Hansard

Thank you, convener. I appreciate that this is my second appearance at the committee this morning. I will reinforce Jackie Baillie’s comments about safety. That issue has to be paramount in the minds of everyone. I am here as a Central Scotland MSP. Lynne McRitchie, who lodged the petition on behalf of the Wishaw Neonatal Warriors, is a constituent of mine, as is Monica Sheen, who is here today. I do not want to repeat the comments that Jackie Baillie has made, so I will move on to the lack of meaningful public consultation and take my lead from what Fergus Ewing said with regard to a petition that the committee addressed earlier. He talked about the importance of having the confidence of the people who you seek to serve and your local communities. When the Scottish Government got around to doing some consultation, beginning on 21 June this year, people had only 17 days to submit comments. People with lived experience, such as Lynne McRitchie, Monica Sheen and many others, were told that they had to summarise their comments, with a limit of 500 characters, in an online document. There are families whose babies, sadly, did not survive and others who have life-changing conditions, and it is unfair to ask them to summarise their experiences in a few hundred characters. As well as the issues that Jackie Baillie has raised about the inconsistency and inaccuracy of the data and the way that evidence has been presented, I note that we have not had meaningful consultation, so there is no public support or public buy-in for the change. The proposal is not only flawed but has been built on very shaky foundations, which will put at risk the lives of Scotland’s most premature, smallest and sickest babies, and their mums. It is no exaggeration to say that there is a real sense of betrayal across Lanarkshire. As Jackie Baillie said, Wishaw is a much celebrated and award-winning neonatal intensive care unit that is highly respected across the UK. We often say in Parliament that we need to learn more from good practice. This is exceptional practice. The staff are upset, not for their own sakes but because they have very close relationships with the families, who they continue to care for long after babies have left the unit. 10:30 I will briefly touch on the young patients family fund, which is in place for parents of babies who have to be cared for outwith their community. Colleagues will know that that is a reimbursement system, which means that families can apply for their expenses after they have incurred the expense. It is good that that is in place, but many families, particularly those in Lanarkshire, where poverty is sky high at the moment, do not have money for hotels and accommodation and to buy extra food and pay for childcare. That needs to be looked at, too, because the Government has not costed the proposal in that regard and we do not know how much any of it will cost. Lynne McRitchie, who is not able to be here today, has done a great deal of work in her own time. She is mum to Innes, who received care at Wishaw. In an earlier comment she said: “I cannot imagine how we would have felt if we had then been told that best case scenario was to transfer to Glasgow to receive that care. It adds a whole new level of stress and trauma into what is already a horrific experience for parents and families.” We know that, because of capacity issues, many of our families in Lanarkshire could end up in Aberdeen. That is a long, long way from home.