The National:

FOR those hoping to understand a little more about the SNP ’s £1 billion NHS recovery plan announced on Thursday, look a lot further than Annie Wells’s car crash interview on the BBC.

Appearing on The Nine to discuss the plan, as the Scottish Tories’ shadow health secretary, Wells should have been a voice of authority.

Instead what viewers were treated to was a whole lot of nothing, about the sum total of a normal Tory promise.

Firstly Wells, perhaps not understanding how elections work, wasn’t happy that the NHS recovery plan contained a lot of items which are “from manifesto pledges which the SNP made earlier this year”.

So the Scottish Tory MSP is fuming that the SNP have taken their manifesto pledges and put them into action?

We know she’s more used to seeing her colleagues down in London break such pledges, but that’s not typically how politics should be done.

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The Tory also took issue with the fact that the NHS recovery plan does not contain “one mention in there of long Covid, not one mention of long Covid”.

Annie would do better to have another little read of the plan (or get one of the Tories' many donor-funded researchers to do it for her).

In fact, under “Key Risks”, the NHS recovery plan issued by the Scottish Government says it will address the “longer term impact of Covid-19 on the health of the population” and the “impacts of unmet and unidentified health and care needs/ demands on delivery systems and partners”.

It also mentions potential “increased Covid-related pressures on the system” in the future and “high levels of uncertainty” around what these may be.

Call us cynical, but that looks like a mention of long Covid.

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So what will the Tories’ big plan do that the SNP’s won't? Spend £600 million apparently.

As the BBC host dutifully points out, that is less than £1bn.

Wells concedes this point, as even a Tory would have to, before being asked: “Just to be clear, are you saying overall, the Scottish Tories would commit to spending more money than £1bn on an NHS recovery plan?”

Here’s where the metaphorical cars really crash.

As Annie Wells gets questioned on her dismissal of the £1bn plan while only promising £600m herself, she asserts: “We can’t put a figure on how much we’re going to spend or where we’re going to generate that.”

So basically, they can’t do anything but complain. No solutions from the party that brought us a hard-right Brexit. Shock.

To think Wells, as the Tories' shadow health secretary, knows more about this issue than anyone else in the party doesn't bode too well ...