Scots health spending tops £12bn for first time

NHS Scotland Chief Executive Paul Gray

Health spending in Scotland exceeded £12 billion for the first time in 2015-16 and amounted to 40% of total Scottish Government spending, according to NHS Scotland chief executive’s annual report.

It said the number of staff employed by NHS Scotland continued to rise and reached more than 138,000 “whole time equivalent” in 2015-16.

The report said Scotland’s 14 Territorial NHS Boards received an above inflation baseline increase of 3.4%.

It said that for the eighth year in a row, all Scottish NHS Boards achieved their financial targets.

The Scottish Government allocated £10.4 billion directly to the 14 Territorial NHS Boards.

The seven Special NHS Boards and Healthcare Improvement Scotland received £1.3 billion, and £0.5 billion was used to fund a variety of other programmes and research.

The report said Scottish NHS Boards were required to deliver “at a corporate level efficiency” savings of £293 million for NHS Scotland for 2015-16.

“Almost all boards achieved this level of efficiency and a number over-delivered, bringing the final total for 2015-16 to just over £290 million,” the report said.