Plea for merger of NHS Tayside

SNP’s Alex Neil calls for super-board with Fife and Grampian

NHS Tayside should be wound down and services run by a super-board, says a former health secretary.

The SNP’s Alex Neil said the cash scandals at Tayside show the need for a cut in the number of Scotland’s health boards.

He suggested the dodgy accounting was kept under wraps because there are too many of them to be effectively scrutinised.

Tayside would be merged with Fife and Grampian under Mr Neil’s proposal, which is likely to heap pressure on his successor.

A new senior management team has been installed at the Dundee-based board after senior figures were caught dipping into charity funds and hamming up Tayside’s woeful financial position.

The crisis has left Health Secretary Shona Robison fighting for her job.

The call came as one Tayside board member said the new team would not be able to have much impact without being given more resources.

A former SNP health secretary has called for NHS Tayside to be folded in response to the cash crisis.

Alex Neil said the accounting fiddles that led to the demise of its leadership could have been exposed earlier if there were fewer health boards in Scotland.

The Nationalist MSP is proposing the number of territorial health boards is reduced from 14 to three to improve scrutiny and cut administrative costs.

As pressure mounts on Health Secretary Shona Robison over the Tayside saga, her predecessor Mr Neil criticised a lack of ambition in reforming the struggling NHS.

Ms Robison told the chairman and chief executive of Tayside their positions were untenable and drafted in replacements on Friday.

Mr Neil told The Courier: “I think (the Tayside financial crisis) underlines the fact we have got far too many boards, so it’s much easier for these things to slip through the net.

“It’s time to collapse the territorial boards, get rid of the 14 territorial boards and the separate board for the Golden Jubilee.

“Instead of those 15 boards, have three very strong regional boards.

“If I was still there that is one of the things I would be doing, because it’s time for radical surgery on the bureaucracy.”

In comments which will be seen as a swipe at Ms Robison’s leadership, he added: “There is reform going on but it is far too slow and not at the pace or scale required.”

The structure proposed by Mr Neil would see Tayside, Fife and Grampian come under an east of Scotland super-board.

A Scottish Government spokeswoman declined to comment on cutting the number of health boards, but said more decisions were being made on a wider regional level.

“We have been strengthening regional planning and delivery in recent months,” she said.

“This will allow faster decisions to be made at a regional level and, in combination with the more local decision makers, allow for higher quality care for those who need it.

“The combination of national, regional and local decision making give us the best of all worlds to ensure high quality care.”

Picture: PA. Alex Neil during a visit to Forth Valley Royal Hospital in 2013 when he was health secretary, alongside Dr Stephen Hickey and Dr Donna Fraser.