Doctors call for urgent action on 'imminent NHS meltdown'

"Enough is enough" Dr Phil Banfield told me. "We've tried to point things out to health boards and ministers but we've had little response." He's hoping his warnings today might provoke a different reaction.

The warning that the welsh NHS faces imminent meltdown will certainly raise attention. The British Medical Association which Dr Banfield is chair of in Wales points at experience on the ground.

The list includes GPs not being recruited, the cost of temporary doctors are so expensive that practices are not commercially viable and leading to potential closures. Some hospitals are going without trainee doctors leaving services short of doctors.

It makes grim reading and there's a lot more in a report the BMA published today.

The solution they say is a full and urgent investigation into all services in the Welsh NHS. But why now? The Conservatives in Wales and leading politicians like Ann Clwyd have called for similar enquiries before.

Dr Banfield says it's because their past warnings have been ignored and the reality is nobody knows how widespread problems are.

Ministers have always said that Wales is small enough that if bad things were happening they would be spotted, and when things have gone wrong (see Princess of Wales hospital) individual enquires have been set up.

So will we have a full examination of the health service in Wales? It's unlikely. The line from Welsh ministers has always been that it would be costly and it's better to respond to individual problems as they arise.

Politicians calling for an enquiry is one thing, but the BMA represents frontline doctors. We don't know what response ministers will have, but they will be listening.