Annie Wells resigns from Tory frontbench for 'health reasons'

The Scottish Conservatives’ health spokeswoman, Annie Wells, has resigned from the party’s frontbench for “personal health reasons”.

Wells was appointed to the role in May this year following the Scottish Parliament elections.

Despite the unspecified illness, Wells will still attend Holyrood on a “consistent basis” and continue as a constituency representative, according to the Scottish Conservatives.

The Glasgow MSP will be replaced by Dr Sandesh Gulhane, who had previously been the Tories’ public health spokesman.

Meanwhile, Sue Webber will take on the role of spokeswoman for public health, women’s health and sport, in addition to her existing role on drug policy.

Scottish Conservative leader Douglas Ross said: “I’d like to thank Annie Wells for the huge amount of effort she has put in since I became leader and for all the tremendous work that she continues to do for the party.

“I wish her a speedy recovery and look forward to welcoming her back to frontline politics very soon.”

Ross added: “Scotland’s NHS is in crisis and that’s why it’s so important that we build Scotland’s real alternative to this failing government, with frontline experts like Dr Gulhane.”

At parliament on Thursday, Nicola Sturgeon confirmed military assistance was being considered to help tackle ambulance waiting times in Scotland.

Dr Gulhane said: “It’s a huge honour to be promoted to the shadow cabinet and I can’t wait to get started.

“I look forward to working with parties across the Scottish Parliament to recognise and tackle the crisis in our NHS and to improve access to healthcare for patients across Scotland.

“My top priorities will be pushing the SNP to finally set up a network of long Covid clinics to ease the pressure on other frontline services, and to get the Government to focus on tackling lengthy treatment waiting times, which will alleviate the strain throughout Scotland’s NHS.”