UNUSUALLY this week I wanted to write about a devolved issue – one that affects all our lives – the NHS.

Most people I speak to are full of praise for the care they receive from our fantastic NHS staff.

But constituents sometimes come to Vaughan and me with legitimate concerns about the care they have received from the NHS in Wales, or indeed in the rest of the UK, and as your local AM and MP we always follow up on any concerns that are raised.

The NHS in Wales is not perfect, and the Welsh Government recognise that reform and progress is needed in a number of areas, but I have been increasingly disgusted by the Tory strategy of smearing our NHS. Running down the morale of doctors, nurses and health workers is not going to help anyone.

To be told that Offa’s Dyke is a line between life and death by David Cameron or by Jeremy Hunt that Wales has a second-class service is inaccurate, cynical and offensive.

In fact, the Welsh NHS is outperforming the increasingly fragmented service in England.

The staff in our Welsh NHS - in Llandough, UHW and elsewhere - are hard-working, caring and compassionate, they deliver under pressure.

In Wales, almost 90 per cent of people start their cancer treatment within 62 days, in England only 84 per cent do.

In Wales, delayed discharges are at an all-time low, in England they are at an all-time high.

In Wales, we’ve not wasted £3billion on a damaging reorganisation that nobody wanted and nobody voted for.

When the Tories were last in charge in Wales in the 1990s it was not uncommon for people to be waiting 18 months for operations, now the majority of patients receive treatment within 11 weeks. Nurse numbers had been savagely cut; today there are 30 per cent more nurses and 80 per cent more consultants. Only 58 per cent of people survived cancer, now 69 per cent do.

Last week in Welsh Affairs committee I had the chance to grill the Tory Welsh Secretary on the David Cameron and Jeremy Hunt’s disgraceful remarks about the NHS in Wales. He refused to distance himself from them.

David Cameron’s derogatory and erroneous attacks on our NHS are an attempt to divert attention from the damage they’re doing to the NHS in England.

The truth is that the NHS in Wales has dramatically improved over the last decade thanks to Labour’s investment and reform. We also have huge challenges and both Vaughan and Mark Drakeford, our health ministers, have been clear about where we need to do better to deliver for patients. But it is an honest and frank debate we need – not smears and sensationalism.