Calls for Dedicated School Nurse at Heol Goffa

VULNERABLE children with some of the most profound and complex medical needs at a Llanelli special school are being ‘put at risk’ by the lack of a dedicated school nurse, a Labour Llanelli town councillor has warned.

Lliedi councillor Shaun Greaney, a former governor of Ysgol Heol Goffa, is urging Plaid-run Carmarthenshire County Council and Hywel Dda University Health Board to appoint a dedicated school nurse without delay.

‘Parents have told me the authorities are playing Russian roulette with their children’s lives at the moment,’ said councillor Greaney.
He called it ‘a scandal which could have terrible consequences.’

The Children’s Commissioner for Wales, Rocio Cifuentes MBE, and her team are currently investigating after it was revealed that teachers and support staff are regularly administering emegency medicine, and are tube feeding, and seizure monitoring to ensure the health and safety of a number of children.
Councillor Greaney said headteacher Miss Ceri Hopkins had been battling for five years for a nurse to be appointed to, and based at, Ysgol Heol Goffa, calling it ‘an inordinate delay’.

‘The school, the parents, and I, feel this is a dangerous situation which cannot be allowed to continue to fester to the point of a fatality. Further dilly and dallying threatens to breach Children’s rights to a safe education.

‘The staff at the school are amazing and are doing their very best to avoid that but they are not medically trained to the standard of a nurse and that’s what these children need and deserve.’ he said.

Now councillor Greaney has brought a motion – seconded by Labour group leader councillor David Darkin – to this week’s (WEDNESDAY) full meeting of Llanelli Town Council urging colleagues to back the school’s pleas for a dedicated nurse.

Speaking in advance of the meeting, councillor Greaney said: ‘This is about protecting the children and their wellbeing, not party politics. I am hoping that all parties in the Chamber – all councillors, will examine their consciences and ask themselves – would they be happy for their own children to be faced with the same potentially unsafe situation?’

The Motion calls on Carmarthenshire County Council ‘to take all necessary steps’ to secure the immediate appointment of a dedicated full-time registered nurse for Ysgol Heol Goffa.

It adds that the recommendation by Estyn in January this year, the intervention of the Children’s Commissioner for Wales, and the concerns of Llanelli MP Dame Nia Griffith ‘all require a clear and time-bound response from Hywel Dda University Health Board.’

The Motion also asks for ‘a clear update of what the Health Board intends to do and when.’

Councillor Greaney said: ‘This is an opportunity to be grasped by the town council to send out a clarion call, on behalf of the whole of Llanelli, The county council and health board must not be allowed to duck and dive out of this with more delay and dither.

‘They must deliver for the safety and the sake of some of Llanelli’s very special children who suffer dire and sometimes life-limiting disadvantages.
‘Further failure to act would be criminal in my book.’

Before seconding the Motion, councillor Darkin said: ‘All we are calling for is the righting of what is a clear wrong, an injustice faced by the school community.

‘The children’s needs are such that the case for a dedicated, full-time nurse on site is clear and categoric.’

Carmarthenshire County Council’s Leader, Cllr Linda Evans, said:

“The Local Authority and the school have expressed concerns about the lack of a dedicated school nurse for several years, well before the Estyn inspection report. Hywel Dda Health Board is responsible for the school nursing service in Carmarthenshire. The school and the Local Authority are in ongoing discussions with the Health Board about ensuring the nursing needs of learners are met.”