A day-long wait for an ambulance to tend to a 91-year-old woman has been raised with Wales’ First Minister.

Theresa Jones had to be dragged back to her room on a sheet from the corridor after she fell in a Port Talbot residential home. After falling at 9 pm on January 31, a 999 operator told staff not to pick her up in case she had broken a bone.

After a nearly 24-hour ambulance wait, the 91-year-old was eventually taken to Morriston Hospital, Swansea, where tests revealed she had not broken anything and she was returned to the care home the following day.

Commenting on the news that the woman was left on the floor “like a piece of rubbish” during a nearly 24-hour ambulance wait, Russell George MS, Welsh Conservative Shadow Health Minister said: “After 91 years, Mrs Jones should not have suffered this humiliation and indignity. What happened to her is completely disgraceful, yet sadly epitomises the crisis at the heart of the Labour-run Welsh NHS.

“We know that you have less than a 50/50 chance of an ambulance arriving on time for the most serious life-threatening calls in Labour-run Wales, now we know that you could end up waiting a whole day.

“The Welsh Conservatives want to see a substantial workforce plan enacted and an end to the under-resourcing of our Welsh NHS. Labour must spend the full consequential uplift received for health on health. Scrap the vanity projects.”

Following First Minister’s Questions, Andrew RT Davies MS, Leader of the Welsh Conservatives, said: “People in Wales will see stories like these and fear what might happen to them if they need an ambulance or enter an emergency department.

“Our health service is under immense pressure, with patients and staff suffering, while the Labour Government and Plaid Cymru obsess over constitutional issues and plan to put 36 more politicians in Cardiff Bay.

“The Labour Welsh Government should drop its vanity projects and have a laser-like focus on putting a stop to these sorts of incidents in Wales.”

The Welsh Ambulance Service's assistant director of operations Sonia Thompson said: “We are deeply sorry about Mrs Jones' experience, which we know will have been a painful and distressing wait for all involved, including staff at the residential home.

“This is not the level of service we wish to provide to patients.

“Our ambulance service is under extreme and well-documented pressure as a result of wider system pressures across the NHS.

“As an ambulance service, we're thinking very differently about the way we deliver services in future, and we are already testing some new ways of working across Wales to understand how we can relieve some of the pressure,” she added.