The NHS board was restructured in 2002

The board's responsibilities will be assumed by NHS Greater Glasgow and NHS Highland, Health Minister Andy Kerr said in a statement to parliament.

The board, which serves 420,000 people in an area stretching from Campbeltown to Paisley, is �80m in the red.

Ministers have decided there is no prospect of balancing the books and the debt will be written off.

"Whilst recognising progress, I do not think that the executive could justify allowing a publicly-funded body to spend so much more than its income," Mr Kerr told MSPs.

We will have great difficulty recruiting and retaining staff Jim Devine Unison

"To this end, we have concluded that a fresh start is required and the building of renewed confidence is necessary.

"I am therefore announcing the executive's intention to consult on the dissolution of Argyll and Clyde NHS Board."

He said it was apparent that the geography of the board's area "was simply not natural" for a single area.

'Misplaced concerns'

There are fears that the move will cast doubt on the long-term future of the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley, which is only 10 minutes from Glasgow's Southern General. The latter could expand to become a "super hospital".

But Mr Kerr said: "Such concerns would be misplaced.

"The RAH is a valuable resource that significantly contributes to the delivery of first-rate services for local communities and we expect to see that continue."

The health minister said a fresh start was required

Argyll and Clyde chairman John Millin said he was "disappointed" at the decision, at a time when the board was almost half-way through a five-year financial recovery plan.

Andy Patrick, RCN board member, said staff had worked had to provide good care during "almost impossible circumstances".

NHS Greater Glasgow is expected to take control of Inverclyde Royal in Greenock and the Vale of Leven Hospital in Alexandria.

The executive set up NHS Argyll and Clyde two years ago to succeed the three primary and acute trusts introduced by the Tories.

'Cash starvation'

Critics argued that it did not make sense to lump together remote Highland and island communities with the sort of urban deprivation found in places such as Greenock, Paisley and Dumbarton.

Other opponents have insisted the structure was not to blame, but cash starvation by the executive.

Patients' groups said that the move would not reverse the ward closures and hospital downgradings which had damaged their communities.

Local MSP Duncan McNeil, the Labour member for Greenock and Inverclyde, said he hoped that scrapping the board would offer "a fresh start" and tackle two main problems.

Speaking on BBC Radio's Good Morning Scotland programme, he said: "Geographically, it no longer makes sense to balance the interests of remote and rural areas with the need and demands or urban communities with high levels of deprivation and ill health.

Protesters demonstrated against planned cuts in Argyll and Clyde

"Debt, I believe, has to be lifted in order that we can give a new board the opportunity to plan services with nothing else other than the quality of patient service to consider."

However, the public sector union Unison labelled the move "a daft proposal".

Jim Devine, from Unison, said: "We will have great difficulty recruiting and retaining staff because if you are a manager you don't want to have on your CV that you worked in the only health board since the creation of the NHS in 1948 that was abolished by government diktat."

We have to ensure our local campaign for services to be kept in our area is maintained and that whatever structure is put in place that our needs are met. Vivien Dance Local campaigner

Scottish National Party health spokeswoman Shona Robison demanded to know why it had taken so long to agree a financial plan.

Tory West of Scotland list MSP Annabel Goldie said: "It seems that sticking one bit of the area on to Greater Glasgow Health Board and the other bit on to NHS Highland is frankly, I think, at the moment, a fairly meaningless solution and fraught with problems."

Liberal Democrat Argyll and Bute MSP George Lyon, an audit committee member, said the modernisation of the mental health services in his area, agreed by the outgoing board earlier this year, should proceed as planned.

Four senior managers resigned in 2002 after a damning report by a Scottish Executive support team, which found a culture of managerial and financial incompetence.

A former board member and a local campaigner against downgrading of services said she wanted to know what would replace it.

'A good day'

Vivien Dance said: "We have to ensure our local campaign for services to be kept in our area is maintained and that whatever structure is put in place that our needs are met.

"I think today is a good day for people power as we have campaigned for a considerable time for a redrawing of the geographical boundaries."

She said local people would be looking at the "small print" of what the health minister said.

Underlying pressures

The Scottish NHS Confederation welcomed the decision to write off the board's debts.

But director Hilary Robertson said: "Our fear is that any such proposal to restructure an organisation in this way does nothing to resolve the underlying pressures that contributed to the problems in the first place."