Nursing bosses warn lack of staffing needs puts SNP's NHS vision at risk of falling flat
Fears have been raised over a lack of workforce planning in the Scottish Government’s NHS improvement plan.
Nursing bosses have warned SNP ministers that their blueprint to revive the NHS ignores staffing demands needed to boost healthcare capacity.
Health Secretary Neil Gray unveiled the NHS Scotland operational improvement plan which focuses on boosting capacity to ease backlogs and improving the “flow” through hospitals.
But concerns have been raised that the blueprint, the details of which had been previously announced by the Scottish Government, is missing key workforce planning needed to ensure it can be achieved.
Colin Poolman, RCN Scotland director, said: “The Scottish Government has proposed little that is new in this plan. It also lacks the detail nursing staff and the public need to assess whether or not it can be achieved or will solve the problems our health and care services are facing.
“There is no mention of the workforce need or reference to the ministerial nursing and midwifery taskforce. Audit Scotland have previously called for an update of the NHS workforce plan, but this improvement plan has no mention of that. Nursing staff want to hear that the Taskforce’s recommendations will be fully funded and implemented swiftly.”
He added: “More staff will be needed to deliver these improvements yet we are hearing from nursing students that they are concerned they will not get a job when they qualify later this year because health boards are cutting recruitment.
“All in all, nursing staff reading this will be left scratching their heads wondering just how the aspirations in this plan will be achieved in reality.”
The Scottish Government will publish two plans on the future of the NHS in the coming months, it has been announced.
Ministers are working with local authority body Cosla to create a population health framework which will be released in the spring, while a health and social care service renewal framework will be released in late June.
The announcement came as part of the government’s operational improvement plan for the NHS, released on Monday.
The plan said: “We are co-developing the population health framework with Cosla and in collaboration with Public Health Scotland, NHS directors of public health and other local, regional and national partners. We will publish it in spring 2025.
“The framework will detail a long-term, cross-government and cross-sector approach to primary prevention of ill health, i.e how we support people to live healthy and fulfilling lives and stopping health problems arising in the first place.
“We will publish our health and social care service renewal framework in late June 2025.
“It will build on the vision for reform and set out the strategic policy intent for health and social care in Scotland for the medium to longer term.”
The 21-page document largely reiterated commitments made by the First Minister in a speech in January, where he pledged to reduce waiting times in the health service so no-one is waiting longer than one year by March 2026.
As part of the plan to reduce waiting times for diagnostics, the document pledged seven-day working for radiology as well as mobile scanning units, to improve availability of MRI, CT, ultrasound and endoscopy procedures in a bid to reduce the waiting list to less than six weeks by next March.
Announcing the plan, Mr Gray visited the flow navigation centre – a virtual tool designed to control the flow of patients through emergency departments – at Kirklands Hospital in Bothwell, South Lanarkshire.
He said: “This plan details how the Scottish Government will deliver a more accessible NHS, with reductions to long-waits and the pressures we currently see.
“It shows how we will use the £21.7 billion health and social care investment in the 2025-26 Budget to deliver significant improvements for patients.
“We want to increase the number of appointments, speed up treatment and make it easier to see a doctor. By better using digital technology, we will embrace innovation and increase efficiencies.
“This plan is ambitious but realistic, and builds on the incredible work of our amazing health and social care staff across our health boards, to deliver real change.”
Scottish Labour deputy leader Jackie Baillie said the plan amounted to “recycled ideas”.
“This is the SNP Government’s fifth plan in four years, yet thousands of Scots are still queuing for A&E every week, while nearly one in six are stuck on a waiting list,” she said.
“Scottish Labour has long advocated for patients to be able to access treatment wherever they are based and for the National Treatment Centres to be used to their full capacity, so we welcome the SNP’s adoption of these ideas.
“Sadly, though, much of the plan amounts to recycled ideas — the digital front door was supposed to be launched at the end of 2023 and this report confirms that it will only have been piloted in one board by the end of this year.
“We don’t yet have electronic prescribing across the country and this was promised in 2021.
“The pledge that Scots should ‘only’ wait a year for treatment just reveals the low ambition the SNP has for our NHS.”
She said that a Scottish Labour government would ensure GP appointments within two days, reduce waiting times and increase social care capacity.
Scottish Tory health spokesman Dr Sandesh Gulhane said the plan was “rehashed”, adding: “This latest announcement from Neil Gray is full of promises that should have already been met by the SNP and it exposes the overwhelming failure of Humza Yousaf’s Covid recovery plan.
“All aspects of our NHS are in a state of permanent crisis on the SNP’s watch. They have repeatedly failed to ensure money gets to where it is needed most in the health service.”
Comments
Want to join the conversation? Please or to comment on this article.