Calls to create NHS whistleblowing hotline

THERE were calls in the Scottish Parliament yesterday for a national NHS whistleblowing phone line to be set up in the wake of the NHS Lothian waiting lists scandal.

Labour health spokeswoman Jackie Baillie said data gathered by her party showed only one case of whistleblowing in the NHS in the past two years.

She added that there had been a dramatic rise across Scotland since 2008 in the number of patients marked on records as “unavailable for social reasons” – the reason used most often by NHS Lothian to wrongfully suspend people from the list.

“This has been going on for the past four years. Why has no action been taken before now?” she said. “There is mounting evidence about the use of social unavailability that is much wider.”

Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon, left, said: “Let me say this to Labour or indeed to anyone else: if you have evidence that waiting time rules are not being applied properly, bring it forward and it will be thoroughly investigated. I will not tolerate the manipulation of waiting times.”