Highland NHS cash hijacked

WE learned this month that the two top executives of NHS Tayside have been replaced because Scottish Government ministers had lost confidence in their ability to manage the NHS Tayside finances (“NHS chiefs forced out amid charity cash row”, The Herald, April 7).

We can, as of April 13, read, on the NHS Highland website, that “For the avoidance of any doubt NHS Highland is 100% clear that, at no point has endowment fund cash been put towards something that would be classed as a ‘core’ NHS expenditure”.

My question to Scottish Government ministers who have no confidence in NHS Tayside’s financial management, would be: “How does the hijack, described as ‘re-purposing’, of a charity fundpurchased asset costing £1.1 million square with what you would describe as acceptable?”.

The decision to close the

Highland Heartbeat Centre, a specialist coronary rehabilitation unit based within the Raigmore precinct, was taken in order to accommodate other facilities despite NHS Highland never having funded the unit. It hadn’t used endowment fund cash; it just seized what the cash had purchased.

Are any Scottish ministers available to answer this question? Ned Larkin,

28a Old Edinburgh Road, Inverness.