A snapshot of public opinion on the NHS in the devolved nations
About 5 mins
On 7 May 2026, voters in Scotland and Wales will head to the polls against a backdrop of economic pressure, cost-of-living concerns and stretched public services.
In both nations, people rate health, social care and the NHS as the second most important issue facing their nations. Health and care is also set to be a key concern for people in Northern Ireland in the run up to Assembly elections in May 2027.
As the Holyrood and Senedd elections near, how is the health care system perceived across devolved nations – and do political priorities reflect public concerns?
Here we explore voters’ key priorities and issues across the devolved nations using findings from our public polling with Ipsos, a regular series we have run since 2021.
Ipsos’s UK KnowledgePanel has more than 25,000 panellists recruited using random probability address-based sampling – the gold standard in survey research. We are referencing two waves of online polling:
- Wave 8, conducted from 8–14 May 2025, had 2,286 respondents. The unweighted numbers for each nation were: England (1,804), Scotland (169), Wales (161) and Northern Ireland (152).
- Wave 9, conducted from 4–10 December 2025, had 2,214 respondents, with unweighted numbers as follows: England (1,721), Scotland (168), Wales (170) and Northern Ireland (155).
Key demographics were reviewed to ensure a balanced sample was selected in each wave, and the resulting sample was weighted. The full methodology can be found in the accompanying Ipsos report.
What are the public’s views on NHS performance?
Our most recent polling found that, across all three devolved nations, the public feels pessimistic about the NHS. Barely 1 in 10 people in Scotland (12%), Wales (13%) and Northern Ireland (13%) think the standard of NHS care improved in the past 12 months. And around half expect standards to worsen in the year ahead (S: 51%, W: 47%, NI: 58%), similar to the UK overall.
When asked about NHS performance overall, people in all three nations are more likely to disagree that the NHS provides a good service (S: 47%, W: 42%, NI: 55%) than to agree. People in Northern Ireland are more likely to be negative than the UK overall (42%).
However, people are more positive about their own experiences: more think that their local NHS provides them with a good service than don’t (S: 50% vs 27%, W: 41% vs 35%, NI: 45% vs 40%).
People in Scotland and Wales are more likely to disagree that their devolved government has the right policies for the NHS (S: 45% disagree vs 20% agree; W: 39% vs 19%). However, these views are still less negative than the UK overall (54% vs 15%), except in Northern Ireland where people are notably more negative: 67% disagree while only 6% agree .
What are the public’s priorities for the NHS?
The public’s top priorities for the NHS vary across the three nations (Figure 1).
In Scotland, the main concern is making it easier to get appointments at GP practices. The Scottish government’s priorities for primary care focus on prevention, early intervention, value for money and moving care closer to home.
In contrast, the top priority for people in Wales is to improve ambulance response times. Since 2020, the national target of reaching 65% of the most life-threatening calls in 8 minutes has been missed. In July 2025, a new approach shifted targets to measure patient outcomes and introduced a new ‘purple’ category for the most urgent callouts.
In Northern Ireland, reducing waiting times for routine hospital services tops the public’s priorities – perhaps unsurprising given waiting times have long been a cause of concern in the nation. In 2023, the equivalent of a quarter of people in Northern Ireland were on waiting lists, more than double the proportion in England.
Figure 1
Our May 2025 polling showed that the NHS and health care are the biggest priority for future public spending in all three devolved nations, particularly in Northern Ireland (72% vs 62% for the UK). People in Northern Ireland were also more likely to prioritise reducing inequality between different regions of the UK than people in England and Scotland (NI: 21%, E: 11%, S: 10%). Evidence suggests that economic hardship is more prevalent in Northern Ireland than the UK as a whole, with low trust in the UK and Northern Irish governments. Meanwhile, people in Scotland were more likely to prioritise social care for older people (34%) compared with the UK overall (25%).
What does this mean for forthcoming elections?
In each nation, the public overwhelmingly supports the founding principles of the NHS: care that is free at the point of use, available to everyone and funded by taxes. The Scottish public is particularly likely to support the principle that the NHS should be available to all (91% vs 85% for the UK).
Across the political spectrum in Scotland and Wales, parties’ manifestos are prioritising action on the NHS. All parties have backed the founding principles of the NHS – including Green Party, Liberal Democrats and Reform UK. Many opposition parties argue for NHS reform, with a focus on improving productivity, reducing bureaucracy, and forward planning. Tackling elective waiting lists top the agenda for many parties.
In Scotland and Wales, our polling shows that the public have clear top priorities for the NHS – but not every party’s manifesto engages with these.
In Scotland, the SNP, Labour, Liberal Democrats and the Conservatives all pledge action to improve access to general practice, aligned to the public’s main concern.
In Wales, the Conservatives, Liberal Democrats and Reform UK all highlight ambulance response times, though Labour, Plaid Cymru and the Green Party don’t refer to this public priority.
In the final weeks of campaigning, politicians should focus on the public’s priorities for health and the NHS: ambulance response times in Wales and GP appointments in Scotland.
While the Northern Ireland Assembly elections are still a year away, health is likely to be high on the public’s agenda, particularly given how little progress has been made on improving waiting times for routine care. People in Northern Ireland are more pessimistic about the health care system than the UK overall, and amid ongoing political instability, addressing these entrenched problems may be challenging.
Our polling finds a perceptions gap, where people in each devolved nation have positive experiences of local health care, but express negative views about the service as a whole. Given the political importance of the health care system, closing this gap will require devolved governments to not only improve services but also convince the public that these improvements signal a wider, systemic recovery.