Scotland is short of cash National Health Service has pledged to pay private companies £850m to carry out NHS work in a desperate bid to ease pressure on struggling staff, this newspaper can reveal.
A Mail on Sunday investigation today exposes the enormity of the privatization of the NHS SNP government, now that the beleaguered health care system is increasingly trying to outsource its core daily tasks.
Since January 2023, contracts worth hundreds of millions of pounds have been awarded to private companies – many based in England, and some as far away as Denmark and the United States. The Netherlands – to assist with diagnostics, tests, x-rays and treatments.
It means that as the taxpayer-funded health service battles record waiting times and overstretched resources, thousands of Scotland’s NHS patients and their data have been diverted to the private sector.
The core work of NHS Scotland is being outsourced
Hospitals and GPs are increasingly relying on a cadre of private staff to bolster their dwindling ranks.
Health Secretary Neil Gray and NHS Scotland confirmed last night that the NHS will only record ‘private healthcare expenditure’ if it relates to a patient being sent to a private company to have a clinical procedure carried out.
They admitted that their statistics do not take into account contracts for staff from private employment agencies, privately run services for picking and moving products and other private services that support daily operations, such as privately owned digital platforms – despite all these tasks being a core activity. part of the job of the NHS.
With the true extent of the privatization of the NHS Scotland revealed today by The MoS, First Minister John Swinney’s claims that he would keep the NHS in public hands and protect it from the threat of ‘Westminster’ privatization have come into sharp relief came into view.
Last night, critics slammed the SNP for its blatant ‘hypocrisy’ and its failure to get to grips with the crisis engulfing Scotland’s NHS.
Scottish Labor health spokeswoman Jackie Baillie said: ‘This highlights how staggeringly hypocritical it is for the SNP to criticize Labor for viewing outsourcing and private contracting as a temporary measure to help boost NHS capacity and reduce waiting lists.
The SNP have the audacity to call themselves protectors of the NHS when it has been their failure to adequately strengthen the workforce and fund vital services over the last seventeen years which has left our NHS in permanent crisis.”
Scottish Conservative health spokesman Dr Sandesh Gulhane said: ‘Scots will be shocked to hear that the SNP has spent a whopping £850 million on privatizing our NHS in the last 18 months alone – something that my party has always been against it.’
This article has searched all government contracts awarded by the NHS’s main procurement team, National Services Scotland, since January 2023.
Apart from purchasing essential medicines, the NHS in Scotland has spent £850 million outsourcing day-to-day operations.
Some contracts concern services that will be provided over a number of years.
Our research shows that £665,000 has been set aside since the start of last year to pay Cambridge doctors to collect and test the oesophageal cells of Scottish patients to help the NHS diagnose certain cancers.
And German company Fresenius Medical Care has been awarded a £7 million contract to provide home dialysis for patients.
A £30 million contract was awarded to companies to review X-rays and other scans on behalf of Scotland’s NHS, with one in Norresundby, Denmark, given access to NHS patient records.
Another address listed on the purchasing portal was for Medispace, based in Zoetermeer, the Netherlands.
One company in Harlow, Essex, was awarded a £1.9 million contract to supply blood clotting drugs to homes across Scotland and process associated waste.
Money will also be spent in the private sector on genetic testing of embryos before their implantation during the IVF process.
A Cambridge company was awarded a £3.5 million contract to give Scots access to online therapy, while another company specializing in psychiatry was awarded £13.6 million for similar work.
Meanwhile, research into dermatological complaints will now take place online, with screenings carried out by Oxford doctors at a cost of £561,000.
A further £930,000 has been earmarked for dermatology work, partly to ‘reduce the number of face-to-face appointments in secondary care’, according to documents uploaded by the NHS.
Video consultancy services – used to reduce the number of face-to-face appointments – will cost the health service £5.8 million.
Money has also been spent on ‘providing a range of inpatient procedures, clinics and outpatient services to support the NHS in Scotland in the delivery of comprehensive and effective healthcare services’, which is likely to include procedures such as hip and knee operations, cataract surgery and vasectomies. .
But of particular interest to industry bodies such as the British Medical Association is that the NHS has set aside a huge reserve of £750 million for agency staff, while many of the companies supplying the workers are also based south of the border.
Other companies were awarded another £33 million contract to supply workers.
BMA Scotland chairman Dr Iain Kennedy said: ‘The money spent on locums should instead be spent on properly staffing the service.
‘Permanent staff are not only by far the most cost-effective option, they also provide the stability and continuity of service that best serves patients.’
Alan Taman, of campaign group Doctors for the NHS, lamented an increasing ‘reliance of the NHS on private providers to provide basic services’.
However, for concerned taxpayers and professionals, the need to outsource key activities may be a symptom of a service delivery under extreme and ever-increasing pressure.
The NHS in Scotland is struggling with waiting lists at record highs, despite SNP pledges to eliminate long delays.
Mr Gray said: “Using the independent sector to provide additional capacity is not a new development.
As is the case across Great Britain, limited use of alternative providers, within or outside the local area, including independent sector providers, may be necessary in certain circumstances in response to capacity constraints.
‘The figures quoted relate to a range of contracts, including the provision of temporary workers, digital platforms and other services.’
The SNP’s Amy Callaghan said: ‘The SNP will always protect our NHS and keep our health service in public hands.’
