Latest news with #DameJackieBaillie
STV News
6 days ago
- Business
- STV News
Scottish water bosses to get £400k pay rise amid customer price hike
Scottish Water bosses have received £400,000 in pay rises despite hiking prices by nearly 10% for customers. The total cost of senior executive salaries rose to almost £1.4m in 2025, up from just more than £1.1m the year before, the body's annual report released on Wednesday shows. The chief executive Alex Plant's salary has gone up by £50,000 and now sits at £295,000. His total pay packet, including pension contributions, totals £523,000. Scottish Labour has said the 'eye-watering' salary increases will 'stick in the craw' for people across the country who are paying higher water bills this year. 'People across Scotland are struggling to make ends meet, yet the wages of bosses at Scottish Water are eye-watering and continue to rise,' Labour deputy leader Dame Jackie Baillie said. Baillie said water bosses are picking up 'hefty incentive bonuses totalling more than £230,000' at the expense of Scottish taxpayers. From April, the average household bill increased by £44 per year. That's on top of a 8.8% rise the year before. Scottish Water said more investment was needed as current infrastructure is put under 'significant pressure' by more extreme weather conditions, such as more periods of drought and intense rainfall. The Scottish Lib Dems said this year's pay rises are the third highest on record, despite water bills going up sharply and 24,398 sewage dumps last year. 'The SNP government is rewarding their water company for failure,' Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton MSP said. 'Scottish Water are paying out enormous bonuses to bosses who are presiding over filthy sewage dumps and hitting customers with bigger bills.' Chief operating officer Peter Farrer saw his salary fall by around £20,000 but his overall package increased to £312,000. Chief financial officer Alan Dingwall, who joined the firm last year, was paid a salary of £175,000 and a total package of £293,000. But the body's annual report also shows a record performance in the past year in customer satisfaction – which hit 94% – as well as other positive results in leak reduction and the halving of serious pollution, leading Mr Plant to describe the past 12 months as 'our strongest year ever'. A spokesman for the utility company said: 'Scottish Water is one of the largest and best-performing utilities in the UK, but executive pay is significantly lower than in similarly sized private companies, where we need to compete for talent. 'Across the business, the biggest percentage pay rises have been given to the lowest-paid workers, narrowing the gap between the chief executive's pay and median employee earnings, which is already much smaller than the pay ratios in other companies of our scale. 'Total remuneration also includes pension contributions and variable pay related to performance, which is only paid when the business delivers strong results, as it did last year, with 94% customer satisfaction. 'Every Scottish Water employee is eligible for an annual outperformance payment.' The Scottish Government has been contacted for comment. Get all the latest news from around the country Follow STV News Scan the QR code on your mobile device for all the latest news from around the country
STV News
07-07-2025
- Health
- STV News
Almost £2bn spent on temporary nurses and midwives over five years
The Scottish Government has been accused of taking a 'sticking plaster' approach to health staffing after analysis found nearly £2 billion has been spent on agency and bank nurses and midwives over the last five years. Scottish Labour analysis of NHS workforce data found that between April 2020 and March this year £1,904,286,884 was spent on such temporary staff. The spending was across all of Scotland's 14 health boards, as well as specialist services including NHS 24, the Scottish Ambulance Service, the State Hospital and the National Waiting Times Centre. The bill rose from £235,881,479 in the year ending March 31, 2021 to a height of £489,997,556 in the year to March 31, 2024 before falling in 2025, according to the analysis. Scottish Labour health spokeswoman Dame Jackie Baillie called for a long-term solution. She said: 'The SNP has spent almost two decades mismanaging our health service, opting for short-term fixes, rather than coming up with a solution to address long-term challenges. 'The use of temporary staff is an expensive sticking plaster and cannot be a substitute for a proper plan aimed at tackling the significant problems facing the NHS. 'This is an unsustainable way of managing our health service and ministers must listen to calls for a workforce plan to meet recruitment needs.' A Scottish Government spokesperson said: 'NHS Scotland's overall workforce, including nursing and midwifery staffing, has increased over the last year, whilst the latest workforce statistics show a 62% reduction in nurse agency usage and spend across 2024/25, decreasing for the second year in a row. 'These figures show the progress being made to reduce NHS Scotland's reliance on agency workers and focus resources on frontline services, which has enabled boards to reinvest upwards of £94 million in the delivery of those services most valued by the Scottish public. 'The use of temporary staff in an organisation as large and complex as NHS Scotland will always be required to ensure vital service provision during times of unplanned absence, sickness or increased activity.' Get all the latest news from around the country Follow STV News Scan the QR code on your mobile device for all the latest news from around the country
The Herald Scotland
01-07-2025
- Health
- The Herald Scotland
John Swinney: My promise to Scots on public services
READ MORE He adds: "Too often, services have been delivered in silos, creating barriers for those using them, especially those who need support the most. "That must change. We must deliver a generational shift in how we access public services in Scotland. Put simply, we must always think of people, instead of services. "It should not matter which agency, department or part of the local authority delivers that service – it should only matter that the service is delivering for you. Put simply, we must deliver whole family support." He points to a pilot project in Easterhouse, Glasgow, where eight GP surgeries – including Oakwood Medical Practice, which he recently visited – are implementing the model with Scottish Government funding. Each practice now has a dedicated family wellbeing worker linking people to a range of support services. Mr Swinney also highlights reforms in Glasgow's care system, which have seen a shift towards early intervention and family support – a model he wants to roll out nationally. "We need to turn this ground-breaking work into business as