Meeting of the Parliament 17 January 2024
I draw members’ attention to my entry in the register of members’ interests, which shows that I am a practising national health service general practitioner.
The Scottish Parliament’s Health, Social Care and Sport Committee has discussed the Scottish National Party’s befuddled plan to create a national care service in 21 meetings since June 2022. In May last year, at meeting number 15, the perplexed minister, Maree Todd, told us that it was hard for her to get her “head around” the National Care Service (Scotland) Bill. The SNP’s flagship £2 billion policy has been completely changed by Humza Yousaf—it is being rewritten as we speak—but the SNP will not let us see the actual wording of the policy before the stage 1 vote, almost certainly due to time pressure.
We agree that the bill needs to be further delayed, but why not decide when the changes to the bill can realistically be completed and then create a realistic timetable? That would allow us to vote on a bill that we can read, not one that we need to guess at. Today, just as Maree Todd said in May, nobody can get their head around the bill. The Government should create a realistic and fair timetable for the Parliament.
17:09