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The Times & The Sunday Times
The Times & The Sunday Times
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Merger plan for health boards and councils

Jason Allardyce
The Sunday Times
The chair of Holyrood’s finance committee, SNP MSP Kenny Gibson, proposed the measure at their spring party conference
The chair of Holyrood’s finance committee, SNP MSP Kenny Gibson, proposed the measure at their spring party conference
Jason Allardyce
The Sunday Times

SCOTLAND’S health boards and local authorities could be merged under radical public sector reforms to be proposed at this week’s SNP spring conference.

With public services under financial pressure, Kenny Gibson — who chairs Holyrood’s finance committee — will suggest the move to improve the effectiveness of preventative healthcare.

In a motion backed by his committee colleague, Glasgow MSP John Mason, he will argue that increasingly scarce resources and ever-rising demands means it must be considered to delivering better public sector outcomes.

The motion states that “considerable difficulties remain in introducing preventative service delivery, not least because organisational silos work against decisive, democratic decision-making”.

It adds that it is “time to look at merging health boards and local authorities to create more strategic bodies, while devolving some of their current powers down to town and community level to allow decision-making to be as close to people as possible”.

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If it is backed by conference a re-elected SNP government would be under pressure to examine and consult on the proposal at an early date.

SNP MSP Kenny MacAskill, while justice secretary, described the number of councils and health boards in Scotland as untenable. With Scotland having moved from eight police forces to one police force, he queried the case for continuing to have 32 local authorities and 14 health boards.

But the Scottish government until now has said it favours “closer service integration” rather than structural reorganisation of public services.

The move could result in areas such as Ayrshire, which currently has three councils and one health board, changing to a single structure which would bring the NHS authority under democratic control. In other parts of Scotland small local authorities such as Inverclyde and Renfrewshire could be brought together.

Gibson said that creating larger, more powerful authorities could give local politicians a greater chance of securing economic investment and lead to better delivery of healthcare.