16 April 2010

Rhoda Grant, Labour’s spokesperson on health on the Highlands and Islands , described this year’s initial revenue allocation by the Scottish Government to NHS Highland as "continuing at a virtual standstill level".

She was responding to answers to Parliamentary questions which show that although the allocation has gone up in cash terms, when inflation is taken into account, the allocation has remained almost the same as in the past three years.

Expressed in 2010-2011 prices, in real terms, the allocation in 2010-11 of £480.6 million to the health board was only half a million pounds greater than in the year before.

Similarly, the 2009-10 allocation was only seven hundred thousand pounds greater in a budget of £480.1 million than its previous year.

She said: "Standstill allocations make it very difficult to enhance front line services.

"The NHS requires increases in funding above inflation to keep pace with scientific and technological progress, the healthcare requirements of an ageing population, and changing patient expectations .

"If the NHS is to move care closer to patients and away from the centre they need to invest in new technology.

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This technology will provide savings in the long run but needs up front investment .

"These allocations do not measure up to these needs.

Nor do they match the SNP’s self-proclaimed aim of making Scotland ‘a world leader in patient-centred healthcare quality’"

She continued: "The Scottish Government remain determined to reduce NHS Highland’s overall Scottish share of the revenue allocation under a new system.

"If this system had been in full operation this year, then NHS Highland would have lost over £10 million in initial revenue."

When overall annual revenue spending is examined, in the SNP Government’s first full budget year in 2008-09 showed a drop in 2 per cent drop in real terms with spending on health in NHS Highland compared with the previous year 2007-08 under the budget set by the former Labour-led Scottish Executive.

Information from Parliamentary questions on NHS Highland initial revenue allocations :

12 April 2010

Index Heading: Health and Wellbeing

Rhoda Grant : To ask the Scottish Executive what the initial revenue allocation was to NHS Highland in 2007-08, (ii) 2008-09 and (iii) 2009-10 and is for 2010-11, also expressed in real terms, and what the value would be expressed as an NHS Scotland Resource Allocation Committee (NRAC) target allocation.

The initial revenue allocations were/are:

Initial allocations expressed in real terms are:

The adjusted figures are shown at 2010-11 prices.

If allocations were made on the basis of the NHS Scotland Resource Allocation (NRAC) target, then they would have been:

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