LABOUR will today pledge to protect local NHS services from the threat of closure, sparking claims from the SNP that the party is guilty of "astonishing hypocrisy".
Kezia Dugdale will say that under a Scottish Labour government, a string of health services currently at risk would be saved. They include the Lightburn Hospital in Glasgow, the children's ward and maternity unit at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley and emergency care facilities at Vale of Leven Hospital.
Labour will also commit to preserving the children's ward at St John's Hospital in Livingston, which is at risk of a downgrade after NHS Lothian struggled for several years to recruit enough staff to run it safely.
Ms Dugdale said: "The NHS is Labour's proudest achievement in government. We will always commit to a health service free at the point of need. That's why a Labour Scottish Government will protect NHS spending, so that our health service has the resources it needs to deliver the care people in Scotland deserve.
"Under the SNP the local services that people across the country rely on are at risk. It's unacceptable for the SNP Government to kick decisions about the future of our health service into the long grass until after the election.
"Labour will protect local services across Scotland, including the children's wards at the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Paisley and St John's Hospital in Lothian. Thousands of parents and children depend on the help and support they get from their local hospitals."
The party has already committed to offering GP appointments within 48 hours and social care packages within a week. However, the latest pledges were criticised by health secretary Shona Robison.
She said: "This is astonishing hypocrisy from Labour given their shameful record of hospital closures while in office. It was Labour who scrapped A&E at the Vale of Leven, and it was the SNP who protected services at the Lightburn Hospital and St John’s.
"Of course, one of the first actions of Nicola Sturgeon when the SNP took office was to halt Labour’s planned closure of the busy Monklands and Ayr A&E Units – so we will take no lectures on hospital closures from Labour.
"Labour are completely out of ideas – resorting to the same hypocrisy and baseless scaremongering that means that no one trusts a word they say any more."
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