Catastrophic out of hours service cost millions - Jenny Randerson

12.00.00am BST (GMT +0100) Wed 13th Sep 2006

New research by Welsh Liberal Democrat health spokesperson Jenny Randerson has shown that the GP out of hours services imposed on local health boards in 2004 not only caused clinical chaos, but cost many local health boards far more than was budgeted for.

"GP out of hours services were contracted out in 2004 and these figures show that many local health boards had to spend thousands or hundreds of thousands of pounds more than they planned paying for the service.

"Ceredigion local health board paid an extra half a million pounds: Powys paid £681,000 and Wrexham paid £361, 000 in additional funding in the last year alone. That's not even taking into account the extra funding it cost on the previous year.

"When the new services were launched the clinical disasters were well documented. I know most Assembly Members received complaints from their constituents about how the service had got poorer.

"These figures show that not only was the out of hours service a clinical disaster, leaving patients hanging on the end of the phone or without access to appropriate treatment, but also a financial catastrophe. To re-launch a service so it costs more and delivers a poorer service has to go down as one of this government's biggest failures."