Seòmar agus comataidhean

[Made a request to intervene.]

I thank Carol Mochan for that new title, “the member at the back”—I am quite happy with it.

Carol Mochan is a good socialist, like me. Does she have concerns about the noises coming from Wes Streeting and Rachel Reeves with regard to public services and, in particular, privatisation steps in the English NHS, which will impact on Scotland?

I will take the member. Is she challenging those quotes?

Will the member take an intervention?

Will Paul Sweeney take an intervention?

I say with respect to the member that she had better check how the money is allocated to Scotland.

Labour’s shadow health secretary has admitted that, when it comes to NHS funding, Westminster is damaging Scotland’s NHS because of the Westminster austerity that we have suffered for 14 years. Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, has indicated that the Labour Party, if it is elected to office, will not increase income tax, national insurance, corporation tax or VAT, and that it has accepted very strict borrowing limits within very strict fiscal and tax rules, and squeezed spending budgets. Does Labour have several money trees?

The Labour health spokesperson also said that the party wants

“the NHS to form partnerships with the private sector that goes beyond just hospitals”,

having previously admitted that he will be

“holding the door wide open”

to private interests in the NHS. To me, that is privatisation.

Private healthcare investors have also stated that the Labour Party would

“kick-start private sector investment much more proactively than the Tories were able to do.”

On a point of order, Presiding Officer. I seek your guidance. Two members—Humza Yousaf and me—have been mentioned by Tess White in a rather disparaging manner. Is not it incumbent on her to let us intervene and respond?

The Scottish Government, in choosing to invest more than £19.5 billion in health and social care in 2024-25, is giving our NHS a real-terms uplift in the face of UK Government austerity. I understand that NHS funding comprises almost 40 per cent of the Government’s budget. It has more than doubled under the present Government, and staffing is at a record high, as colleagues have said, with far more doctors and nurses per head in Scotland than in England. By working with the trade unions, the Government prevented a single day of strike action over pay in our health service, unlike elsewhere in the UK. We all know that Scotland has an increasing ageing population and, therefore, increasing demands on health and social care, and the fallout from Covid continues to add pressure to NHS services.

I now turn to the financial context, which Sandesh Gulhane and Jackie Baillie conveniently sidestepped. There is a perfect financial storm, which started with austerity under the Tories, following the 2008 bank crash, and continues to this day. There was Covid; Brexit, with its costs; the raging inflation, which peaked at 11 per cent, that was brought about by the disastrous Liz Truss budget, and the natural wage demands that followed as a consequence; and the energy inflation that resulted from Ukraine’s invasion by Russia, which was compounded by a failure of UK Governments to invest in home-grown energy over decades, having squandered North Sea oil revenues, unlike independent Norway.

Before we tackle reform, let us lay to rest some myths. A good place to start is to follow the money. If any UK Government makes public sector cuts, because of Barnett consequentials, we suffer, too. That is significant when I refer to Labour’s plans, should it come to power. For example, if more health is delivered through the private sector, public funding decreases in England, so funding that is devolved to Scotland decreases when the Scottish Government is determined to keep the NHS in public hands.

Yes, I will take an intervention.

[Made a request to intervene.]