§ Mr. Nicholas Bennettasked the Secretary of State for Wales when it is expected that the Pembrokeshire health authority's funding will reach equalisation with other Welsh authorities at the level recommended by the Yates committee.
§ Mr. GristThe pace of revenue equalisation between health authorities in Wales cannot be predicted with certainty. It depends upon annual revisions to the revenue formula (developed by the Resource Allocation Working Group) for demographic and other data changes and the availability of resources for equalisation in the light of competing demands on growth funds. If there are no significant changes in the formula in future years and the scale of provision made available for equalisation in 1987–88 is maintained, all authorities in Wales other than516W Gwynedd should be within plus or minus 1 per cent. of their formula shares by 1990–91. Given that the formula is intended to be only an indicator of relative resource needs, I would regard such a banding as the achievement of a broad measure of equalisation which represents our current policy objective.