OVER the next few weeks, we will be giving each local candidate in the Scottish Parliament elections a chance to have their say. We willbe questioning them on a range of topics of vital importance to the Scottish public.
This week, the candidates will be giving their vierws on the topic of health and telling us their plans if elected to Holyrood on May 5. Standing for the Cunninghame South seat in this election are Ruth Maguire, SNP; Louise McPhater, Labour; David Rocks, Conservative, Tom Armstrong, Liberal Democrat and Maurice Campbell, independent.
We will also be publishing exclusive interviews with every party leader in the weeks to come.
Ruth Maguire (Scottish National Party) on health:
THE last year as we have lived through the pandemic and coped with the measures put in place to keep everyone safe, the importance of good mental and physical health has perhaps never been clearer.
We will be forever indebted to our excellent health and social care workforce who put themselves in harm’s way to provide care and support to those who needed it during extremely difficult times.
It is crucial we show through our actions how much we value our health workforce and improve pay and conditions.
Under the last SNP government there has been record health spending, record NHS staffing, free prescriptions and eye tests, free personal and nursing care for all, the bestperforming A&E services in the UK, the most GPs, nurses, midwives, dentists, and NHS staff per head in Britain. However, despite these investments we can do more.
That’s why in the coming weeks the SNP will announce further details on how, if elected, an SNP government will recruit more staff, bring down waiting times, open more elective care centres, invest in mental health services, invest £250m to tackle the drugs death emergency and set up a National Care Service.
Louise McPhater (Scottish Labour) on health:
THE NHS is the envy of the world. An institution that embodies the sort of fair and just society that the Labour Government of the time wanted to create as part of rebuilding the country following the Second World War.
The last 12 months have been the hardest since that war and thank goodness we had our NHS to protect us during it. But we now face the greatest rebuild in generations - and it’s time the NHS, and its staff, were rewarded. Ayrshire’s health board faces a £31m funding deficit this year and have already made £9m of cuts during the pandemic.
Health trade unions asked for a 12.5 per cent pay rise, to recognise and reward the dedication of NHS staff throughout the pandemic and they are only getting four per cent. Care staff, who are already some of the lowest paid workers, are getting as little as a 20p pay rise.
As your MSP, my focus will be on rebuilding from the pandemic and that includes a properly funded NHS, a fair pay rise for NHS staff and £15 an hour for care workers. They kept us safe, now let’s reward them. Claps don’t pay the bills.
David Rocks (Scottish Conservative) on health:
Our NHS has gone above and beyond over the last year and I can’t thank our heroic staff on the frontline enough for their efforts. That’s why I am delighted that the Scottish
Conservatives have pledged to deliver record funding for our NHS in the next Parliament.
£2bn extra in funding will be delivered by a double lock. Whatever is higher; the rate of inflation or Barnett consequentials from the UK Government will deliver that funding increase for our NHS.
The COVID crisis and the vaccination programme has shown our health service at its very best. With over 2.5m Scots having now had a vaccine, it is an incredible success story for Scotland and the UK.
Make no mistake, if we had followed the SNP’s advice and signed up to the EU vaccine scheme, we would be lagging behind. We must keep up the momentum as it is our best route out of the restrictions.
If you want to increase funding for our NHS and focus on tackling the backlog in our waiting times for patients, then only a vote for the Scottish Conservatives will achieve that.
We will be relentlessly focused on our recovery, rather than putting public services at risk with another referendum.
Maurice Campbell (Independent) on health:
What is more important? Your health, or your wealth? In this technologically advanced time, we live longer, but at what cost. We have physical and mental health, so what is more important? All of them.
As we have become more advanced, the division in health has widened. The rich can afford private health, and the rest of us depend on our fantastic NHS. But the NHS has suffered for decades - budget cuts, staff shortages - to the point most people have to wait two weeks or more for a doctor’s appointment, which is wrong.
The COVID-19 pandemic has decimated not only our population but the very soul of society. There is a mental health crisis, people have been locked away for over 18 months, trying to cope with the isolation and guilt of not being able to see their loved ones. This has left many scarred and broken. I have suffered mental health conditions since my youth, but never been treated. No one should suffer as I have.
So health or wealth? Even wealth cannot save you, and a balance for our society must be achieved, as the constant cycle of poverty and early death among our people can and should be halted.
Tom Armstrong (Scottish Liberal Democrats) on health:
The virus has shown how much we should value the health and care services and the people who work in them.
Scottish Liberal Democrats want to put our NHS recovery first and fix the disruption the pandemic and the previous administration has created.
Our proposals will build a stronger NHS for the future, improve health and wellbeing, and allow us to achieve the targets for treatment that were being missed pre-pandemic.
We want to increase local access to support and reduce waiting times. Nobody should travel far from where they live to access essential services. We can do that by embedding more nurses, physios and mental health staff with GPs so that people can get a wider range of diagnosis, treatment and follow-up care within their community.
As Scotland begins to reopen from lockdown, we desperately need to invest in mental health services. We will increase the number of counsellors and ensure that they are located at community centres, hospitals, workplaces and schools.
We have to act now to build health services back up after the virus. Our plan is urgent. We can’t wait years for a referendum to come and go.
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