Under consideration PE2053: Stop the cuts to community link workers and help secure their long-term future within GP practice teams
Calling on the Scottish Parliament to urge the Scottish Government to take action to ensure that the number and hours of current community link workers serving the poorest communities are not cut in the next financial year; and take binding steps to secure long-term funding for community link workers in GP practices across Scotland.
Previous action taken
GPs at the Deep End have made representations to Scottish Government ministers and officials.
We have also written to Glasgow City Integrated Joint Board members and councillors about the situation facing community link workers in Glasgow, as well as writing to MSPs representing the areas in which impacted practices are based.
Background information
Community link workers (CLWs) are based in GP surgeries across Scotland. They offer patients help with housing, benefits, debt, food insecurity, fuel poverty, physical inactivity, loneliness, abuse and much more when these impact on their health. They also listen to people about what they need to be well, and support them to achieve this. This allows doctors and healthcare staff to focus more of their time on diagnosing and treating medical conditions.
Glasgow City Health and Social Care Partnership (HSCP) plan to cut the number of CLWs by at least one third from April 2024. Across Scotland, the funding for community link workers is short term, insecure and unstable, meaning this is not a local budgetary decision, but one rooted in national funding arrangements.
The gap in healthy life expectancy between the richest and poorest in Scotland has never been wider. We believe cuts in CLW numbers during a cost-of-living crisis will only widen these health inequalities.
2,571 signatures
This petition is now under consideration
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