NO waits longer than seven days for a GP appointment and recruiting more doctors could improve the NHS in Gwent.

That’s according to candidates seeking the support of voters at May’s Senedd election where the health service, and its performance, will be a major issue.

The Welsh Government spends around half of its total budget, which is £27 billion this year, on health and social care but too often headlines around the NHS feature stretched budgets, long waiting lists and patient dissatisfaction.

While official figures show hospital waiting lists fell in February, for the eighth month in a row and down 28,000 from January, the picture is mixed with the number of patients waiting longer than the target times for both diagnostics and therapies having risen to the highest on record since 2024.

In an effort to respond to concerns over waiting times, the Welsh Government invested £120m over the past year to increase the number of operations performed.

But locally the Aneurin Bevan University Health Board, which is responsible for NHS services and hospitals in Gwent, has planned for the number of patients waiting two years for some surgeries to increase over the next 12 months without further additional funding being available.

With elections to the Senedd to be held in May candidates standing in two of the new super constituencies covering Gwent have been asked how their parties will approach improving the ambulance service, waits to see GPs and emergency care.

Gwent has already seen significant investment, and knock-on changes to services, with the opening of the Grange Hospital at Cwmbran shortly before the last Senedd election in 2021.

While that created a centralised critical care centre it has also meant the accident and emergency unit at Newport’s Royal Gwent and Nevill Hall in Abergavenny operate as minor injuries units.

Labour is promising three new hospitals, in Wrexham, west Wales and Cardiff which Anthony Hunt, one of the candidates the party is putting forward for the six seats in the Sir Fynwy Torfaen constituency, called a “£4 billion fund” that will “modernise services”.

The election, which many believe will see Labour lose its grip on power in Cardiff Bay, is being pitted as a straight fight between Reform and Plaid Cymru. Support from across the expanded 96 member Senedd is likely to be required to form a government with the fully proportional system intended to make single party majorities less likely.

The Conservatives, whose current Senedd Member for Monmouth Peter Fox, will contest the Sir Fynwy Torfaen seat, has, similar to Reform, promised to work with surgeries on staffing but has an eye-catching promise on appointments.

Mr Fox said: “We will invest in primary care, recruit and retain more staff while working with GP surgeries.”

Ian Chandler, who is the Green Party’s top ranked candidate in Sir Fynwy Torfaen, said it would “restore the share of NHS funding for primary care, enabling more GPs, nurses and community health workers—expanding capacity, improving access, and shifting care closer to home.”