Debate contribution: Healthcare: Integrated 111 Service

Debate contribution by Mr Alan Chambers on 18 May 2026.

MLA: Mr Alan Chambers
Party at the time: Ulster Unionist Party
Date: 18 May 2026
Type: Debate contribution
Business: Opposition Business
Heading: Healthcare: Integrated 111 Service
Assembly identifier: Official Report component 5548798

Text

Few issues better reflect the pressures facing our health service across these islands than the pressures on urgent and emergency care. Every MLA in the Chamber will know of constituents and families who have contacted our offices to highlight their experiences. As the Minister has said regularly in the Chamber, those pressures are no longer associated just with winter but are persistent and all year round. Demand continues to rise. Patients present with increasingly complex needs and challenges, with delayed discharges continuing to place enormous strain on hospitals and ambulance services alike. Against that backdrop, the principle behind an integrated regional 111 service is sound. While I support the ambition behind the motion, we must be realistic about timelines. Establishing a fully integrated regional 111 service by September 2026 would require significant workforce planning, digital infrastructure and financial investment. It simply cannot be delivered overnight, nor, I suspect, by September, especially given the fact that we still await a Budget. Mr McGrath mentioned the current pressure on our workforce: he is absolutely spot on. However, the timeline in the motion would undoubtedly add to that pressure between now and September. In principle, a properly designed 111 system could absolutely provide patients with a simpler and more accessible route into urgent care. It could help to ensure that people receive advice earlier, are directed towards the most appropriate setting and avoid unnecessary attendance at already overcrowded emergency departments. Therefore, I am keen to see it delivered. Importantly, the debate also goes directly to the heart of the wider shift-left agenda. For too long, Northern Ireland — a bit like the NHS across the UK — has operated a hospital-centric model that is no longer sustainable. However, we should not pretend that a 111 service on its own is a silver bullet. That is why I very much welcome some of the practical measures that are already under way. Phone First services help to direct patients towards more appropriate pathways, while same-day emergency care services and Hospital at Home models are beginning to demonstrate how care can be delivered differently and more effectively. Likewise, the recent introduction of the Ambulance Service's release-to-rescue protocol has the potential to be a real game changer. For too long, ambulance crews have effectively been trapped outside hospitals instead of responding to emergencies in the community. As an MLA, I have worked with families in North Down over the years who have had to watch a family loved one lie on the ground in pain for appalling lengths of time because there was not sufficient crew available to attend to them with the urgency required. I commend the Minister for taking steps to rectify that even if they are not always entirely easy or universally popular. The problems that we see in our hospitals today started many years ago. One of the greatest dangers for any health system that is under sustained pressure is that abnormal conditions gradually become normalised. Corridor care, excessive ambulance handover delays and patients waiting unacceptable lengths of time for treatment should never become accepted as simply part of modern healthcare. That is why the responsibility is on us all to ensure that emergency care in Northern Ireland does not just exist but is capable of delivering the safe and timely care that patients deserve. Introducing a 111 service is part of a much broader programme of reform, one based on long-term planning, workforce investment and the political will to confront the deep structural problems across our health system.

586 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

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