Overall, for health and social care, there was a £22.5 billion investment, including £17.6bn for frontline NHS services, alongside new funding for GPs and social care.
The announcement comes at a time when more than 600,000 people in Scotland are on NHS waiting lists, and after planned junior doctor strikes were recently called off.
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Dr Iain Morrison, chair of BMA Scotland’s GP Committee, said the confirmed funding package recognised the scale of pressures facing general practice but cautioned against diverting resources away from core services.
“We welcome this focus on investment in frontline services in the budget as continuation of steps towards putting General Practice on a sustainable footing for the future,” he added.
However, he raised concerns about the investment in pilot schemes such as walk-in GP centres.
Dr Morrison said: “We will be looking into the budget in further detail to understand fully how it will help Scotland’s patients, GPs and the NHS. However we cannot afford to see essential resources lost into pilot schemes with limited potential.
“We know walk-in centres used elsewhere in the UK have not demonstrated good value for money and we remain unconvinced that this model will have a significant impact on reducing demand on other services, including GP workloads. To end the “8am rush” it would be better, as is happening with the funding restoration deal we agreed, to direct resources into core, essential services, such as general practice, which will deliver the NHS service in Scotland that people deserve and want.”
Dr Morrison added that stabilising the profession remains a long-term challenge.
“There is still much work to be done to stabilise and rebuild General Practice across Scotland in both urban and rural areas and we are working with the Scottish Government to implement the funding package we have agreed. We hope politicians both now and in the future recognise that General Practice is the cornerstone of the NHS and giving GPs the right amount of time and capacity to deliver high quality care to the people we serve will deliver huge health and economic benefits to the nation.”
Similar concerns were raised by the Royal College of GPs, which said the budget welcomed additional funding but warned it remained insufficient to deliver a genuine shift of care into the community.
RCGP Scotland Chair Dr Chris Provan said: “I welcome the funding arrangements outlined in the draft budget, which include the first instalment of funds to deliver on the agreement reached between BMA Scotland’s GP Committee and the Scottish Government – an additional £98m in the next financial year.
“This agreement will increase general practice’s share of the NHS budget from approximately 6% to 7%. While this is a step in the right direction, it falls short of what is needed to shift care into the community. A decade ago, general practice received approximately 11% of the NHS budget.”
Dr Provan said the funding should be viewed as a stabilisation measure rather than a long-term solution.
“The additional funding in this budget, along with the longer-term deal, should be viewed as a stabilisation measure. It will help practices retain and recruit more GPs, enabling them to grow capacity and be better able to care for their patients.”
He said more fundamental reform is needed.
“However, if the Scottish Government is serious about its ambition to deliver more care in the community, this must be backed by a significant shift in resources, including finance, workforce, and infrastructure. Returning general practice funding to at least 11% of the NHS budget, and working towards 15% over the longer term is essential to empower GPs to provide more care closer to home.”
The Royal College of Emergency Medicine praised the Scottish Government for the uplift in NHS frontline spending and social care as well as announced plans for improvements to training, retention and working conditions.
However, the RCEM raised concerns around a lack of plan to tackle bed blocking.
RCEM Vice President for Scotland Dr Fiona Hunter said: “Time after time the reality in our A&Es has got worse, not better, despite claims from the government that the NHS has been on ‘the path to recovery’ in recent years.
“We are seeing more and more patients waiting alone on trolleys in hospital corridors for hours on end, getting sicker and being put at risk of harm.
“This has happened because exit block has not been tackled, despite promises to the contrary from the government.
“The devil will be in the detail and I will reserve judgement for when myself, and the members I represent, see improvements in our Emergency Departments.
“We look forward to continued engagement with the government on how it seeks to tackle hospital flow, and await further information on how the Health Secretary will take today’s promises and turn them into action and, ultimately, improvements for our patients.”
The Finance Secretary said the Scottish Government would invest a record £22.5bn in health and social care to strengthen the NHS, cut waiting lists, and improve access to GP services.
Of that total, £17.6bn will go towards frontline NHS services, with £2.4bn allocated to support the “vital work” of GPs, primary care, and community services.
A further £2.3bn will be invested in social care.
“Our ambition is to deliver the best care at the right time in the right place to be at the point of need,” the Finance Secretary said.
Unveiling the proposals, she added: “It means our health service will have the resources it needs to continue reducing waiting times and continue cutting waiting lists.”
She said there would be “significant investment” in staff, leading to higher wages and improved training, stressing that the NHS is “nothing without its staff”.
“I want them to hear loud and clear that they are respected and valued,” she said.
The £2.3bn allocation for social care, she added, would “enable further action to reduce delayed discharges”.
“This is a budget that will enable our health services to do more and do it better. I have no doubt our constituents will not look favourably – and that is an understatement – on any party that can’t bring themselves to back a budget that offers so much to our NHS,” she said.
Yet, the Scottish Conservatives said the budget does not address long-term concerns within Scotland’s health service.
Their health spokesperson Dr Sandesh Gulhane MSP said: “The SNP’s Budget will do nothing to address the permanent crisis in Scotland’s NHS.
“It sums up the SNP’s warped priorities that they are cutting frontline care budgets in cash terms, they have found an extra £11m to support one of their quangos.
“Despite claiming to prioritise our NHS, the SNP are nowhere near meeting their promise of ending year-long waits by March or eradicating delayed discharge as Shona Robison promised to do so over a decade ago.
“The SNP’s current approach is simply not working for staff pushed beyond broken point and patients languishing on waiting lists. They should have used this Budget to adopt our plans to slash bureaucracy and ensure resources got to the frontline as quickly as possible.”
Labour’s health spokesperson and deputy leader Jackie Baillie said that although additional funding is welcome, this budget will not deliver the “transformational change” Scotland’s health service needs.
She addedL “More funding is welcome, but year after year we have seen that this alone cannot fix the crisis in our NHS.
“We need bold reform to make our NHS fit for the future and a 19th SNP budget won’t deliver that – but a Scottish Labour government will.
“Scottish Labour will stand up for NHS patients and frontline staff, cut SNP waste and bureaucracy, support social care and primary care, and invest in the services we need to drive down waiting lists.”
The Scottish Liberal Democrats welcomed a commitment to additional support for neurodiversity and hospices within the budget, however, added they are pressing the government to “go further” in bringing down waiting times and delayed discharges.
Scottish Liberal Democrat economy and finance spokesperson Jamie Greene MSP said: “More support for neurodiversity and hospices were big priorities for us, so I am very pleased to see commitments to these in the draft pages of the budget.
“Serious action is needed to bring down waiting times and delayed discharges, so we will be watching very carefully to see whether there is any movement by the government to do this.
“Ultimately, in the coming days and weeks, we will be pressing the Scottish Government to go further. That means squeezing the Scottish Budget for every penny, so that we can get stuff done for our constituents.”