Prof Kerr is stepping down from overseeing his recommendations

David Kerr said he was "disappointed" that the new SNP government planned to reverse some decisions to centralise key hospital services.

The SNP has promised to scrap plans to downgrade accident and emergency services at Monklands and Ayr.

The health secretary Nicola Sturgeon is expected to confirm the decision in a statement to parliament on Wednesday.

Professor Kerr, who is a cancer specialist, said such a u-turn would be "emotional and irrational".

But Ms Sturgeon said she disagreed with Prof Kerr.

I think we are fudging difficult decisions which in the longer term will deliver better health for the folk of Scotland Professor David Kerr

She added: "He [Prof Kerr] has done a great service to the NHS in Scotland and now as health minister I look forward to building on the work that he has done.

"The key is that in the Kerr report he has laid a foundation for the future of the health service and I am happy to adhere to those principles."

In an interview on Sunday with BBC One Scotland's Politics Show, Prof Kerr praised the previous health minister, Labour's Andy Kerr, for taking tough decisions and said he was "disappointed" some of these would now be unpicked.

Professor Kerr said he was not stepping down from the implementation group set up to oversee the application of his recommendations because of disagreements with the new minority SNP government.

'Is the plan wrong?'

He said he blamed new work commitments elsewhere including his role overseeing plans to tackle cancer in Africa.

The Oxford University medic spent two years compiling a report on the future of the NHS, and warned Ms Sturgeon not to "fudge" difficult decisions.

He said: "I think there are two issues that we have to deal with.

Nicola Sturgeon: "As health minister I have tough decisions to take."

"One is the plan, with the Kerr report we came up with a national framework for delivering I think appropriate A&E care.

"And the second thing is about making hard decisions.

"Is the plan wrong? I don't think so. I think this is a plan to reorganise, to redesign, accident and emergency care in Scotland, to improve the quality of care to save lives and to deliver it much more locally."

He added: "I don't think that has changed at all and therefore because I'm driven by data and logic, I don't quite understand the reason for changing it."

Prof Kerr claimed there is growing "global" evidence of the benefits to be had from specialising certain types of emergency care in certain areas.

He said: "I would rather have folk from Monklands, from Ayr, treated at the right sort of hospital, with the right people, with the right depths of staff at the right time.

"I think we are fudging difficult decisions which in the longer term will deliver better health for the folk of Scotland."

The future of some A&E departments are in question

Ms Sturgeon, who was also interviewed on the Politics Show, said she would be not be drawn into the detail of her planned announcement to the Scottish Parliament.

However, she said: "I have to make tough decisions as health minister and I will have to take into account the great pressures that health boards face and how clinicians want the service to be delivered.

"But I will also give as much weight as possible to public opinion, the public fund the NHS and it is their opinion of how the health service is delivered which I don't believe has been given adequate consideration by the previous administration."

Ms Sturgeon said she would have been delighted if Prof Kerr had decided to continue in his advisory position, however, she recognised the excellent opportunity he now faced and wished him good luck.