Scottish Water bill tops political agenda

he future of Scottish Water was thrust to the top of the political agenda today when Alex Salmond unveiled the last programme for government of this session of parliament.
The First Minister published a package of ten bills for the last eight months before the election, one of which is to be the Budget Bill – [...]

Lib Dems claim Salmond planning budget ‘blame game’

lex Salmond will not make a real attempt to get his budget passed this year, preferring instead to indulge in a “blame game” ahead of next year’s Holyrood elections, Tavish Scott, the Scottish Liberal Democrat leader warned today.
Mr Scott launched his attack on the First Minister ahead of key cross-party budget talks at Holyrood.
John Swinney, [...]

Tories lay out terms for budget support

ohn Swinney will be told this week to introduce a raft of savings including an end to free prescriptions and a public sector recruitment freeze if he wants to get his budget passed.
Scotland’s finance minister will meet opposition parties on Wednesday this week for a crunch meeting which he hopes will pave the way for [...]

Analysis: the splits between Scotland and England show

One hundred days. That is all it has taken to re-shape politics in Britain. Not only do we have a Liberal Democrat in (temporary) charge of Number Ten but something more fundamental has happened too.
After just 100 days of this coalition government, Scotland and England are diverging once again. The administrations in Edinburgh and London [...]

Opinion: The true cost of Calman

No one can expect to escape the effect of the huge cuts in UK Government spending set in train by last week’s emergency Budget. But in Scotland, if the much-vaunted Calman proposals are adopted, the impact is bound to be even more severe.
The cuts will certainly result in a significant reduction in the block grant [...]

Opinion: We don’t need a new Forth bridge

This opinion piece was provided by Lawrence Marshall, chair of the ForthRight Alliance (FRA) in response to Hamish Macdonell’s article on these pages last month. The FRA are campaigning against the planned additional road crossing of the Forth at Queensferry. Mr Marshall was chair of Forth Estuary Transport Authority (FETA) from 2005 – 2007.
Whilst the [...]

Has Alex Salmond lost his edge?

lex Salmond is still the biggest beast in the Scottish political jungle. He is a politician of rare skill, a quick and occasionally devastating debater and a strong leader.
All those traits remain but a convergence of other factors have prompted murmurings to grow louder in the background, from inside and outside the SNP. In short, [...]

Private sector is no knight in shining armour

by John Knox

The only people who can save us now are the White Knights of the private sector. As we stumble around in post-budget shock, watching the public sector being pounded by George Osborne’s siege engines, we’re being told that in the long run we will all be better off when the private sector rides [...]

Facing the Cuts: 7 ways to balance the Scottish budget

FIVE billion pounds. That is what the Scottish Government will lose over the next four years. Five billion pounds. That is an enormous amount of money – 16 per cent of the Scottish block grant. But it will be even worse for most departments because health is being spared the axe.
Given that health spending accounts [...]

Scottish businesses fear VAT rise fallout

Read the full text of George Osborne’s Budget speech.
Business leaders from across all sectors of Scotland warned today of serious problems from the Chancellor’s decision to raise VAT to 20 per cent.
George Osborne, the Chancellor, announced a raft of new spending cuts and tax rises in his emergency Budget which, he claimed, would help curb [...]

Full text of George Osborne’s Budget speech

Here’s the full text of George Osborne’s Budget speech.
Mr Deputy Speaker, this emergency Budget deals decisively with our country’s record debts. It pays for the past.
And it plans for the future. It supports a strong enterprise-led recovery.
It rewards work. And it protects the most vulnerable in our society.
Yes it is tough; but it is also [...]

VAT up to 20% and public sector pay freezes in Budget

Read the full text of George Osborne’s Budget speech.

In a Budget speech lasting just under an hour, Chancellor George Osborne has unveiled a package of tax increases and budget cuts designed to make the UK “balance its books” by 2016.
He said he would “not hide hard choices from the British People”. 77 per cent of [...]

All sectors wait in trepidation for Osborne’s Budget

Yesterday may have been the longest day – and it must surely have felt like it to those waiting for the Chancellor to deliver his Budget. Hikes in VAT and Capital Gains Tax? New green taxes levied on air travel? A new “bank tax” introduced? Swingeing cuts in the public sector? And on the [...]

No Scottish honeymoon for Lib-Con marriage

The smiles were real yesterday – on both sides. Alex Salmond had what he wanted: £182 million for renewable energy with the likely addition of another £190 million in London Olympic consequentials. For David Cameron, it was another step in his journey to make himself, if not loved, then at least appreciated, north of the [...]

‘Bollywood in the Highlands’ part of government’s South Asia plan

he Chancellor may have disappointed Scottish exporters in the Budget, but the Scottish Government has other plans. This afternoon its External Affairs Minister, Fiona Hyslop, published its “India Plan”, part of a programme of engagement with South Asia.
India’s already an attractive market for Scotland. Even with the global downturn, it managed to [...]

Scottish Parliament sketch: Comfortably numpty

he words “numpty” and “sap” were bandied around the Scottish Parliament today. It’s what you’d expect really, certainly if our politicians truly are representative of what most objective observers agree is a timorous, dimwitted nation.
The homely insults were hurled during First Minister’s Queries, much of which was taken up with the Budget announced in that [...]

Diary: dash to the bookies after the Budget

Westminster is awash with reports this morning of Labour MPs hurrying down to the bookies to place substantial bets on their party emerging with the most seats after the election.
Alistair Darling’s Budget may not have led to celebrations in the City and it was certainly not well received by large parts of the national press, [...]

Budget Sketch: Cider with Dozy

Read our full Budget coverage
It was a bad Budget for cider-lovers and a good one for fans of computer games. More interestingly, the sub-text of the badinage in the Hoose o’ Commons was more about alleged sleaze, involving alleged Lord Ashcroft on the Tory side and an alleged Hoon on Labour’s.
In a decidedly 70s-looking swirling [...]

