Scottish NHS to receive £1.1bn from UK-wide social care tax
- Published
The Scottish NHS will receive £1.1bn a year from a new health and social care tax, the UK government has said.
The tax will be introduced across the UK to pay for reforms to the care sector and NHS funding in England.
But a proportion will also be ringfenced and given directly to the Scottish health service.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson said health and social care in all parts of the UK would "benefit from significant additional support".
And while Scottish Health Secretary Humza Yousaf said the tax rise was a "blunt tool" and called for clarity about the arrangements, he confirmed the extra funds would be spent on health and social care in Scotland.
Plans for a new tax were announced by Mr Johnson on Tuesday, with the prime minister saying it would raise £36bn for the NHS and social care across the UK over the next three years.
The move breaks a Conservative manifesto pledge, but Mr Johnson said change was needed due to the Covid-19 pandemic and that the cash would fund "the biggest catch-up programme in NHS history".
The tax will begin as a 1.25 percentage point rise in National Insurance Contributions from April 2022, before being established as a new levy on earned income from 2023.
Papers setting out the plan said the new tax will operate UK-wide, and that "there will be a legal requirement to allocate the levy revenues for spending on health and social care".
It said Scotland would benefit from an additional £1.1bn of spending by 2024-25, which it said was more than would be raised in the country through the new tax.
The prime minister unveiled plans for the new tax alongside his Chancellor and health secretary
In a letter to the leaders of the devolved administrations - including First Minister Nicola Sturgeon - Mr Johnson said there would be a "significant and permanent increase" to health spending.
He said the new UK-wide levy would be ring-fenced to provide this funding, and confirmed that the devolved administrations would benefit from extra cash via the Barnett formula due to increased spending in England.
The prime minister also called for a face-to face-meeting with the devolved leaders next month, which he said would be an opportunity to discuss responsibilities and roles ahead of the COP26 summit in Glasgow in November.
The Scottish government said it was "disappointing" that the UK government did not discuss the announcement of an increase to national insurance contributions with the devolved administrations.
In a statement, it pointed out it had "a long-standing commitment to pass on in full all health Barnett consequentials to fund health and social care services".