Welsh first minister shakes with anger in clash with Tory leader over NHS budget

Wales’s First Minister Mark Drakeford was visibly overcome with emotion when he clashed with the country’s Tory leader over the NHS budget.

Andrew RT Davies quoted a member of the public who said healthcare in Wales was ‘like a third-world country’ after he fell and then had to wait for an ambulance on the floor in pain for 15 hours.

Mr Drakeford launched into a passionate tirade when he responded: ‘You have chosen to use that language here this afternoon. What do those people face?

‘They face cuts to their pay because of the policy of your Government, and now they face cuts to the budgets that the health service itself will have at its disposal.

‘It is shocking. It is absolutely shocking to me, but you will think that you can turn up here this afternoon with a mess that your party has made to the budgets of this country to the reputation of this country around the world.

‘You think you turn up here this afternoon and claim some sort of moral high ground? What sort of world do you belong in?’

Those sitting around Mr Drakeford in the Senedd nodded and banged their desks.

Eventually, Llywydd Elin Jones had to interject to try and de-escalate things.

She said: ‘I understand that the arguments and the feelings run high on these issues from a variety of perspectives.

‘I understand some of the shouting taking place, but I won’t have people pointing in anger and just sticking and gesticulating in anger at other people.

‘Can we just take a moment just to calm down?’

Scottish first minister Nicola Sturgeon tweeted soon after: ‘100% with Mark Drakeford his anger and frustration at Tories who take a sledge hammer to the economy and public services, and then try to pretend that the consequences have nothing to do with them. They do just the same in Scotland’.

The Conservatives are currently facing huge backlash for Liz Truss’s disastrous budget, which sent the pound crashing.

Ms Truss has since had to make several humiliating U-turns, with the latest seeing Jeremy Hunt replace Kwasi Kwarteng as chancellor.

A recent poll gave Labour a record 36-point lead over the Tories – suggesting the SNP could win more seats and be the official opposition after the next general election.

Redfield and Wilton Strategies put Labour on 56 per cent, the Tories on 20 and the Liberal Democrats on 11. That could see the Tories win just 22 seats, behind the SNP on 42, the Lib Dems on 47 and Labour on 515.

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The first minister said: ‘You think you turn up here this afternoon and claim some sort of moral high ground?’