Budget blows for Scotland on whisky and fuel

Read our full Budget coverage
The price rises for drink and driving has became the focus in Scotland as the Chancellor’s Budget started to sink in.
The rises in alcohol duty of 2 per cent from midnight on Sunday will mean an extra 38p on to the price of a bottle of whisky, according to the Scotch [...]

Mixed reaction to a ‘holding’ Budget

Read our full Budget coverage
oday’s Budget was very much a case of the bad news followed by a few sweeteners. The bad news reflected the state of the economy, which contracted by 6% during the recession. Some signs of recovery however are there. The Chancellor’s estimate for growth of just over 1% [...]

The Budget at a glance

Read our full Budget coverage
In what is likely to be his last Budget no matter who wins the general election, the Chancellor, Alistair Darling, faced the challenge of finding some sweeteners amongst the gloom. He needed to show he was serious about reducing the deficit without making the electorate too miserable.
The main points:
Economy

£2.5 billion one-off [...]

Trampling the Chancellor and Darling Fell underfoot

Read our full Budget coverage
With a general election just around the corner, and at risk of sounding like a spin doctor for one of the opposition parties, let me say this: A lot of people have looked at the Chancellor with alarm, and a few have even trampled him underfoot.
No, not the Rt Hon Alistair [...]

Opinion: Economy in Wonderland as the country goes to pot

By John Knox
ot since Alice sat down at the Mad Hatter’s tea party has there been such a crazy week. I’ve felt like the Dormouse, waking up occasionally and finding myself sitting between the Mad Hatter and the March Hare as they carry on a conversation of non sequiturs. It’s been as mad [...]

General Election will be on 6 May … probably

Gordon Brown appeared to end the speculation over the election date this morning by giving the clearest indication to date that polling day will be on 6 May.
The Prime Minister announced this morning that a budget would take place in “two weeks time” on 24 March.
A budget on 24 March would give the parties six [...]

Public sector already making savings ‘but it has to do more’

Scotland’s councils made more than £800 million in efficiency savings last year but they need to do much, much more than that if they want to negotiate the next few years of cutbacks and spending curbs without cutting frontline services. That was the message from Audit Scotland which published a report this morning into public [...]

Analysis: mayors the way to combat cuts?

By John Knox
Local councils are turning to the unenviable task of trying to make their services fit their budgets now that they know exactly what they have to spend in the coming year. Earlier this month, the finance secretary John Swinney announced how the £12 billion allocated to local government is to be shared out [...]

Economic figures ‘pushing Brown to April election’

ordon Brown may be preparing to call an early election with polling day taking place in early April – ahead of the publication of the crucial next economic growth figures.
The Caledonian Mercury understands that Tory strategists are now working on a timetable of polling day being on Thursday, 8 April this year – a [...]

NHS strategy shifts from targets to quality

he Scottish government’s NHS quality strategy, launched yesterday, might turn out to be one of the most significant policy documents from the current administration.
That’s if it works.
The idea is a shift of focus for health providers – and by that I mean people as well as organisations – from the idea that unless you’re breaching [...]

Bush ‘to blame for US deficit’

em>The New York Times has hit out at Republican criticism of President Barack Obama’s handling of the economy, placing the blame for the country’s staggering budget deficit squarely on the shoulders of former President George W Bush. Slashing government spending now, the paper also warned, would plunge the United States into “even deeper trouble”.
“When President [...]

Scottish Government’s budget passed without usual stramash

MSPs passed the SNP’s budget tonight – with considerably less fuss than in previous years.
John Swinney, the Finance Secretary, had still been forced into concessions to secure the opposition support he needed to get it through, but not on the scale of previous years.
Mr Swinney announced a £20 million boost to cope with demand for [...]

Opposition parties unite to expose capital budget secrets

IT is the political equivalent of the total eclipse of the moon: the opposition parties at Holyrood have today managed to ignore their differences and unite around a common goal.
Labour, the Conservatives, the Liberal Democrats and the Greens have agreed on a joint strategy for the budget, or at least one part of it.
On the [...]

Obama to announce $250 billion spending freeze

President Barack Obama will bow to public pressure in the wake of the Democratic Party’s shock election setback in Massachusetts by announcing a three-year spending freeze in his State of the Union address tomorrow.
The freeze, which comes amid growing public concern over Obama’s $787 billion economic stimulus package boost and trillion dollar budget deficits, is [...]

Money first, independence second

It seems that the head rules the heart in the SNP government, at least for now. Ministers were due to unveil their independence bill today but delayed it – causing much glee among their opponents.
No-one really seemed to know why it had been delayed but it has now emerged that ministers decided they could not [...]

Sturgeon: cuts will make NHS better

In the first of a series of interviews with people who have an impact on health and health services in Scotland, Jennifer Trueland talks booze, tears and quality of care with health secretary Nicola Sturgeon.

Cuts will make health boards more efficient
NHS patient experience survey imminent
Sturgeon detects shift in attitudes on alcohol
She cried over hospital [...]

Austerity budget may be Swinney’s easiest yet

t is somewhat ironic that John Swinney, the Finance Secretary, will find it easier to get his budget through the Scottish Parliament this year, when the money is tight, than he has done in previous years.
This is Mr Swinney’s third budget. The first two proved to be torturous and difficult affairs. His main courting partner [...]

Diary: Tories hold key to Swinney’s coffers – again

The Conservatives have been in private discussions with the Finance Secretary for the past few weeks trying to hammer out concessions which will allow them to vote for the SNP budget.
The Tories started by arguing for the mutualisation of Scottish Water and the abandonment of the SNP’s plan to scrap prescription charges but these were [...]