A LIVID Douglas Ross has told Nicola Sturgeon never to question his commitment to the NHS in a bitter clash at Holyrood after she suggested he was faking his concern.

The Scottish Tory leader’s voice trembled as he spoke about seeing his infant son given oxygen and being fed through a tube at Aberdeen Sick Kids Hospital last year.

“First Minister, please don’t ever question my commitment to our National Health Service,” he told Ms Sturgeon at FMQs as she avoided eye contact by reading her notes.

“Don’t make political points out of this, when politicians are raising serious issues.”

It followed the Scottish Tory leader raising record waits in A&E units, with 5000 patients waiting more than half a day for treatment in August.

Asked if she believed the Scottish Government’s new winter action plan would end the problem, Ms Sturgeon admitted the performance of A&E units was “not good enough”, and that the hangover from the Covid pandemic was partly to blame.

She said: “While there are big challenges in our NHS and in A&E departments, our A&E departments remain the best performing anywhere in the United Kingdom.

“So while I am not complacent, the health secretary is not complacent, yes we do believe that the measures he set out in terms of the recovery update and winter plan will make a positive difference.”

She then took a more political turn, raising Mr Ross’s on-off support for reducing the top rate of income tax, mirroring the Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng’s flip-flop after his mini-budget.

She said: “It frankly beggars belief that Douglas Ross stands here today and talks about the National Health Service, because I think his concern for the National Health Service today is even less convincing than it normally is, because he’s spent much of the last week arguing for us to take millions of pounds and put that into the pockets of the richest people in our society, regardless of the impact that would have on our National Health Service.”

Mr Ross replied: “First Minister, please don’t ever question my commitment to our National Health Service, when it was just over a year ago I had to follow my wife in an ambulance as she gave birth. 

“When it was just over a year ago that I had to see my infant child on oxygen and  fed through a tube in Aberdeen Sick Kids Hospital. 

“Don’t make political  points out of this, when politicians are raising serious issues.”

Mr Ross’s wife Krystle gave birth to the couple’s second child, James, in 2021 after a “blue light” 65-mile ambulance transfer from Dr Gray’s Hospital in Elgin to Aberdeen.

He later described his drive following the ambulance as the “worst I’ve ever had”.

He and his wife had their first child, Alastair, in 2019.

The First Minister said she had “enormous sympathy” for Mr Ross’s experience, but then doubled down on her original criticism.

She added: “I do think it is reasonable to question the commitment to the National Health Service of anybody who argues for millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money to go to cutting taxes for the richest in our society rather than be invested in the National Health Service.”

Mr Ross also questioned Ms Sturgeon about a case where the turnaround time for an ambulance was longer than 13 hours.

Alluding to a £600million plan announced by Health Secretary Humza Yousaf this week, Ms Sturgeon said: “Of course, £45 million for the Scottish Ambulance Service was part of the winter plan that was announced - and that was about Scotland’s National Health Service.”

Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar raised the cases of two patients who faced long waits for treatment in the NHS.

One of them, Anne Sinclair, died this summer after waiting seven months for diagnoses and five months for treatment of an aggressive form of cancer.

Mr Sarwar said: “Her last words to her son Ricky were: ‘Keep fighting, tell my story, we need to stop this happening to anyone else. I love you.'”

Ms Sturgeon said cases where the NHS falls short are “unacceptable”, but for the “overwhelming majority” it provides an “outstanding service”.

She said: “I don’t shy away from, I will never shy away from, the serious challenges and pressures on our National Health Service.

“That is why it’s so incumbent on Government to support the National Health Service with the investment and the other forms of support that it needs.

“We will always do that for the sake of patients like Anne.”

Mr Sarwar said Ms Sturgeon had used the word “unacceptable” six times already about various problems in the NHS, yet they kept happening.