Hansard

I refer members to my entry in the register of members’ interests. I am a practising general practitioner in the national health service. I am also a member of the Parliament’s Health, Social Care and Sport Committee.

The lead committee charged with scrutinising the National Care Service (Scotland) Bill had four evidence sessions with COSLA, and we now know that every single one was a waste of time. That is not COSLA’s fault, and it is not MSPs’ fault; it is because the Scottish Government eventually came to the conclusion that Humza Yousaf’s original version of the bill simply would not work. It therefore pulled the bill, and it changed much of what had been focused upon and scrutinised for the past 18 months. We were unable—and we are still unable—to ask appropriate questions, due to unseen changes that the Government is making. Why not just let us see the bill in its full detail? Is it not ready? Does the Government even know what it wants? There is a secret group creating secret changes, with a secretive SNP Government at the helm.

When it comes to the latest SNP rebrand of its NCS bill, members of the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee are well aware that there is a dearth of detail, and there are so many unanswered questions, including about money. It is not just Opposition members who are shaking their heads. The Parliament’s Finance and Public Administration Committee has repeatedly raised concerns about how the proposals would be funded and has pointed out that costings did not and could not reflect the actual costs of the provisions of the bill. The SNP-Green Government is already spending over £800,000 every month on civil servants to get the NCS up and running. We are told by the Minister for Social Care, Mental Wellbeing and Sport, Maree Todd, to expect a total spend of £2.2 billion. However, it is all very unclear, given the many iterations of the financial memorandum.

The bill is far from ready for a stage 1 debate and vote, and the lead committee has simply not been able to properly examine what is now on the table, because we do not know what is on the table. Despite the warnings, the SNP-Green Government says that it is unable to articulate and communicate how its national care service would actually work in practice. The Parliament is being asked to support a bill on the basis that, come stage 2, all will be revealed. Really? That is not how scrutiny of legislation is supposed to work. We are not here just to give the Government the benefit of the doubt. All of us are here to scrutinise the Government’s plans and the decisions that are made to ensure that the people of Scotland get a good deal, not the best guess.

The only reason why the bill is going on the agenda tomorrow is that the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee voted along party lines. To be clear, MSPs on the Health, Social Care and Sport Committee who are not in government are united in our thinking that the bill must be sent back for proper scrutiny. The four committee members who are not SNP or Green members dissented on up to 46 of the report’s 110 recommendations, including support for the bill’s general principles. SNP-Green ministers might well respond by saying, “Well, this is a framework bill. At this stage, we only need to agree the principles.” That is not good enough. It is not right to push through a bill that the Government itself cannot even articulate.

If the current bill were a car, we would not know what make, what model or even what colour it is, but the Government is suggesting that we put down hundreds of millions of pounds in a deposit anyway.