WATCH: Jamie Stone says Highland healthcare ‘stripped back and gutted’ by 17 years of centralisation that ‘has wreaked havoc on my part of the world’
In the first adjournment debate of the new parliamentary term far north MP Jamie Stone told the house that in the Highlands rural healthcare has “been stripped back and gutted, leaving residents with access to too few local services.”
He brought the debate forward in the hope of placing the issue near the top of the new Labour government’s agenda by detailing in his address a scathing litany of failings affecting GPs, their patients, women, carers, staff and children.
Mr Stone believes the problem is that “17 years of centralisation has wreaked havoc on my part of the world” leading to too many services that are only available in Raigmore hospital.
The impact of those failing has been devastating for patients who must now travel further than ever to access healthcare while debilitating staff, not least financially, sparking an exodus of qualified personnel with no one to replace them.
Mr Stone said: “We are here to discuss the adequacy of healthcare services in rural areas. For fear of being predictable, I am afraid to say that the health services in the Highlands are not, in fact, adequate at all.
“Of course, health is devolved, but 17 years of centralisation has wreaked havoc on my part of the world. Health services have been stripped back and gutted, leaving residents with access to too few local services.”
Changes to the GP contract in Scotland, he argued, greatly disadvantage patients who can no longer access vaccinations via their local general practices.
“Now patients must travel 70 miles or more to the nearest A&E where they will only face further waits due to A&E backlogs,” he said. “Worse still, there are already delays for babies who need their first life-saving vaccinations. The fact is, the Scottish Government’s one-size-fits-all approach simply doesn’t work.”
Recruitment is a major problem – without staff no service can be provided, Mr Stone takes up the issue: “Poor wages, and terms and conditions, and lack of proper travel reimbursement all lead towards the general impression that the game simply isn’t worth the candle. That is why we’re missing key workers and paying through the nose for locum and temporary staff.
“In the past year, NHS Highland has spent £21 million on locum staffing. That is almost three per cent of its entire budget. A truly eye-watering sum, and for very little indeed.
“Wouldn’t this money be better spent reopening the care homes, hospital wards, or pain clinics that have been forced to close?”
For many it would be unthinkable to travel long distances to give birth but in Caithness and north west Sutherland that is the norm – it’s a well known issue that Mr Stone has been raising since his “maiden speech in 2017”.
“Caithness General Hospital used to have a consultant-led maternity service, which meant expectant mothers could have their babies locally. It was downgraded once before, but as the MSP at the time, I had much more influence to get it restored, which I did.
“Since then, the maternity services have been downgraded once again, and there appears to be no movement from the Scottish Government to reverse this.
“This means that pregnant mothers have to make a 200-mile round trip in the car to deliver their babies.”
But that is not the only way in which women are being short-changed: “Women’s health has been removed from the far north. A routine trip to the gynaecologist, a diagnosis for a life-threatening ovarian cyst, or for endometriosis, means travelling all that way - if you are lucky enough to get an appointment before the condition progresses too far.”
He concluded: “My ask of the minister is to recognise that many of the problems I have highlighted today are not unique to the Highlands but are faced by many remote communities all over the country.
“That being said, I also ask that this new Labour Government works hard at improving the relationship between the UK and Scottish Government. Only with proper cooperation will the needs of the Scottish people be met.”
He added: “Indeed, an analysis of how the Scottish Government spends this money, and whether it is being used for its original intention, would be welcome.”
Karin Smyth, the minister of health and social care, said: “I hope we can begin this Parliament as we mean to go on, by being candid about the formidable challenges that the NHS faces.
“As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said on his first day in the job, the NHS is broken, and it will be the task of this Government to build a new NHS for the future. That means the NHS in our rural and coastal areas, no less than the NHS in our towns and cities.”
