Scots face harsh health cuts too

25 Mar 10
Scotland faces crude and deeply damaging cuts in health spending, the head of an international think-tank warned delegates.

By David Scott

25 March 2010

Scotland faces crude and deeply damaging cuts in health spending, the head of an international think-tank warned delegates.

Graham Leicester, director of the International Futures Forum, said the NHS in England had been told to prepare for 20% cuts over three years. However, the Scottish Government had announced an above-inflation increase in its health budget without issuing any warning of ‘troubles ahead’, he said. ‘My fear in Scotland is that when the deep cuts come, which surely they must… they will be crude, ill-thought-through and deeply damaging – more damaging than they need be.’

Leicester said this would happen because the cuts had not been planned for and would be the result of ‘panic, politically and otherwise’.

There was a desperate need to think ‘longer term’, he stressed.

Did you enjoy this article?

AddToAny

Top