Chamber and committees

That is excellent. Thank you all for your responses.

Are you suggesting that a charitable trust, for instance, could be hijacked into becoming a private business while still using the frontage of that trust?

Does that mean that the Scottish Government still intends to, as was announced, double investment in the health capital maintenance backlog budget over the next five years, or has that been affected by those moneys having had to be allocated to deal with Covid?

Does that take into account, as Mr Hoy mentioned, the ageing population and suchlike, and the extra moneys that will have to be generated to increase capacity?

Thank you very much.

That is helpful; thank you very much.

I have a wee question about reform and innovation and how they are being used by the Scottish Government and NHS boards. You mentioned, I think, the need to monitor public awareness and acceptance, and ways of assessing services to make sure that they are effective—[Interruption.] The way I am coughing, I might need to go to hospital. Hold on a second, if you do not mind. I like a bit of melodrama.

Given that the public need a realistic understanding of what is being achieved, and given the need to try to involve them in difficult choices, how effective has the Scottish Government’s redesign of the urgent care programme been in reducing the number of people who self-present at hospital? What feedback has been received from patients about the service changes that have been made?

You mentioned Covid-19 and the specific expenditure that it brought about. Are there plans to support NHS boards to continue to reduce and monitor Covid-19 expenditure? If so, what are they?

Welcome. It is nice to see you here. I want to ask about financial sustainability. We are informed that the Scottish Government’s health budget has increased by £4.4 billion since 2018-19, and that the total Scottish budget allocation for health and social care is £19.1 billion in 2023-24. That level of spending has been brought forward—it was expected to be that amount in a couple of years’ time.

However, NHS boards’ financial plans have shown that, of the 14 territorial boards, only three are expected to break even in 2022-23 if their savings targets are met, and seven of the eight national NHS boards are expected to break even if their savings targets are met. Does the Scottish Government have an update on the number of boards that broke even in 2022-23?

Is that a revision of the current brokerage arrangements between the Government and the NHS boards?