 Health staff are set to receive pay increases this year |
Health boards across Scotland have shelved new services as they struggle to fund a series of pay rises for staff, it has emerged. Nine of the country's 15 health boards have admitted to BBC Scotland that they have had to abandon new investments.
Many face multi-million pound wage bills and said they still do not know the full cost of the pay rises.
Health Minister Malcolm Chisholm said funding was an issue but the pay rises were not straightforward.
Four pay rises coincide this year.
Under Agenda for Change many nurses will receive an increase of up to 15%.
The new contract for GPs will increase investment in surgeries, while consultants will get a pay rise backdated to April last year and receive overtime for the first time. Junior doctors will be entitled to up to two years' additional salary if they work more than 56 hours a week.
The difficulties are spelled out in recent papers from Fife Health Board.
It said: "In view of substantial cost pressures, 2004/5 cannot be a year in which boards will have the financial capacity to introduce service developments."
Glasgow has gone as far as listing what is being shelved, including therapy for autistic children, a clinic for eating disorders and a bereavement service.
'Patient needs'
Of Scotland's 15 health boards, only Grampian, Highland and Ayrshire and Arran said they were not in difficulties.
Speaking on BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland programme, Mr Chisholm conceded that health boards faced a difficult period.
He said they would be able to share in an extra �70m funding to help implement the new contracts.
"These are not straightforward pay awards as people would understand them," he said.
"Staff will get more money and we must reward staff properly, but it's very much about money for modernisation.
 |  Mental health has always been seen as a Cinderella service in relation to other services  |
"This is about designing posts and roles around the needs of patients." The minister said "the real focus" this year was being placed on the Agenda for Change programme to ensure nurses and support staff received similar financial rewards enjoyed by doctors.
"Agenda for Change is based on rewarding people properly for the skills they are using and developing," he said.
On the issue of scrapping some services, Mr Chisholm conceded some new developments would not be pursued due to the financial constraints.
But he also said that stroke and coronary heart disease strategies would benefit from increased investment.
Mr Chisholm said mental health services would receive a financial boost following the introduction of the new Mental Health Act next April.
'Critical state'
However Richard Norris, head of policy at the Scottish Association of Mental Health (SAMH), said it was concerned that health boards were not treating the issue as a priority.
"Mental health has always been seen as a Cinderella service in relation to other services," he said.
"It's not simply seen as the priority by health boards and health trusts in the way they see services for cancer and it doesn't get the same headlines."
Shona Robison, health spokeswoman for the Scottish National Party, said serious questions must be raised about what the executive is doing to improve the NHS.
She added: "These services should have been fully funded in the first place but instead they are facing a critical state, and my main concern is that this total mishandling of the situation could now have a serious impact on patient care."
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