He commented: “I welcome the announcement from the Department of Health yesterday that £30 million has been made available to try and help reduce hospital waiting times.
“However, this is simply a drop in the ocean of what is needed to tackle the issues in our health service.
“While I welcome any money that is being made available to tackle waiting times, I am concerned however that this means that money is simply being moved away from the transformation fund to plug an ever-growing funding gap in the health service and is not a new injection of money.
“The latest waiting time figures from December showed that 271,553 patients were waiting for a hospital appointment and this is simply unacceptable.
“These people are being left to suffer as a result of political brinkmanship between the DUP and Sinn Féin.
“Healthcare and the health of the people in the North must be prioritised. It is imperative that things change and the SDLP believes that an overall transformation of the health service is required to tackle the ever growing issues,” added Mr Durkan.