SCOTTISH Labour has accused the SNP of “failing Scotland’s health service” after it was revealed a recruitment crisis left NHS boards spending almost £2 billion on temporary nurses and midwives in just five years.

Scotland’s 14 NHS boards spent £410 million on securing the agency and bank workers to backfill vacancies in the year up to April 2025, down on last year’s total of almost £490m, but almost double the £236m total spent in in 2020-21. 

The biggest spender was the nation’s largest board, Greater Glasgow and Clyde, which shelled-out almost £133m over the last year, a 73 per cent increase since 2020-21.

Lanarkshire on £41m, Ayrshire and Arran on £33m, and Grampian on £47m have all seen spending more than double over the same period.

The total bill across all boards for that five-year period now stands at a staggering £1.9bn.

Scottish Labour pinned the spiralling spend — which has almost tripled over the last decade — on the Scottish government’s apparent inability to fill more than 2,600 vacant permanent posts in nursing and midwifery.

Health spokeswoman Jackie Baillie MSP said: “The SNP has spent almost two decades mismanaging our health service, opting for short-term fixes, rather than coming up with a solution to address long-term challenges.

“The use of temporary staff is an expensive sticking plaster and cannot be a substitute for a proper plan aimed at tackling the significant problems facing the NHS.

“This is an unsustainable way of managing our health service and ministers must listen to calls for a workforce plan to meet recruitment needs.”

A Scottish government spokesperson said: “NHS Scotland’s overall workforce, including nursing and midwifery staffing, has increased over the last year, while the latest workforce statistics show a 62 per cent reduction in nurse agency usage and spend across 2024-25, decreasing for the second year in a row.

“These figures show the progress being made to reduce NHS Scotland’s reliance on agency workers and focus resources on front-line services.”