Endless talk about the need for major reform in the Scottish NHS has brought little evidence of any change on a grand scale.

Waiting times for treatment are getting longer, patients still find themselves stuck in hospital queueing for care packages and social services appear unable to prevent a rising tide of emergency admissions to ward beds. Matters came to a head this autumn when a stinging Audit Scotland report said that the Scottish government had not explained how it expected its vision for looking after the growing elderly population to be delivered and that its cost implications remained “unknown”.

Yesterday ministers published a fresh plan intended to address these concerns. It