NHS chief faces waiting time criticism

SCOTLAND’ STOP health official has accepted criticism of the NHS’s so- called waiting time guarantee which has never been met and has been described as “a farce”.

The Patients Right Act 2012 offers a treatment time “guarantee” of 12 weeks but no health board has met the target to date.

And there is no guarantee it will be met in the immediate future, NHS Scotland performance director John Connaghan told Holyrood’s Public Audit Committee.

NHS Scotland chief executive Paul Gray accepted the criticism that he is “not fulfilling the will of the parliament”.

Those who are not seen within 12 weeks have the right to seek a judicial review, according to Mr Gray, a process that can cost many thousands of pounds.

But he rejected a suggestion that this amounted to telling the poor to “go whistle”.

Committee convener Hugh Henry said: “A legal guarantee is far more than a target, it’s something that is enshrined in law.

“Now that legal right is not being met, so you are not fulfilling the will of parliament, the boards are not implementing the will of parliament and patients across Scotland are not having their legal entitlement observed, guaranteed or implemented.

“Is it not a farce that you have a legal right and you can ignore that?”

Mr Gray said: “We are not ignoring it. We are working towards it.

“I accept the points you make, and we are working to get ourselves into a better position than that.”

Picture: Andrew Cowan. NHS Scotland chief executive Paul Gray.