two years ago.

Mr Price had written to Mr Drakeford after the first minister told the Senedd: "The decision... was because we were advised that that is what we should do by the auditor general, by Healthcare Inspectorate Wales and by Welsh government officials whose job it is to provide ministers with the advice."

The health board had been put back into the highest level of government supervision the day before.

The Senedd's record of proceedings has now been amended to include a footnote to Mr Drakeford's comments, with links to two letters from him to the presiding officer, Elin Jones.

Adam Price and Mark Drakeford chatted to pupils at Ysgol Caer Elen in Haverfordwest

The first letter explains the process that leads to a decision on special measures, while the second says Mr Drakeford "was anxious to correct any misunderstanding about the process".

"I hope my letter did that by setting out the three-stage process leading to ministerial decisions about NHS organisations' escalation status and clarifying that Audit Wales did not - and does not - advise ministers directly on these matters."

A similar footnote was made to remarks by Mr Gething in November 2020, when he said that taking Betsi out of special measures was the "clear, objective advice" of Audit Wales, the body that Mr Crompton heads-up.

Plaid Cymru health spokesman Mr ap Iorwerth said: "So Welsh government asks for letters to be added as footnotes to the Senedd record, which proves they misled the Senedd over taking Betsi Cadwaladr health board out of special measures.

"But they won't actually admit to misleading the Senedd! You couldn't make it up."

"Our point has been proven, and it's rather humiliating for Mark Drakeford and his Labour government, but I'm sure that the Welsh public would have preferred ministers to just be honest."

Betsi Cadwaladr health board has been back in special measures since late February

The clarification emerged on the same day Mr Drakeford and Plaid Cymru leader Adam Price were on a visit in Pembrokeshire.

Speaking at Ysgol Caer Elen in Haverfordwest, Mr Drakeford said the process where ministers make decisions about a health board's status is "complex".

"If you're trying to summarise it briefly on your feet on the floor of the Senedd, you don't always convey the full complexity of things," he said.

"I want to make sure that people in Wales know exactly how the system works.

"I set that out in a letter to the presiding officer. I'm grateful that she's happy for it to sit in the record of the Senedd so that there can be no confusion on the part of anybody."

Asked if he could have been clearer, he said: "What I've done is made sure that if anybody wasn't clear, there's no reason at all why they can't be clear in the future."

Mr Price, when asked if he agreed if the clarification was humiliating, said: "It isn't the focus of our visit today."

"We've been calling for the record to be corrected. We're glad that that's happened, and we want to reflect further on it," he added.