Robison refuses to quit over NHS cash scandal

HEALTH Secretary Shona Robison has rejected calls to quit following revelations charity cash was used to pay for new IT systems at NHS Tayside under her watch.

Bosses were forced to step down earlier this month after The Herald revealed £2.7 million had been raided from the board’s endowment fund in 2014 and spent retrospectively on general running costs.

Ms Robison insisted a “robust process” was now in place to fully investigate the issue and ensure the practice was not replicated at other health boards across Scotland.

But Scottish Labour’s health spokesman Anas Sarwar said she had “failed too many patients” and “breached the trust of the public” – and should consider her position.

He said: “This scandal has happened on her watch, in her local health board. It is her mismanagement and her failure. The sad reality is that the public have lost confidence in SNP Health Secretary Shona Robison and she has lost control of her brief.

“Shona Robison must now do the decent thing and withdraw herself from this investigation, if not from her portfolio all together.”

Ms Robison said the Office of the Scottish Charity Regulator (OSCR) was leading the probe into NHS Tayside.

She insisted all investigations – including those by external auditors – would be completed by the end of June, adding: “I would have thought in anybody’s eyes, that is a robust process – with the independence of OSCR at its heart.”