Our Collective Voice: 2026 Scottish Election Manifesto

The 2026 Scottish Parliament election takes place in the context of serious, overlapping challenges. Half of adults in Scotland now live with a long term condition and the number of unpaid carers continues to rise. Ongoing pressure on public finance negatively impacts the delivery of essential public services and the third sector is stretched to breaking point. At the same time, our everyday rights are under increasing threat.

However, the challenges Scotland faces are not insurmountable if we collectively rise to meet them. In this manifesto, the Health and Social Care Alliance Scotland (the ALLIANCE) set out our solutions to these challenges and call on Scotland’s political parties to offer a vision of hope for the next five years. We have a vision of Scotland as a human rights leader, with fair finances and an equitable economy. A Scotland where in equal partnership with the third sector, we renew social care and deliver public services for everyone, rooted in effective prevention, early intervention, and lifelong support.

Ahead of the 2026 Scottish Parliament election, the ALLIANCE and our members call for all political parties to make the commitments below. You can access the ‘Our Collective Voice’ manifesto in several formats:

• Via the chapter links at the top of the following sections
• The designed manifesto PDF
• A plain text DOC
• An Easy Read PDF or DOC
• A British Sign Language (BSL) version

Scotland as a human rights leader

Incorporate human rights

• Pass a Scottish Human Rights Bill that incorporates a range of international human rights and accountability directly into Scots law.
• Maximise the capacity for incorporating human rights in Scotland, following the Supreme Court ruling on the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child Incorporation Act.
• Enhance the powers of the Scottish Human Rights Commission and ensure it has adequate and sustainable resources.

Act, monitor and report on human rights

• Prioritise implementation of Scotland’s second National Action Plan for Human Rights (SNAP 2).
• Proactively respond to UN human rights recommendations through appropriate action planning and resource allocation.
• Ensure that robust, disaggregated equality and human rights data is systematically gathered, analysed, and used to inform decision making.
• Improve human rights monitoring and reporting, underpinned by a national human rights tracker tool that includes data from a range of sources.

Realise the right to health

• Ensure equality and rights are explicitly mainstreamed and embedded within all public services.
• Take action to support a Right to Rehab approach through local and community services.
• Embed a Right to Palliative Care approach across services.

Fair finances and an equitable economy

A sustainable third sector as an equal partner

• Embed and deliver fair funding for the third sector across all public sector funders, including sufficient multi-year funding.
• Reimburse Scottish third sector organisations for the increased cost of employer National Insurance Contributions.
• Formally acknowledge the third sector as an economic investment and contributor, including them as an equal partner in public service reform and financial decision making.
• Include the third sector in the Scottish Government’s contributions to ongoing development of the UK-EU relationship.

A human rights and wellbeing approach to finance and the economy

• Embed human rights budgeting and Wellbeing Economy approaches across all areas of fiscal policy, including through a tax system that raises sufficient revenue to sustain services.
• Carry out robust equality and human rights data gathering and analysis to measure and assess the impact of public finance decisions.

A progressive approach to social security

• Deliver further improvements to the Scottish social security system including greater flexibility for unpaid carers.
• Implement the recommendations of the Independent Review of the Adult Disability Payment to deepen the human rights basis for social security.
• Ensure that all devolved payments are set at adequate values.

Renew social care

Deliver social care reform

• Develop national oversight and scrutiny of social care to end the postcode lottery and improve standards, access, quality and accountability.
• Reform commissioning and procurement to take a collaborative and human rights based approach.
• Abolish non-residential care charges.
• Substantially increase financial investment in social care, to ensure demand is met and third sector providers are adequately funded.

Build a valued service where everyone has a voice

• Provide equal rights and support for all Integration Joint Board (IJB) members, ensuring that voting rights for lived experience, unpaid carer and third sector representatives translate into meaningful input and influence.
• Actively involve people with lived experience and the third sector in the health and social care reform process.
• Improve pay and conditions for social care staff and address institutionalised gender bias.

Public services for everyone

Meet everyone’s communication and access needs

• Develop a new See Hear Strategy and create a Scottish Government Sensory Policy Unit for a prioritised, joined-up approach.
• Provide a clear legal right to inclusive communication.
• Pass a Digital Inclusion Bill to realise the vision of Scotland as an ethical digital nation.

Services that work for people of all ages

• Refocus attention on the importance of Getting It Right For Every Child (GIRFEC), whilst strengthening implementation, data gathering and reporting.
• Introduce an older people’s health and social care strategy and action plan.

Improve and invest in tackling women’s health inequalities

• Drive the systemic change needed to ensure all women across Scotland enjoy their right to timely, accessible, suitable, and good quality healthcare.

Better support people with learning disabilities, autism and neurodiversity

• Pass a Learning Disabilities, Autism and Neurodiversity Bill.

Strengthen prevention and lifelong support

Strengthen prevention

• Ensure policy intent on prevention is implemented.
• Protect and increase investment in the Community Links Worker approach.
• Commit to maintaining the Self Management Fund and the innovative projects it supports.

Deliver effective and lifetime support for long term conditions

• Ensure that any overarching framework complements rather than replaces condition-specific action.
• Invest in greater support for people with long term conditions.
• Develop a supportive approach to health and work.

A reenergised approach to mental health

• Develop rights based mental health and incapacity law by implementing the recommendations of the Scottish Mental Health Law Review.
• Invest in mental health services, including renewed funding for the Communities Mental Health and Wellbeing Fund.
• Roll out the Living Well: Emotional Support Matters approach to support the mental health and wellbeing of people with long term conditions and the third sector organisations that work for and with them.