JOHN Swinney has admitted huge sums are being spent on private firms to bail out Scotland’s ailing hospitals – despite the SNP accusing Labour of planning NHS privatisation.
The First Minister said it was a “question of scale” between the number of firms used by the NHS here compared to England and that he would not back any further involvement, unlike his rivals at Westminster.
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Mr Swinney was grilled on the issue by The Scottish Sun on Sunday after it emerged that hundreds of millions of pounds have been forked out by Scotland’s NHS to pay private companies to help ease staffing shortages.
It is despite the SNP’s Westminster Leader Stephen Flynn having last week accused Labour of pushing to privatise the NHS – a claim described as an “outright lie” by Scottish Labour.
Speaking about previous remarks made by Labour’s Shadow Health Secretary, Mr Swinney said: “Wes Streeting has said that he’ll hold the door open to the private sector and he’ll hold it open much wider than Tony Blair did.
“If you look at just now, the private sector occupies about 10 per cent of the health service in England, it represents less than one per cent of the health service in Scotland.
“I am concerned that Labour are on course, if he’s going to do it more than (Tony) Blair, he’s going to expand all of that and that will ultimately have an effect on the funding that’s available for the National Health Service in Scotland, and that is a significant worry.”
But put to him that there is a gap between Mr Streeting suggesting Labour would go further than ex-PM Blair and the SNP’s claims that Labour would privatise the NHS, Mr Swinney said: “I think what Wes Streeting was indicating is that there is going to be an upsurge in the partnerships with the private sector.
“He says, ‘I want partnerships to go much beyond hospitals’ – so that suggests to me we’re looking at a very different model, and I don’t like that, I don’t want to see the National Health Service privatised, I want to see it properly funded.”
The Scottish Sun pointed out remarks made by Mr Flynn last week who said “the Labour Party is now joining the Tories in this Westminster push for NHS privatisation.”
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But when pressed over whether he would go as far as repeating that claim, Mr Swinney said: “That is the danger that’s posed by what Wes Streeting is setting out, yes.”
Mr Swinney was quizzed after it emerged that contracts worth hundreds of millions of pounds have been awarded to private firms – many of which are based in England, as well as some from as far afield as Denmark and the Netherlands – to help ease pressure on Scotland’s NHS.
The Mail on Sunday reported £850million of taxpayers’ cash has been spent since January 2023 to help the under-pressure service here cope with demands and to plug staffing shortages.
But Mr Swinney said: “In some cases, what gets defined as private sector activity in Scotland will be the use of agency staff, for example, who are filling vacancies.
“Now obviously, I want to make sure that we’ve got staff on NHS employment participating and we’ve got vacancies in the health service, so we’re keen to fill those vacancies, we’d rather have those vacancies filled than be using the agency contractors, for example.
“But that’s part of the kind of pragmatic steps to resolve staff shortages, it’s not about privatising the health service.”
The Scottish Sun on Sunday asked Mr Swinney why it is right for the SNP to make use of the private sector here, but Labour can’t do the same in England.
He said: “There’s questions of scale, for example. From data that I’ve seen, the health service in England is using the private sector on routine stuff to an extent which is about ten times the level in Scotland, so there’s that question of scale.
“But, secondly there’s the agenda. You won’t get me arguing for greater involvement of the private sector in the NHS, Wes Streeting is arguing for that and he’s proposing that, and that’s the difference.”
