Meeting of the Parliament 22 December 2022
I suspect that I will not be able to do the matter the justice that it deserves in the time that we have. I am happy, as always, to pick it up with Douglas Ross and other members, and maybe to do a briefing for cross-party members in order to address some of the issues.
What I mean is that our laser-like focus should be on model 6—the end destination, which is the full return and restoration of consultant-led maternity services to Dr Gray’s. We will not proceed with model 4, as per Ralph Roberts’s report. However, it is really vital, where there are recruitment challenges, that there is cross-boundary work to ensure that services at Dr Gray’s are sustainable.
Douglas Ross knows that NHS Grampian’s model 6 plan, as endorsed by NHS Highland, makes the point that we are going to make significant investment in Raigmore, for all the reasons that have been articulated by Edward Mountain. Raigmore is in need of not only refurbishment but an investment in the workforce.
If there is a time, as per the current plan, when Raigmore has in place the clinical capacity and infrastructure to take more women from Elgin or Moray more widely, while Dr Gray’s is still being fully restored—because there is a time gap between 2025 and the end of 2026-27—we should ask whether Douglas Ross’s constituents should have the choice of going to Raigmore, which is a shorter journey than going to Aberdeen. That conversation is absolutely worth having.
Members should make no mistake about it: given the ambitious timescale for the return of maternity services to Dr Gray’s, my feeling—which I have shared with the health board—is that the focus must be on model 6.