by Keith Richmond and René Lavanchy
The Scottish Labour Party and trade unions in Scotland have condemned the Scottish National Party government for putting thousands of workers’ jobs at risk.
MSPs at Holyrood last week passed the SNP’s £30 billion budget. Finance minister John Swinney said they had to take some “tough decisions” and that the next year “would mark the start of a period of a real tightening of public spending” in Scotland.
The SNP administration was backed by the Greens and the Conservatives. Labour voted against the budget and the Liberal Democrats abstained. In return for Conservative support, the SNP has agreed to Tory demands to set up an independent budget review body to take what Annabel Goldie, Conservative MSP for the West of Scotland, called “a no holds barred look at public spending”. Public sector unions fear that is bound to call for even deeper cuts in public spending.
Andy Kerr, Labour’s finance spokesman, said: “The finance secretary has delivered a budget that falls far, far short of what needs to be done to stimulate Scotland’s economy.”
And a spokesman for Scottish Labour said: “We could not support the budget because of cuts in basic services. The budget does not make provision for the Glasgow rail link, which will mean 1,300 jobs will not be created. £222 million has been cut from the housing and regeneration budget. We wanted a budget that aids recovery, not one that costs Scotland thousands of jobs.”
Unison’s Scottish secretary Matt Smith said: “This crisis was not caused by the public sector and we know that public services work, and yet some politicians and media commentators seem to think that it is axiomatic that our services – and those who deliver them – should pay for the irresponsibility of our private sector banks.”
The union has warned that council workers in Scotland already face a wave of redundancies in the coming year, with at least 3,400 job losses, as a result of local authority budget cuts of more than £300 million.
Unison says the cuts are part of more than 4,500 public sector job losses it says it has identified by checking budgets in each local authority and public body where figures are available. The union believes that more losses will emerge as other bodies release their figures, and is planning a campaign this spring to defend public sector jobs north of the border.
Announcing the figures at a rally in Glasgow last week, Dave Prentis, the union’s general secretary, said: “Spending on public services makes sense if you are trying to grow the economy. For every pound spent on public services, 64p goes back into the local economy.”
A Unison Scotland spokesperson added: “Everybody bears a certain responsibility for the cuts. Obviously the money that comes from the Treasury, there’s an issue there; however the Scottish government who then allocate that money can’t simply abrogate their responsibility. They’ve negotiated a council tax freeze over the last two years. That’s cost about £200 million.”
The Convention of Scottish Local Authorities was not available for comment.
