Thank you Caroline for your contribution. You remind us that everything we do is about people.

That's what motivated Nye Bevan and Labour when we created the NHS in the teeth of opposition from the Tories. We are proud of our NHS, proud of its achievements and proud of the people who work in it - the nurses, the doctors, the cleaners, and many others besides.

It's part of a golden thread that runs through the history of the Labour Party from the creation of the NHS in 1948 through to the enactment of the national minimum wage in 1998.

I believe our task is to weave that thread further, transforming the lives of our people and our communities. The values of our Labour Party are as relevant today as they were in the past.

Now, Nicola Sturgeon tells us that the "NHS is safe in her hands".

Does anyone recognise the quote? Nicola Sturgeon echoed Margaret Thatcher's words when she too claimed that the NHS was safe in her hands.

We know all to well what Thatcher did to the NHS, and what the Tories will do, dismantling the very essence of our National Health Service.

So just how safe is the NHS in the SNP's hands?

4,000 frontline staff cut. That's 1,500 nurses. That's Physios. And that's occupational therapists. Real people delivering frontline services.

All of these cuts happening now - quite simply these are SNP cuts.

The only things going up are cancelled operation, blocked beds and hospital readmissions.

And the hard fought for improvement in the fight against infections like C Diff, led by the families from the Vale of Leven and delivered by NHS staff, are now being put at risk by SNP cuts to cleaning hours and SNP cuts to nurses.

If that's how the SNP protect our NHS, we want no more of it.

They have also presided over a postcode lottery of care. It is not right that in one local authority area you can pay £30 per week for a care service, that in a neighbouring local authority is £300. It is not right, and it is not fair.

And the SNP's record in providing social care is no better. SNP controlled local authorities like West Dunbartonshire, passing an emergency budget just this month, cutting services to the old and vulnerable amounting to millions. Don't you dare grow old with the SNP.

Merging Health & Social Care

Iain Gray announced earlier our intention to create a national care service within the NHS, bringing together health and social care so that no-one falls through the gaps - one organisation, one budget and one focus - on the person needing care.

Older people tell us they want to remain in their own homes and communities for as long as possible. We know that with the right support, at the right time, we can prevent older people from becoming unwell and being admitted to hospital.

A new national care service will help shift the balance of care, enable people to remain in their own homes and will end the postcode lottery of care so that we have consistency and fairness across the country.

We are determined to ensure that the focus is local. Based on Community Health Partnerships, respecting the cultures of both social care and health in equal partnership, and democratically accountable to local councillors.

To take the detail of this work forward I have established an expert panel. And I am pleased to announce that it will be led by Sir John Arbuthnott. There is no doubt that he has a considerable track record in promoting joint working between public sector agencies.

He will be joined by David Mannion of Age Scotland and one of Scotland's most experience councillors Harry McGuigan, who will help us shape the future of care in Scotland.

Home care

Iain has also made clear our intention to end the indignity of the 15 minute care visit. We will start that process in the lifetime of the next parliament.

Who can forget the BBC Panorama programme that exposed a national scandal? Elderly people isolated and left alone. Even when care workers visited, it was little more than a box ticking exercise. We need to restore dignity and humanity to the care system.

We will support our home care workers by providing them with more time to meet people's needs. With a new national care service we can stop the race to the bottom in social care procurement.

Health Boards

In tough financial times we need to make sure that our focus is on patient care.

We cannot afford any penny spent to be spent less than efficiently. We need to make sure our investment in the NHS works well for us.

On that basis, it is time to consider the number of health boards in Scotland. We need to streamline our structures. It is not sustainable to have 22 separate health boards - 14 area boards and 8 special boards - for a population of our size. We will move immediately to reduce the number of special boards - merging some and bringing others back in to government or devolving the functions to area health boards.

I know that change can be unsettling but we will be relentless in our focus on patients, treatment and people requiring social care.

And let me offer certainty to the staff. It was Labour in the Scottish Parliament that first introduced the policy of no compulsory redundancies in the NHS. We recognise that staff are the backbone of the service and we will maintain that policy for health and social care.

And conference, we won't stop at ending the postcode lottery of care in our social services. I also want too want to end the postcode lottery of care in our NHS.

I believe in one Scottish NHS providing universal care and treatment to the highest standards, so we will create a single postcode of care with equal access to services.

No more postcode prescribing or postcode treatment - achieving the NHS 1 postcode is our ambitious endeavour to ensure that every Scot truly has equal treatment, free at the point of need in every part of Scotland. And NHS 1 will be the symbol of our determination to deliver common provision through common endeavour in the teeth of Tory attempts to erode public services.

And finally, a word on the Tories.

The NHS is our legacy, a constant symbol of Labour values, and it is a legacy that we will protect in these tough economic times.

And it needs protecting.

I began this speech by paying tribute to Nye Bevan, one of Labour's greatest heroes.

Well, despite their promise to protect NHS spending the Tories have just given health the worst sustained settlement since Bevan was in the ministry of health.

This is worse than a standstill budget. As the price of drugs rises and demand for services grows from an ageing population it will mean deep cuts in every hospital and every doctors surgery the length and breadth of Britain.

The Tories are turning the clock back, not to the 1980s but to the 1930s.

And the SNP are helping them. Cutting jobs and cutting nurses. It's no wonder that Annabel Goldie wants a coalition.

You can't put a wafer biscuit between the real Tories and the Tartan Tories. Well Labour won't stand for it. We will protect our NHS.

If I become the Health Secretary, every penny that the Scottish Government gets as a result of UK decisions on health will go to health - and health revenue will not be reduced by a single penny in cash terms.

But we will go further. Our commitment is this. Every penny of efficiency savings generated by the NHS will stay in the NHS.

Conference, Scotland faces a clear choice in May.

A choice between a Tory Government at Westminster aided and abetted by the SNP who will attack the very essence of our NHS or Labour who will defend it to the hilt.

A choice between a Tory Government at Westminster who are putting nurses on the dole or Labour who will do everything in our power to protect patient care

A choice between a Tory Government at Westminster who will tell patients to go private as standards fall or Labour who know that the values of the NHS are special

This is the choice facing Scotland next May. Now let's go out and fight for it.