LABOUR HYPOCRISY ON PRESCRIPTION CHARGES

LABOUR HYPOCRISY ON PRESCRIPTION CHARGES

CHARITIES CALL ON LABOUR TO SCRAP PRESCRIPTION CHARGES SOUTH OF BORDER

Commenting on Jackie Baillie’s press release attacking the Scottish Government over prescription charges, SNP MSP Dr Ian McKee accused her of hypocrisy and making misleading comments since patients in England are still waiting on Gordon Brown to keep a promise made over a year ago.

In her release Jackie Baillie said that patients suffering from a debilitating long-term illness have to pay for prescriptions in Scotland when they are free in other parts of UK. However patients with long-term conditions in England are still paying more than double the cost for a 12-month pre-payment certificate than in Scotland. Last week, a coalition of 20 charities representing conditions like arthritis, spina bifida, heart disease, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, crohn's disease and Parkinson's disease implored Mr Brown to keep his promise.

The SNP Government has been reducing prescription charges year on year since it took office and plans to abolish them completely for ALL illnesses by the end of the Parliamentary session. In contrast Labour has only abolished charges for cancer sufferers, a move which has alienated sufferers of other long-term conditions who have questioned why they are not given parity of treatment.

Commenting Dr McKee, a former GP, said:

“This is utter hypocrisy from Jackie Baillie and shows the depths to which Labour is stopping in the health debate. The SNP Government are not only abolishing prescription charges for cancer sufferers in Scotland but for all conditions.

“And unlike her misleading statement many of those suffering from a debilitating long-term condition south of the border are still paying prescription charges.

“This level of debate from Jackie Baillie not only shows the astonishing hypocrisy that Labour now express.

"It is the SNP which is bringing down the cost of prescription drugs and we will see this tax on ill health abolished next year.

"The early evidence of the first reductions show that it is those with long term conditions who have to live with the cost of medicines who have benefited most from these cuts.

"Prescription charges are a tax on ill health and are unacceptable in a modern society. It is only the election of an SNP Government which is bringing about their abolition.