Next, I will bring in Ross Greer, who is going to take us back a wee bit.

The students who are doing those community engagement courses are getting only £1,800 from the Scottish Government versus the fees that universities would get if the students were travelling from elsewhere.

The ministerial team has given its full backing to the low-emission zone in Scotland’s capital, which might also reduce traffic volumes and tackle congestion across Edinburgh.

Will the Minister for Agriculture and Connectivity give his backing to a project that is estimated to remove half a million cars during the central belt rush hour—a project that will be more beneficial to achieving our net zero goals than Edinburgh’s low-emission zone—and build a station in Winchburgh?

Our NHS is an incredible national asset—I do not think that anyone doubts that—but it continues to face growing challenges. The SNP’s consistent attempts to blame its NHS failures on the UK Government lack credibility; after all, it has full control over healthcare. However, here we are, with more than 840,000 Scottish people waiting on an NHS waiting list. In March 2024, almost a third of patients had to wait for more than four hours in A and E. Just 71.1 per cent of cancer patients are seen within 62 days. Since the SNP promised to increase the number of GPs by 800 by 2027, GP numbers have decreased by 42. Right now, there are more than 4,000 nursing vacancies in NHS Scotland. In 2023, NHS staff faced around 31 assaults a day.

I could go on, but we have heard those statistics many times before, and I am sure that we will hear them again in this debate.

The only way to bring down the waiting lists is to be more efficient with the resources that we have or to create more capacity to do more. Just imagine what we could do if we could do both.

Here is what I mean by being more efficient. I recently spoke to a surgeon who operates across two different hospitals. In one hospital, the theatre is staffed with tens of nurses and operating department practitioners, and they deal with two cases, or maybe three if they are lucky, on a list. In the other hospital, there are far fewer staff in each theatre, but on one list, they can deal with six to eight cases. Faster patient turnarounds and fewer delays between cases is more efficient. Imagine how we could bring down waiting lists if that was compounded with increased capacity.

It is blindingly obvious to me that the decision that the SNP Government took to stop all new capital investment in our NHS will be catastrophic. The SNP Scottish Government appears to favour short-term solutions that will have devastating long-term consequences for our NHS. As Jackie Baillie said, we were promised 11 new regional treatment centres that were intended to bring down the waiting lists. Now, the Scottish Government website mentions only four.

In addition to those treatment centres, dozens of NHS construction projects across Scotland have been stopped. Vital projects in Lothian have been postponed. Those include a new cancer centre, a new eye hospital and a national treatment centre in Livingston. A GP surgery in East Calder that is crying out for a new facility has been all but abandoned. That is before we talk about community hospitals in and around the area closing. With a growing population and diminishing resources, the new chief executive of NHS Lothian has a real challenge ahead of her.

Let us focus on preventative healthcare for a moment. Right now, for every £1 that we spend on our NHS, we spend just 2p on public health. Investing in prevention has substantial benefits in reducing patient demand and costs, as does early diagnosis and treatment. That keeps treatment costs down, it results in far better patient outcomes and it gets people back to work, with a far better quality of life. We need to greatly increase spending on public health interventions if we are to make prevention the overall strategy for our approach to healthcare. We all know about the success that the smoking ban had in the immediate aftermath of its introduction.

Arthritis and other musculoskeletal conditions affect a third of Scotland’s population—that is, 1.7 million of us. Just last week, figures were published that showed record NHS waiting times, with trauma and orthopaedic waits forming the single largest cohort: they make up a third of all waits.

I am one of those 1.7 million, and I am far too young to be getting new knees just yet, but I have been in chronic pain and on a significant level of medication to manage that pain. That medication is not free; it costs money. Yesterday, I went to the GP for the second injection in my knees, so I have now had them both done. Almost immediately after my hyaluronic acid injection, I experienced a significant reduction in pain, I have increased mobility, and I am not taking the medication any more, which will have many health benefits.

Here in Lothian, there are very long waits for such joint injections. I have been very fortunate to have a GP who can do them, and I want to give a thank-out to Dr Graeme Parry in Colinton surgery. I met a physio who told me how important a role physios can play for people with arthritic joints, yet the Chartered Society of Physiotherapy has highlighted a worsening workforce crisis in physiotherapy, with record high vacancy rates and one in five physiotherapists considering leaving the profession. It is a key profession for getting elderly patients who are stuck in hospital more mobile and able to function themselves, which would free up hospital beds and appointments and make space for other activities to take place.

For those who really want to talk about preventative spend, I want to speak about a rare and incurable genetic condition that affects spinal motor nerves, which is called spinal muscular atrophy or SMA. Unless it is caught early, it results in progressive muscle wasting and weakness. With approximately one in 16,000 British babies born with SMA, the case for adding it to the screening blood spot tests for all newborns is obvious to me. I notice that Mr Doris is in the chamber—I know that he, too, cares passionately about the condition. Yes, that test will cost money, as will the treatment, but the cost of round-the-clock care for someone with SMA is around £500,000 a year, so surely that fits both financially and philosophically with the principle of preventative medicine.

