Updated on 28 May with details of the Cabinet Secretary's portfolio.

The First Minister has appointed Angela Constance to be the next Cabinet Secretary for Health and Care. She takes over from Neil Gray who moves to Ms Constance’s old job as Justice Secretary.

According to the initial news release giving the names of all the members of the new slimmed-down nine person cabinet, the word ‘social’ is to be dropped from the job title.

Ms Constance, the MSP for Almond Valley in West Lothian, worked closely with health minister colleagues when she was Minister for Drugs Policy from 2020 until she was promoted to the cabinet in 2023.

Before being elected to parliament in 2007, she had been a social worker and children’s services spokesperson for the SNP on West Lothian Council.

Ms Constance will have overall responsbility for:

• primary care and GPs
• community care
• acute services
• unscheduled care
• NHS performance
• workforce, training, planning and pay
• allied healthcare services
• patient services and patient safety
• health and social care integration
• health improvement and protection
• quality and improvement
• person-centred care
• eHealth
• NHS estate
• centre of excellence for rural and remote medicine and social care

Ms Constance inherits a series of overarching policy strategies from her predecessor, most notably the Population Health Framework and Health and Care Service Renewal Framework, which are regarded as being  central to the government’s plans to help people maintain good health, prevent disease and reform health and social care services.

Announcing his cabinet, John Swinney said a priority will be public service reform:

“As a leaner, more agile government, our full focus will be on delivering on the things that matter most to the people of Scotland, including supporting people with the cost of living crisis, ensuring easier access to the NHS and delivering a fresh start with independence.”

On social media, Ms Constance said:

“It’s a privilege to have been asked by the First Minister to serve the people of Scotland in his newly elected Scottish Government. I am delighted to be appointed as Cabinet Secretary for Health and Care and will be getting straight to work.

“This is my ninth role in government and fifth cabinet secretary job and I am determined to put my experience to good use in the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead.”

Manifesto commitments

NHS senior leaders will be watching with interest to see whether Angela Constance makes any changes to the cornerstone programme of NHS reform: the creation of two sub-national NHS regions where NHS boards will be required to work together to share resources and bring down each region’s financial deficits to zero.

The SNP manifesto commits the new government to adopt a 'once for Scotland' approach to reducing duplication of corporate activity, ‘ensure acute services are supported in the most efficient manner possible’ and ‘substantially’ consolidate the number of health bodies.

Already, two national NHS boards, NHS Education for Scotland and National Services Scotland have been merged to create Public Services Delivery Scotland.

Ms Constance will also have to deliver on the manifesto commitment to ‘rebalance care’ towards early intervention and community prevention by expanding Hospital at Home services across the country, and the promise to provide additional services on the new MyCare.scot app, including a national booking system for NHS appointments, and completion of the move to paperless digital prescribing.

During the election campaign, the SNP placed the creation of a network of walk-in GP services across Scotland high on their list of commitments. Ms Constance will be expected to maintain momentum to deliver the promised one million additional appointments despite both the Royal College of General Practitioners in Scotland and the BMA saying the money would deliver far more if it was simply invested in the existing general practice network.

Swapping jobs

There had been speculation that Neil Gray – who moves into the role of Cabinet Secretary for Justice just vacated by Ms Constance – would be asked to return to health and care to take forward the ‘unfinished business’ of NHS reform and try to place social care on a sustainable footing.

The decision not to reappoint him was seized on by Scottish Labour within minutes of the announcement.

Scottish Labour deputy leader Jackie Baillie issued a statement saying:

‘John Swinney’s decision to sack Neil Gray as Health Secretary is a catastrophic admission that Scotland’s NHS is being failed by the SNP’.

 

 

Read more: Nursing pressures creating high risk of harm; New MSPs: What they did before; Briefing: Mental Health in the manifestos; Briefing: Social care in the manifestos; Briefing: NHS reform in the Holyrood manifestos

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