'Grab your portfolio by the nuts and make it work.'

For months now, Cambrian News has been covering the state of our health boards, highlighting how the system is broken and how our health boards in mid and west Wales are failing the people they are supposed to serve.

Last week, we carried the shameful story of how an 83-year-old Borth man who was undergoing radiation was asked to pay £200 for transport costs. Yes, he had a car. But the treatment he was undergoing also meant that he could not drive.

Does the right hand not know what the left hand is doing?

Why is it that our health boards have no issue writing reports, keeping records, paying huge salaries to those who 'manage' our health services, but people like Charles Swift are left hanging in the wind?

The week before, we carried the story about operations across the Hywel Dda University Health Board area being cancelled because there are too few anaesthetists to assist with surgical procedures.

The week before, we carried a look at how waiting times in our A&E departments are abysmal.

And yes, we even carried carefully crafted news from the Welsh Government that our ministry of health was spending money and had a plan to tackle waiting times. It came with a smiling mugshot of Mabon ap Gwynfor - remember him? - our local lad done good by becoming the Minister for Health.

Let's call a spade a spade here.

Mabon is a huge disappointment.

Before he became the health minister in the new minority Plaid Cymru Government, Mabon used every press opportunity to wax lyrical about how his party would do things differently, would make changes, would respect our local hospitals, and would listen to the people of mid and west Wales.

He had a master plan to turn Bronglais into one of 10 regional centres of excellence. It was going to be a new beginning for the Aberystwyth hospital, and gone would be the hours of waiting to be seen, weeks of waiting for appointments.

According to Mabon, the good people of mid and west Wales would no longer be treated as second class citizens, and no longer would parents or offspring have to worry about how their sick children or parents would end up hours away in facilities in the very south of Hywel Dda's catchment area.

Mabon had a lot to say too about the Welsh Air Ambulance Service was shutting down bases and moving its helicopters to more populated areas - where the roads are better and there's less need for the critical airlift services. Quite frankly, if the Welsh Air Ambulance Service were based in Australia, it would shut down the flying doctor service for the outback to concentrate on larger population centres.

Quite frankly, that all seems like a con job. Mabon isn't answering questions and has gone to ground.

Mabon has a lot to answer for. And here at Cambrian News, we won't be letting him off the hook until he comes clean and explains why he and his party have failed to live up to the promises he so freely made.

Let's start with a simple explanation of why Mr Swift, a man who has paid into the system for many decades, is treated so shabbily.

Don't, Mabon, pass the buck and blame the ambulance service. They answer to you. Don't put it down to Hywel Dda errors. You're the boss.

Explain why this happened. Just for starters.

There's lots more we want answers for. Real answers, not some polished policy document your comms team has been hatching over the past 100 days or so.

You were very clear when you were in opposition and you had a lot to say. Where is your candour now?

Mabon – here are some ideas off the top of my head.

There should be four health boards in Wales: North, mid and west Wales, and one for the Cardiff region, one for Swansea. And Aberystwyth needs to be the centre for mid and west Wales. Four boards, many less big salaries to pay.

In Aberystwyth, there's a university. Work with them to expand dentistry into a full-blown medical school. A training hospital.

A shortage of nurses? Sit with your county councils and Elin Jones and allow for an exemption on council taxes for health care workers employed by the NHS. Ditto for doctors.

There’s a building sitting idle in Aber that’s crying out from proper usage.

Work with Aber uni or social housing companies to turn some of their accommodation into medical staff housing. Bodlondeb would be a good place to start.

Think outside the box. Be creative. Look for what can be done and do it. Don’t look or listen to those who will tell you otherwise. They have vested interests and huge pensions to protect.

Grab your portfolio by its nuts and make it work.

Wake it up.

Right now, the system is broken. And you seem truly incapable of fixing it.

Yeah, the people of mid and west Wales have every reason to be peed off at you. You're letting us down.