I thank Mr Doris for that update.

Still on the subject of preventative action, on Friday I met a lady in Colinton called Shona Harrower. She wanted to tell me about a truly preventative approach from Norway.

“Amazeballs free sports equipment loan scheme for all under 25s with a residential address in Norway”,

she proclaimed.

“Rachel (my daughter) just sent me this awesome photo from Norway. An old school friend visited her, and they borrowed all the camping gear they needed from the (free) Bua shop to make memories like this”.

If a picture could tell a thousand words, that one certainly did. What is there not to like about tackling physical and mental health at the same time, and getting our young people involved in sport and nature?

The NHS in Scotland has been described as

“not sustainable in its present form”

by Professor Paul Gray, the former head of the NHS in Scotland. The SNP has driven the NHS into that crisis. It must adopt the Scottish Conservatives’ proposals from our “Modern, Efficient, Local” healthcare paper to secure the future of our NHS in Scotland.

Will the member take an intervention?

Will the member take an intervention?

The spending is not ring fenced. If the NHS in England chooses to contract a private provider to provide a service, the money still comes to Scotland as a consequence. It is not allocated in the manner that the member is saying that it is.

I am really pleased to have the chance to speak in this debate, as I once considered a career as a physiotherapist, although life clearly took a different turn. I might go back to it later—that is always an opportunity if we get things right.

Amid record vacancy rates and a failure to increase the number of undergraduate training places in Scotland, patients desperately need more physiotherapists. The Chartered Society of Physiotherapy says:

“patients’ recoveries are being put in jeopardy by a worsening workforce crisis, with Scotland now lagging behind other parts of the UK on physiotherapy training.”

The shortage in Scotland’s physiotherapy workforce creates further challenges across the healthcare system, which ultimately impacts patient care. Various factors are contributing to the demand for physios, including the ageing population, an increase in chronic conditions and backlogs for treatments, which have been made worse by the pandemic. However, it is not just that there is an increased demand for physios; it is also the case that the supply and training of physios have not kept pace with the demand.

Addressing the shortage requires a multifaceted approach. The Chartered Society of Physiotherapy has started a campaign called “Scotland needs more physios”, which is underscored by the belief that Scotland does not currently educate or train enough physiotherapists to supply the workforce to meet the population’s needs. In England, the number of undergraduate training places has doubled to meet demand, but there has been no such increase in Scotland in the past decade. Although Scottish course programmes are oversubscribed with applicants, not enough places are being funded to meet the needs of Scotland’s national health service.

Increasing the number of training places in physiotherapy programmes and enhancing support for students could and would help to boost the number of new graduates entering the field. Furthermore, physiotherapists have stated that they are finding it extremely difficult to recruit staff for their practices across Scotland, with vacancy rates at a record high. That has a knock-on effect on existing staff morale, with increased levels of stress and work pressures and challenging working conditions. There is competition for staff, which creates an artificial pressure on the environment, with people taking staff from one practice to another. We need better working conditions, the best competitive salaries and opportunities for professional development to retain staff and attract new recruits.

I recently met a physio who made it clear just how important they are to people with arthritic joints. I suppose that I would put myself in that bracket—as someone with arthritic joints, not as a physio. Right now, that condition is becoming much more prevalent among an ageing population and those who have had an active sporting life before coming here. Physiotherapy is a key profession in getting elderly patients who are stuck in hospital—Mr Rowley said this in his opening remarks—more mobile and able to function, and getting them home and much more independent. That helps, in turn, to free up beds, appointments and doctors for other cases.

A self-referral service would allow people to see a physio quickly. That would also make it important for patients to understand that it is as much down to them to be involved in their care—Ruth Maguire talked about how important it was to consistently do the exercises that her physio recommended—and that we have to buy into the treatments that physios give us.

However, it is not just the elderly who need the service. If a person suffers from pain or an injury for a long time, they are likely to get injuries elsewhere in their body as they compensate. That can also affect their mental health.

Physios, including work physiotherapists, are an essential part of our healthcare service, and they should never be underestimated or undervalued. I thank Mr Rowley very much for bringing this important debate to the chamber.

On Friday 1 December 2023 at 10.25 pm, an explosion ripped through homes on Baberton Mains Avenue, tragically resulting in the loss of one life. Some six months on, families living on the avenue and neighbouring streets relive the horror of that night every day when going about their daily lives. Families whose homes were destroyed are none the wiser regarding the future of their homes. No visible or perceivable progress has been made, and the site looks much the same as it did on that bleak morning of 2 December. Last week, one resident described the situation between the City of Edinburgh Council and insurance companies as being like a Mexican stand-off.

Will the First Minister meet me and the families and do all that he can to influence that stalemate and move things on for those who have been left in limbo?