Nearly one in five North Wales A&E patients waited 12 hours or more in March
Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board recorded the worst A&E performance of any Welsh health board in March 2026 for the third month running, new Welsh Government statistics show.
51.9% of patients at a BCUHB emergency department were admitted, transferred or discharged within the four-hour target in March, compared with 75.1% at Hywel Dda, the best-performing board in Wales.
18.7% of BCUHB A&E patients waited more than 12 hours, also the worst figure in Wales, where the target is that no patient should wait that long.
BCUHB’s four-hour performance was 49.4% in January, its lowest on record, and 49.6% in February.
March’s 51.9% is the first measurable improvement in the board’s four-hour performance since the winter.
More than 48% of patients attending a BCUHB emergency department in March waited longer than the Welsh Government’s four-hour target.
Across Wales, 64.2% of A&E patients were seen within four hours in March, up from 63.7% in February but still well below the 95% target.
10,939 patients waited more than 12 hours to be admitted, transferred or discharged across Wales, 1,126 more than in February.
Half of all the most serious “red” ambulance calls were reached within 9 minutes 25 seconds, longer than in February and above the six-to-eight minute target.
One in ten red calls took longer than 22 minutes 23 seconds to reach.
BCUHB also recorded the worst figures in Wales in February on NHS treatment waiting lists, with nearly one in five patients on the waiting list having waited more than a year, and 1.7% waiting more than two years.
The board was also worst in Wales on diagnostic tests, with 51.1% of patients waiting longer than the eight-week target.
BCUHB has been in Level 5 special measures since February 2023.
Cabinet Secretary for Health and Social Care Jeremy Miles told the Senedd in March that serious concerns remained at the health board, particularly around operational performance and timely access to urgent and emergency care.
Responding to the March figures, Welsh Conservative Spokesperson for Health and Social Care Peter Fox MS said: “After repeated promises to cut waiting lists, these latest figures lay bare Labour and Plaid’s record over the past 27 years; missed targets, broken promises and patients paying the price.”
Fox said the Welsh Conservatives would declare a “health emergency”, increase the number of hospital beds and create a Cancer Treatments Fund.
Reform UK Wales’s Claire Archibald said: “27 years of Plaid and Labour failure has broken the Welsh NHS.”
Archibald said Reform would “put resources wasted on bureaucrats back into primary care” and “hold failing managers to account.”
Welsh Labour leader and First Minister Eluned Morgan MS said: “Nine months in a row waiting lists have fallen in Wales, the biggest sustained drop on record.”
Morgan said the all-Wales average treatment wait was now 16.7 weeks, down from 23 weeks when she became First Minister.
Plaid Cymru spokesperson for health and social care Mabon ap Gwynfor MS said: “Nothing symbolises Labour’s record in government quite like the fact that one in five people in Wales are on an NHS waiting list, with thousands still waiting more than two years for treatment.”
Ap Gwynfor said patients were “living in pain, discomfort and anxiety” and were not getting the treatment they needed.
Plaid said the party would deliver ten new surgical hubs specialising in treatments with the longest waits.
The Wales Green Party said the figures showed a “system stuck in crisis” and said NHS resources should be shifted into prevention and early treatment.
The Welsh Liberal Democrats had not issued a statement at the time of publication.
Separate figures in the same release showed the all-Wales NHS treatment waiting list fell to just under 688,000 in February, the ninth month in a row the figure has dropped and the lowest since December 2021.
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