Hansard

The Convener Lab

Agenda item 5 is consideration of our approach to NHS boards budget scrutiny. We welcome Dr Andrew Walker, our trusted adviser. Members will recall that the ...

Dr Andrew Walker (Committee Adviser)

The paper mentions prescribing cost pressures. As committee members know from when I was appointed, I have had an on-going involvement with the Scottish Medi...

The Convener Lab

We appreciate that.

Dr Walker

Roughly how long do I have to brief the committee, convener, in order of magnitude?

The Convener Lab

Proceed.

Dr Walker

Okay, the rest of the day it is then. That is not a problem.

The Convener Lab

You have done this before, but I do not want you to be caught short. We have scheduled about half an hour for this, but we are running a bit behind.

Dr Walker

That is no problem at all. I will aim for a maximum of 10 minutes.

The Convener Lab

That would be great.

Dr Walker

First of all, thank you to everyone who helped me with this work behind the scenes—especially to Nicola Hudson from the Parliament’s financial scrutiny unit,...

The Convener Lab

Thank you, Andrew. The paper raises a number of questions and we might come back to consider some of the gaps. Do members have any questions or comments?

Fiona McLeod SNP

Under question 2, on “Planned spending on acute services versus primary care and community services”, you finish by saying:“The data reported by boards is no...

Dr Walker

That is very helpful. One of the boards said that 30 per cent of its spend went on other services and that it ended up with only about 30 per cent of its spe...

The Convener Lab

Anyone else?

Dr Simpson Lab

I am quite interested in prisoners’ health, funding for which was transferred from the Scottish Prison Service to the health boards in November. It has now b...

Dr Walker

The question is whether, although the money is not officially earmarked, boards are looking to protect the spending.

Dr Simpson Lab

Yes. What are they spending at the moment and are they going to protect it, or do they see pressures that require an increase in that area? I suspect that th...

The Convener Lab

Apart from the inconsistencies—the clarity of the report has been picked up on and questions have been raised as we have gone through—should we write to the ...

Dr Walker

I think that a few boards mentioned it under things that they would like to fund but could not, and I put that under the general heading of capital. However,...

The Convener Lab

I know that the board is setting its budgets now, so there may be money to tackle the backlog, but it is a big number.If everybody is content with the report...

Richard Lyle SNP

I think that it would be useful to have the health boards and the officials before us.12:30

The Convener Lab

So we are agreed that we will take evidence from two panels. One panel will be the health department representatives, so we need to decide on a mix of three ...

Fiona McLeod SNP

In looking at all the tables in Dr Walker’s paper, the health board that jumped out at me was NHS Orkney, which tended to be at either end of the spectrum in...

Dr Simpson Lab

I disagree. NHS Orkney is so small that its problems are really peculiar and its performance can vary hugely. The smallest board that we should invite is NHS...

Fiona McLeod SNP

It was just that NHS Orkney went from 13 per cent to 3 per cent on non-recurring funding, and I thought that it would be interesting to understand how it had...

The Convener Lab

Is there an issue there, Fiona? Do you accept the point that NHS Orkney is really tiny?

Fiona McLeod SNP

Yes, but sometimes it is at the top of the list and sometimes it is at the bottom. It might be easier for NHS Orkney, because it is so small, to explain the ...

The Convener Lab

We need to make some progress—we have had two bids so far.

Richard Lyle SNP

I am not putting in a bid, but in one of our evidence sessions it came out that the chief executive of social care and the chief executive of the NHS are the...

The Convener Lab

We have had two bids. I am not sure that we can have both of those if we want to go for four boards. If that is what members want, we only need another coupl...