{"id":954142,"date":"2026-05-12T05:19:18","date_gmt":"2026-05-12T05:19:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/954142\/"},"modified":"2026-05-12T05:19:18","modified_gmt":"2026-05-12T05:19:18","slug":"scottish-doctors-call-for-national-conversation-on-future-of-nhs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/954142\/","title":{"rendered":"Scottish doctors call for national conversation on future of NHS"},"content":{"rendered":"

Scottish doctors call for national conversation on future of NHS<\/p>\n

The Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (RCPE) has called for a \u2018national conversation\u2019 on the future of Scotland\u2019s NHS.<\/p>\n

\"(c)<\/p>\n

(c) Hush Naidoo Jade Photography <\/p>\n

The call followed last week’s Scottish Parliamentary election which saw the SNP win 58 seats, just sort of the 65 required for a majority.<\/p>\n

Professor Mark Strachan, president of the RCPE, said: \u2018Now that the post-election dust is starting to settle, we are reiterating our call for an open, honest national conversation about the future of Scotland’s NHS.<\/p>\n

\u2018We want to see a healthcare convention established, which should involve politicians across different parties, healthcare professionals and the public. The scale of the challenge is clear: without changes to the funding envelope and without reform, it will become increasingly difficult to sustain a health system capable of providing comprehensive care for everyone, free at the point of use.<\/p>\n

\u2018We urge the political parties to work together across the new Parliament to agree a transparent, long-term plan that protects the founding principles of the NHS for future generations.’<\/p>\n

The RCPE referenced the political agreement on healthcare in Denmark in 2024<\/a>, which was backed by a broad coalition of the three governing parties, as the type of deal the Scottish Parliament should work towards.<\/p>\n

An SNP spokesperson said: \u2018First Minister John Swinney has today written to the leaders of opposition parties in the Scottish Parliament, with the exception of Reform UK, to invite them to co-operate to deliver for the people of Scotland including on building upon the improvements we have made in our NHS.<\/p>\n

\u2018In Government, the SNP led the Future Medical Workforce project with doctors this year with cross-party representation and our new Government will look to build on this.<\/p>\n

\u2018The SNP has a plan for our NHS and it is working – and we will look to keep driving improvements constructively in the new Parliament.’<\/p>\n

Scottish Conservative deputy leader Rachael Hamilton MSP said:\u00a0\u2018After two decades of nationalist incompetence Scotland’s NHS is stuck in permanent crisis mode.<\/p>\n

\u2018We’ve repeatedly urged John Swinney to back our bold plans to slash bureaucracy, boost frontline staffing and bring waiting lists down.<\/p>\n

\u2018But instead of acting on our common sense proposals he chose to double down on his failed policies.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u2018The Scottish Conservatives denied the SNP a majority meaning John Swinney failed to secure the mandate he said would be required to demand another referendum.<\/p>\n

\u2018He should stop obsessing over the constitution and focus on urgently fixing the crisis in the health service.’<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Scottish doctors call for national conversation on future of NHS The Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh (RCPE)…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":954143,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5009],"tags":[748,4884,712,16,15,19178],"class_list":["post-954142","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-scotland","tag-britain","tag-great-britain","tag-scotland","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-workforce"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/116559922445842840","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/954142","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=954142"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/954142\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/954143"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=954142"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=954142"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=954142"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}