A former chief executive of the NHS in Scotland has warned the current system of providing health and social care “is not sustainable in its present form.”

Paul Gray, who was the head of the health service in Scotland between 2013 and 2019, insisted the need for reform is “obvious” and the time to change up is now.

In a call for a debate on future service provision, he argued that people need to “remember that change is hard, and using it as a weapon to claim the moral high ground greatly reduces the likelihood of its success”.

Mr Gray was posting on the website of the think tank Reform Scotland, as it considers what is needed for the NHS to still be taxpayer-funded and free-at-the-point-of-need in 2048 – which will be 100 years since the service was established.

Mr Gray said: “If we seriously want to have viable health and care services in 2048, we need to talk soon and act quickly.”

He argued that Scotland is “now at the point where it is widely recognised that the current approach to providing health and care services is not sustainable in its present form”.

Want to see more SNP fails? – Education Matters