The First Minister has rejected calls at Holyrood to sack her health secretary over mounting problems at NHS Tayside.

Scottish Labour leader Richard Leader said the "time has come" for Shona Robison to be relieved of her duties during First Minister's Questions at Holyrood on Thursday.

Robison is under pressure after it emerged the cash-strapped health board had spent £2.7m in charitable donations to fund a new IT system.

NHS Tayside's then chairman, Professor John Connell, has subsequently quit his role after the health secretary intervened in the management of the organisation, with the minister stating she believed its current board "cannot deliver the improvements required".

The First Minister defended the Robison's handling of the situation and backed her to stay on in the job.

Leonard's call for Robison to quit came shortly after Scotland's auditor general told MSPs that warnings made over the finances the health board were not "taken seriously" at the time.

He asked the First Minister: "We have a health board raiding charity funds to pay the bills and that is after fiddling the accounts.

"And what makes this worse is that this is all happening in Tayside under the nose of the Health Secretary who is a member of this Parliament for Dundee.

"It is too late for Shona Robison to be an honest broker in the NHS Tayside affair.

"The First Minister should reflect on this and face up to the fact that the time has come for the health secretary to go."

In response, Sturgeon said: "I'll continue to give my support as First Minister to the job the health secretary is doing to strengthen the leadership of the NHS Tayside board with the new chief executive and chair arrangements that have been put in place.

"And to make sure that the board have the support to undertake the transformation that it needs to do.

"That's what we will continue to focus on."