Health and Social Care budget analysis: FOI release

Information requested

You asked for:

An explanation and analysis of the following budget lines in this year’s health and social care budget (in Level 3): Health and Capital Investment, Outcomes Framework, Education and Training, Health Improvement and Protection and Quality and Improvement.

The ask requested a definition or explanation of each budget line and information on what exact projects/services/initiatives they fund.

Response

In preparing our response we have interpreted the ask as relating to the 2025-26 financial year.

A breakdown of the level 3 budgets can be found at the following link: Supporting documents - Scottish Budget 2025 to 2026 - gov.scot

This link also includes the published ‘2025-26 Level 4 Budget tables’ which contains a further breakdown of each Level 3 budget, as well as definitions for ‘what it buys’ and ‘explanation of significant changes from the previous year’.

Some further information on the requested budget lines is provided below.

Please note that 2025-26 budgets remain subject to parliamentary approval.

Health and Capital Investment
Revenue or resource spending is day to day spending for things like wages and fuel. Capital spending supports things that endure, such as long term investments or extending the life of existing assets, for example, equipment, health care buildings and other health infrastructure. Research can also be scored as capital expenditure and under the IFRS16 accounting standard, certain leases also require capital budget.

If the 2025-26 Scottish Budget is passed by Parliament, the health capital budget will support:

• Capital allocations to Health Boards for small scale projects and maintenance
• Additional funding to support Health Boards’ priority maintenance and business continuity spending to support resilience
• Progression of business cases for the replacement of Monklands Hospital in Airdrie, the Belford Hospital in Fort William and the Princess Alexandra Eye Pavilion in Edinburgh
• Replacement of NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde’s radiopharmacy facility
• All major projects in construction (Baird and Anchor Hospital in Aberdeen and Golden Jubilee Phase 2)
• Continued support for the national replacement programmes for ambulances and radiotherapy equipment
• Investment in other equipment such as scanners (e.g. MRI, CT)
• Contractual costs associated with the end of PFI contracts
• Leases e.g. for fleet vehicles
• Health research

Outcomes Framework
From 2024-25 this budget has been permanently transferred to NHS core funding and therefore is contained within the NHS Board’s level 4 budgets from 2024-25 onwards. The funding has been provided to NHS Health Boards to cover a range of outcomes to be delivered flexibly as part of the overall budget.

The overarching services include Healthcare Associated Infection Screening, Infant Nutrition and Maternity Services, IVF, Maternity and Neonatal Services, General Dental Services, Obesity, Sexual Health and BBV, Tobacco and Smoking and Insulin Pumps.

Education and Training
The Education and Training budget funds a range of programmes including supporting medical undergraduate and postgraduate training, teaching grants and tuition fees, student support costs for nursing and midwifery education, and funding for paramedics training and bursaries. Please refer to the Scottish Budget 2025 to 2026 link above for the level 4 breakdown of this budget.

Health Improvement and Protection
This budget funds programmes that improve and protect the health of the people of Scotland, including funding for Immunisations including HPV and Shingles, Organ Donations and Transplants, Gender Identity healthcare access, Tobacco Control measures as well as financial support as part of the Scottish Infected Blood Support Scheme. Please refer to the Scottish Budget 2025 to 2026 link above for the full level 4 breakdown of this budget.

Quality and Improvement
The Quality and Improvement budget supports a person-centred approach to healthcare across Scotland, providing investment in thrombectomy services and long term health conditions as well as the development of genomic medicines for the diagnosis of rare diseases. Please refer to the Scottish Budget 2025 to 2026 link above for the full level 4 breakdown of this budget.

About FOI

The Scottish Government is committed to publishing all information released in response to Freedom of Information requests. View all FOI responses at https://www.gov.scot/foi-responses.