Government of Wales Bill

Although I believe in devolution, I believe also that there must be some form of joined-up government. The Welsh Assembly must be thinking along similar lines on certain issues, such as health, when it comes to cross-border services. That should certainly be taken into consideration. I move on to targets and hospitals. One of the problems for the Welsh is that, because the Assembly pays less for patients, they have to face far longer targets. If someone is Welsh and he or she comes across the border to use my hospital, they will have to wait far longer for their operation than my constituents wait. Many Welsh citizens say to me that they feel second-class citizens because of the waits that they face, and that they find them entirely unacceptable. My constituents are treated differently from Welsh citizens when it comes to prescribing drugs at the Royal Shrewsbury hospital. Some Welsh patients receive drugs that my constituents are not allowed to have, and vice versa. This is appalling. Surely the Labour Government, a Government who talk so passionately about the NHS, should be talking about ensuring that services and drugs for patients are the same at a hospital, no matter where they come from. I represent a border town and there are many farmers who own property on both sides of the border. They are frustrated by the differences in single farm payments with which they have to cope. These farmers get together at the Minsterley show every year to talk about how they are being treated in Wales and how they are being treated in England. Division is caused between the two sets of people. The Secretary of State talked about accountability. I shall give one example of where the Welsh Assembly is not proving accountable to people in England. There is a major project on the Welsh-English border—the Middletown bypass—that is being considered by the Welsh Assembly. This huge bypass will come across the border into my constituency, yet it will be adjudicated on by the First Minister, Rhodri Morgan, and the Welsh Assembly. We will have no input. Many acres of Shropshire countryside will be devastated by a huge bypass but we in Shropshire will have no say. We feel, as the Welsh felt in the past, a lack of accountability. I shall talk about jobs, about which I feel passionately. Unemployment has increased in my constituency by 25 per cent. over the past 12 months. We have lost many jobs across the border to Wales. Welsh Members may say, ““That is great. We are doing a better job than you are in attracting jobs.”” However, we are a united kingdom. We should be focusing on jobs throughout the country and not on poaching jobs from either side of the border on the basis that the Welsh Development Agency gives larger grants.