The
Deputy Presiding Officer (Murray Tosh): The
final item of business is a members' business debate on motion S2M-1530, in
the name of Frances Curran, on the Argyll and Clyde clinical review. The
debate will be concluded without any question being put.
Allan Wilson (Cunninghame North) (Lab):
Thank you, Presiding Officer, for recognising my local
interest. I thank Frances Curran for the opportunity to express that
interest and I thank the Minister for Health and Community Care for letting
me express it. I have received representations on the consultation process
that
we are discussing tonight and I have concerns about it. Like many members,
particularly Jackie Baillie, I am concerned about ensuring that it addresses
what we might call, for the purposes of this debate, cross-border issues.
I represent and live in Cunninghame North, which is of course in Ayrshire,
but like Duncan McNeil, my two sons were born in Argyll and Clyde—in Paisley
maternity unit, to be precise. I was a regular attendee in casualty
departments when I played football and, by and large, it was the Royal
Alexandra hospital that put me back together again. Despite the fact that
they live in Ayrshire, many of my constituents use services in Inverclyde as
well as the local primary care services that are provided so well by
Ayrshire and Arran NHS Board. The clinicians who were mentioned by Duncan
McNeil provide and use services in Inverclyde although they live in Largs,
Skelmorlie and Cumbrae—which is known to you, Presiding Officer.
My point is that the issues require consultation between boards as well as
within boards. For all the reasons that have been mentioned by everyone
else, the matter requires strategic consideration rather than a piecemeal
approach to the decision-making process within boards. If clinicians argue,
as some do, that there should be no district general provision west of
Paisley for my constituents, I submit that that proposal should be subjected
to wider scrutiny than is proposed in the west of Scotland. I know that the
minister will want to ensure that that is indeed what happens.
The Presiding
Officer: The last bang of the gavel. The last
decision time. The last day on the Mound. Later this month, we start
Scotland's biggest ever flitting. Staff will be moving down the Royal Mile
at the end of July and members will follow a month later. We meet in
Holyrood for the first time in September, with our new home being opened by
the Queen in October. It will not be a building site; as the Auditor General
said in his report this week, it will be a building of real quality that
will meet the aspirations of the people of Scotland.
It is up to all of us in the chamber to rise to those aspirations. It is not
buildings that make a Parliament but the men and women who are elected to
represent the people. Holyrood will succeed to the clarity of our vision,
the depth of our scrutiny and the quality of our argument.
Have a good break and come back focused on building a better Scotland. |
