Scotland's NHS is in poor health

BY PAISLEY AND RENFREWSHIRE SOUTH MP JOHANNA BAXTER

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Critical condition Johanna Baxter says NHS services in Scotland must improve – and have been given the funding to do so

John Swinney's SNP has broken Scotland's NHS.

Too often, I hear and read about the tragic stories of people in our community languishing on NHS waiting lists, in A&E corridors or being held in ambulance bays for hours on end.

That's not a criticism of our brilliant frontline workers; it's an indictment of 18 years of mismanagement and incompetence by the SNP government in Holyrood.

According to the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, 800 Scots died in 2024 after waiting longer than 12 hours in A&E.

And sadly, this situation is only getting worse.

Figures from the previous year show deaths of those waiting in hospital have gone up 30 per cent.

These are shameful statistics.

And behind them are individuals, grieving families and friends, let down by a health system that is not working for patients, and not working for staff.