“Finance Secretary Derek McKay has offered a budget barely worth a penny. In the face of the most prolonged fall in real wages since records began his plan to increase the top rate of tax by 1p is indicative of his lack of ambition. The SNP can apparently offer little to the 500,000 people in Scotland earning £8.45 [the real Living Wage] or less, or the 150,000 languishing on the housing waiting list, or tens of thousands more facing punitive rents and assaults on their benefits this Christmas.
The Finance Secretary should have offered real change to those bearing the brunt of austerity and hardship by:
- Introducing a £10/hour living wage for all Government employees – NHS, local Government, Civil service etc
- Insisting that no Government contracts were given to any private company not paying their staff at least the £10/hour living wage – this measure would pass the cost of pay increases on to employers
- Kept the 2007 SNP promise to eradicate fuel poverty by taking the renewable energy industry into public hands.
- Replacing the unfair Council tax with a redistributive model, based on ability to pay.
- Increasing the tax paid by the well off substantially more than 1p
This is another missed opportunity by an SNP Government fast running out of ideas who like to make promises but never deliver.”