usual," he writes. Acknowledging this would be a "radical change – generational, even," he says his government must also change how it works. His administration has committed to a "radical programme of public sector reform" as part of a wider national renewal effort. The Scottish Government recently announced plans to make savings of £1 billion, in part by cutting back office costs by around 20% and reducing the number of public agencies. Last week, Mr Swinney gathered leaders from across public services, local government, the third sector and academia to discuss his plan. The event, he says, "filled me with confidence". "There are pockets of success out there – I have had the privilege to see it first-hand. The task now is to grow these into standard, national successes that benefit people all over Scotland. "This kind of working together will be vital if we are going to make whole family support a reality." The First Minister adds: "This is my pledge to the people of Scotland. I want to see change just as much as you do. I want us to realise our full ambitions for Scotland. "As First Minister, I will do whatever it takes to fight for a future where people can access the help they need easily, when and where it is convenient to them." READ MORE Scottish Labour deputy leader Dame Jackie Baillie said Mr Swinney had a "brass neck" to promise improvements after nearly two decades in office. 'The truth is, if the SNP had any ideas at all about how to make public services work better for Scots, they would have done it long before now. 'However, this is a tired government that is completely out of ideas and has no vision for Scotland. 'John Swinney has been at the heart of the SNP in government since 2007 and he must take a large share of the blame for the current state of public services across the country." Rachael Hamilton, deputy leader of the Scottish Conservatives, was scathing: "Scots won't suddenly be fooled into thinking he has all the answers to fix our ailing public services which are completely overwhelmed thanks to the nationalists' gross mismanagement. "That's because they've been too busy promoting divisive fringe 'gender ideology' and unaffordable independence plans, rather than delivering for our health service, our schools and what truly impacts people's lives."
Powys County Times
06-06-2025
- Politics
- Powys County Times
Counting begins in Hamilton by-election
Counting has begun in the Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse Holyrood by-election. Ballot boxes arrived from across the constituency at around 10.15pm, before being rolled out across the counting room at South Lanarkshire Council's headquarters in Hamilton. Turnout has been announced as 44.2%, with a total of 27,155 votes cast on Thursday out of a possible electorate of 61,485. A senior Reform UK source told the PA news agency the party would likely come third in the seat, averting the potential surge the SNP and Labour feared could take hold. A number of high-profile figures in Scottish politics are observing the count, including Scottish Labour deputy leader Dame Jackie Baillie, Net Zero Secretary Mairi McAllan and Labour MSP Monica Lennon. The contest was called in the wake of the death of Scottish Government minister Christina McKelvie and was initially viewed as a battle between the SNP and Labour, but Reform UK saw a surge during the campaign, with the party thought to have a good chance of unseating Labour and coming second. The campaign has been marked by attack ads from the Nigel Farage-led party against Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar, accusing him of prioritising people from Pakistan and using a speech he gave encouraging people from a South Asian background to get into politics. Opponents of Reform roundly criticised the ad as 'racist'. First Minister John Swinney described the contest as a 'two-horse race' between his party and Reform, but Labour has consistently said it is still in with a chance. The First Minister said voters should back his party in order to 'stop Farage'. He added: 'People face a simple choice in this by-election. 'They can either vote for the SNP – elect an SNP MSP – or they will end up with a Reform MSP. That's the simple choice.' Reform is yet to win an election at any level in Scotland, but boasts a number of defected councillors. Mr Farage himself, in a visit to Scotland this week, said it was unlikely his party would win, despite recent polls suggesting Reform was second in voter preference in Scotland with just 11 months to go to the next Holyrood election.
The Independent
08-04-2025
- Health
- The Independent
A&E cannot shake off ‘deep freeze of Government incompetence'
Scotland's emergency departments cannot 'shake off the deep freeze of SNP incompetence', Scottish Labour has said. Figures released on Tuesday show A&E departments continue to struggle with waiting times, with 67.4% of patients seen within four hours in the week to March 30. That was down slightly from 68.2% the week before, but remains well short of the 95% target set by the Scottish Government. According to the figures, of the 27,441 attendances in the most recent week, 1,061 people waited longer than 12 hours to be seen, which is up proportionally from the previous week. A total of 2,788 waited longer than eight hours – a proportional drop. Responding to the figures, Scottish Labour deputy leader Dame Jackie Baillie said: 'Winter pressures may have eased but our NHS can't shake off the deep freeze of SNP incompetence. 'The SNP has run down the NHS but it's the hardworking staff and desperate patients who are forced to deal with the chaos in hospital corridors.' Health Secretary Neil Gray – who has been consistently under fire in recent months over pressures in the health service – pointed to improvements based on the same week last year, when 62.9% of attendances were seen within four hours. 'Our A&E departments are still facing sustained pressure with high levels of hospital occupancy impacting patient flow and causing delays,' he said. 'Despite this, latest weekly figures show more than two-thirds of patients were seen within the four-hour target and performance is up 4.5% compared with the equivalent week last year. 'We are determined to drive improvement and are working closely with all boards to ensure they have the necessary measures in place to cope with any peaks in demand. 'Our £200 million of targeted investment will improve patient flow, enhance capacity and tackle delayed discharge. 'We are shifting the balance of care from acute to community. We are expanding Hospital at Home to at least 2,000 beds by the end of 2026, and will deliver direct access to specialist frailty teams in every A&E in Scotland by summer 2025. 'This will enable frail patients with complex needs to bypass A&E and receive the specialist care they need in the most suitable location for them.'
