Scotland's health and social care secretary has told the SNP conference in Aberdeen that recovery and reform of the NHS and social care sector remain his top priority – which includes making sure there will be no place for large social care providers based in offshore tax havens in the new National Care Service.

Humza Yousaf praised NHS and social care staff for their “incredible work”, but voiced concerns that more people will need healthcare because of the cost of living crisis which he said, because people are having to choose between heating and eating, is becoming a public health crisis.

Sitting alongside cabinet colleagues in a session focusing on the SNP's delivery in government, Mr Yousaf said the creation of the National Care Service is about addressing a postcode lottery of inconsistent delivery of care in different parts of Scotland:

“The National Care Service will make sure we put the workforce front and centre, that we value that workforce. I hear too often from those in social care that they don't have that career progression that others will have in the NHS. So we're going to protect that. And we're going to make sure that we value our workforce up and down the country.”

A section of the proposed legislation for the National Care Service creates a framework to exclude certain providers from bidding to supply publicly funded services.

Mr Yousaf was applauded when he promised to “cement ethical commissioning" within the NCS:

“I'm tired of having private companies who can end up having bank accounts in the Cayman Islands, making that profit and shipping it away into tax havens, and other parts of the world.

“So, while, of course, the independent sector, the private sector, the third sector, and importantly, local authorities, will be part of the National Care Service, we'll do that within an ethical commissioning framework.”

Mr Yousaf branded suggestions that the new UK Home Secretary Suella Braverman is considering reclassifying cannabis as a Class A drug as regressive and dangerous.

He told delegates to the conference that Scottish independence would take away the threat of a Conservative UK government “selling off our NHS” as part of a future trade deal.

Roundly condemning what he called the “economic vandalism” of the UK government, he voiced the concern of Scottish ministers that budgets could be under threat if spending across all UK public services is reduced:

“We end up with Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng who are threatening now, in the midst of the cost of living crisis, to take an £18bn hatchet to public services. Just to put that into context, that's the entire health budget for the Scottish government.”

Deputy First Minister John Swinney, who is standing in for Finance Secretary Kate Forbes, is expected to make a financial statement to the Scottish parliament in the coming weeks following the UK government's changed tax and spending plans.

Read more: Analysis: Scotland’s new care boards; Fear it is "too little too late" for social care; Insight: Scapegoating care sector not the answer;

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