Can’t we do more to fund end-of-life care?

ON Wednesday night I went for a drive to see the Wallace Monument. As I crossed the Clackmannanshire Bridge, the light was soft but clear and I could see the Ochils and beyond them the Trossachs stretching away – forever, it seemed – to the north and west. In the middle distance the Wallace was silhouetted in the golden light.

Since moving to central Scotland in the early 1980s, the Wallace has been one of the most familiar landmarks in my own personal geography.

On Wednesday it was lit up in blue light along with a number of other public buildings in the Forth Valley – including Callendar House and the Kelpies in Falkirk and the Arria statue (or Diana Ross as she is known in our house) in Cumbernauld – to mark the 40th anniversary of Strathcarron Hospice in Denny.

Strathcarron is, I’m afraid, another landmark in my personal geography. It was where my late wife Jean spent her last few days in October 2019.

That time is still painfully vivid in my memory. And yet, even when I was there with Jean, in the midst of the worst moments of my life, I was aware of what a remarkable place it was. The quiet care the staff gave to Jeanie was some small consolation.

I’ve been thinking about how hard it must have been for hospices over this last year. Both financially – with fund-raising

Strathcarron is where my late wife Jean spent her last few days in October 2019

opportunities restricted and hospice shops closed for the most part – and, of course, clinically.

At Strathcarron, Jeanie was surrounded by the people who loved her. But how hard has it been for those working in or needing the services of a hospice this last year? Staff wearing PPE, restrictions on visitors, the whole hellish layer of complication Covid-19 has added to palliative care.

Perhaps this is a good time to look again at how we finance end-of-life care. Last month the Scottish government announced a £16.9 million support package for Scottish hospices. But as the charity Hospice UK points out, on average only a third of the cost of adult hospice care comes from statutory funding.

Strathcarron Hospice alone needs to raise £12,900 per day to operate. Tomorrow it is holding a Big Virtual Tea to mark its birthday and hopefully garner some donations.

There is an increasing demand for palliative care as we live longer. Hospice UK estimates that of the 58,100 people who died in Scotland in 2019 (Jeanie being just one of them), around 44,000 needed some form of palliative care . Yet 11,000 of that number – a quarter – missed out.

There is never money for everything, of course, but for some time now there has been an argument for recalibrating our national commitment to palliative care.

Maternity wards, after all, don’t need to rely on cake sales and marathons for financing.

The state is there to support us at the beginning of our lives. Is there not an argument for more support at its end?