Apologies will not cut it, Sarwar tells Swinney amid NHS and ambulance ‘crisis’

John Swinney has been told his apologies to Scots experiencing long waits on the NHS “will not cut it anymore”.

Anas Sarwar told the First Minister that ambulance waits were getting longer, despite repeated apologies.

The Scottish Labour leader welcomed the Health Secretary’s openness to a national inquiry into maternity care but said the issue was “just a snapshot of the crisis and chaos in our NHS”.

“Scotland’s ambulance service is also in crisis,” he said during First Minister’s Questions.

Mr Sarwar brought up the case of Queen’s Park defender Charlie Fox, who waited 10 hours for an ambulance after suffering a serious knee injury, and Linlithgow Rose footballer Brooke Patterson, who waited five hours for an ambulance after breaking her leg.

Mr Swinney apologised to both Ms Paterson and Mr Fox for their “completely unacceptable” waits.

Mr Sarwar told the SNP leader that saying sorry was no longer enough.

He said: “Week after week John Swinney comes and apologises for the Government’s performance – and things continue to get worse.

“A month ago, he apologised for long ambulance waits, but apologies simply will not cut it any more.”

The Labour MSP brought up the case of David McClenaghan, who died of a heart attack in 2018 when paramedics who arrived at the scene reportedly failed to leave the vehicle to search for him in his office.

“That was seven years ago and a fatal accident inquiry is now under way,” he said.

“But since then, response times have got worse. Ten years ago, 83% of life-threatening cases saw an ambulance arrive in 10 minutes.

“When David McClenaghan died seven years ago, it had fallen to just 73%.

“Now it’s 61%. That is shocking.

“So why is this situation continuing to get worse and worse on John Swinney’s watch – and don’t simply stand up and say you’re sorry.”

The First Minister said NHS staff were working now under more resources from the Government but under “incredible demands”.

Mr Swinney said ministers had made good progress on reducing long waits and that hip and knee operations reached record levels last year.

He told Holyrood: “I recognise that there will be occasions in which public services do not meet the expectations of members of the public and I think the right thing to do, and no matter what Mr Sarwar puts to me and how he characterises my response, I will be honest and open with the public in apologising where those standards are not met.

“What I can say is that Scottish Ambulance Service staffing is up by 31% in the last 10 years, that we have more paramedics, they are up by 57.6% in the last 10 years.

“And what I can also say is that median response times for purple calls was seven minutes, 51 seconds on the most recent data that is available to me.”

Mr Swinney added: “Our staff are working with more resources under incredible demands to meet the expectations for members of the public, and in the overwhelming majority of cases in the country, that is exactly what they do.”