Thank you. That concludes general questions. Before we move to First Minister's questions,

I invite members to join me in welcoming to the gallery, Hannah-Nabour, President of the State Parliament of Lower Saxony.

The next item of business is First Minister's questions.

At question number one, I call Douglas Ross.

This morning, Audit Scotland released a damning report on the state of Scotland's NHS.

Amongst many shocking figures, people waiting over a year for treatment has

jumped from 3.5,000 to 40,000. That is an 11-fold increase since 2019, despite patient numbers falling.

When he was Health Secretary, Humza Yusuf brought in his NHS recovery plan

that was supposed to bring waiting times down. So why, First Minister, are things getting worse, not better?

First Minister, first and foremost, let me say that we take very seriously the comments and the report by the Auditor General that were published this morning.

There are simply no doubt, or indeed attempts by us to downplay the seriousness of the challenges the health services facing, as it recovers from what is undoubtedly the biggest shock of its 75-year existence, the global pandemic.

And of course, there are challenges for every single health service right across the UK.

To answer Douglas Ross's question directly, that we are still facing the accumulative impacts of the pandemic.

People are still, for example, when they are suffering from COVID. That has an impact, not just

of course, an IPC within hospitals, but also, of course, on staff who are able to perform elective

care and treatments and surgeries. These are common challenges, I accept, of course,

they are my responsibility here in NHS Scotland as well as the health secretaries. These are common

challenges right across the country. In fact, if I look at some of the latest data in

September last year, it did show that Scotland there was a hundred and twenty-three

patients waiting per 1,000 of the population for the treatment time guarantee and new

outpatient appointments. That is fewer than in England,

where it is 137 per thousand on the referral to treatment waiting list. And in Wales,

...