Health and Social Care Services are at Risk - Our Voices Matter

The letter to the Chief Officer also expressed concern that there was risk of storing greater pressure elsewhere in the system, including the time people spend in hospital when they are medically fit to return home.

When people are fit to return home from hospital, it makes sense on every level that they can leave hospital without delay. For people, for the hospital it’s the right thing, freeing beds helps to cut NHS waiting lists. Hospital beds are expensive and it’s the same health board paying for social care that pays for hospital beds.

‘Our Voices Matter’ letter to the Chief Officer called for a different approach:

1. Pause the savings that directly affect services which prevent health issues and costs escalating.

2. Future savings are not mainly taken from services people rely on and that efficiencies in the organisation of health services are considered.

3. A comprehensive approach to change is needed with a transformation programme taking a whole organisation and system approach.

4. Follow well-evidenced research and reform, shifting from crisis intervention to prevention; closer partnership working and whole system design rather than incremental cuts.

5. Coordinated, early and ongoing close working with local organisations, like carers centres.

6. Make use of tools like the ‘Scottish Approach to Service Design’ (2019), seeking citizen participation in projects from day one.

From April, Argyll and Bute Health and Social Care Partnership has a budget gap of over £16 million pounds. Their Budget Update issued in January also highlights additional and emerging cost pressures up to £8 million and potentially up to £16 million between April 2026 and March 2027 related to acute care (hospital) costs with NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde.

The details of acute care costs with NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde aren’t known to us or Argyll and Bute Health and Social Care Partnership’s Board (as at 28 January 2026). It is certainly worrying given the savings that are already being considered.

Reflecting on the cycle of cuts to essential public services, somehow it has become normalised. The focus is centered on budgets, not rights, and we have rights. Cuts to preventative, early-intervention and community-based services cannot be made, we owe it to ourselves, our families, our communities to urge leaders to take a whole system approach, and that requires traditional budget lines are re-drawn. Health isn’t a single lens issue, it impacts costs and services across the board, to education, housing and even our welfare costs.

Our Voices Matter and the time to think differently has come.

WE URGE YOU TO COMPLETE THE QUESTIONNAIRE – OUR VOICES MATTER!

Responses are due by 20th FEBRUARY for an initial report and the survey remains open until 12th MARCH

Please go to:

Argyll and Bute Budget Project Survery Questionnaire

For more information on the HSCP Budget Consultation, go to:

Argyll and Bute Budget Saving Review

Or call Social Work on 01546 605517 for further information or a printed questionnaire.

Your local Citizens Advice is here for anyone living in Argyll and Bute; advice is free, impartial and completely confidential.

Argyll and Bute Citizens Advice Bureau
Telephone: 01546 605550