Andrew Liddle, Scottish Political Correspondent
The SNP has been accused of “selling a fantasy” about the staffing crisis in the NHS.
The Scottish Conservatives’ health spokesman Donald Cameron said Scottish Government ministers were behaving “like the band on the Titanic” by trying to “persuade us that all is well – when patently it is not”.
But Health Secretary Shona Robison hit back, accusing Mr Cameron of “double-standards” given the Conservatives’ “woeful” management of the NHS in England.
Scottish Labour’s Anas Sarwar, meanwhile, ridiculed Ms Robison for using her UK Government counterpart Jeremy Hunt as a benchmark of success.
NHS staffing shortages across the north and north-east have been widely reported, with rising agency staff bills and falling numbers of family doctors.
Highlands and Islands MSP Mr Cameron said: “Parroting the line ‘there are record numbers’ is no answer to this crisis.
“There are ‘record’ numbers of people getting old in Scotland, ‘record’ number of demands on the NHS.
“It is quite simply selling a fantasy that our NHS is coping under SNP stewardship.
“Rather like the band on the Titanic, the Scottish Government is trying to persuade us that all is well – when patently it is not. Nobody is buying it.”
But Ms Robison said the NHS was performing better in Scotland than in England, where it is managed by the Conservative Party.
She said: “SNP members will point out the double standard in the Tories coming to the chamber to criticise our record on the NHS, when the record of their own party in government in England is woeful, to say the least.
“I could quote many organisations that are saying much more powerful words about the record of the Tory party in charge of the NHS in England.
“We have to look only at the junior doctors strikes that have been happening in England and compare that to the constructive partnership relationship that we have with our professions here, north of the border.”
But Mr Sarwar taunted Ms Robison over her comparisons with England.
He said: “The cabinet secretary chooses to use Jeremy Hunt’s record as the measure of her success.
“I have got to say, is that the limit of our ambition for Scotland and the limit for our ambition for Scotland’s NHS?
“I give it to the health secretary – she is better than Jeremy Hunt.
“But I hardly think being the second worst health secretary in the UK is much of a compliment.”