Swinney budget to focus on growth

Written By empatlima on Rabu, 19 September 2012 | 20.12

Scottish Finance Secretary John Swinney has promised that his 2013/14 spending plans will be a "relentless pursuit of economic growth".

It is understood that the minister, who will present his budget to Holyrood later, will signal an end to the public sector pay freeze.

Mr Swinney has said that despite UK government cuts his budget will focus on growth.

Opposition MSPs have warned the economy must be at the heart of the plans.

The freeze on public sector pay for those earning more than £21,000 was implemented in the 2011/12 financial year and was due to come to an end in March 2013.

Mr Swinney has direct control over pay when it comes to Scottish government workers and staff at quangos, but local authority employees negotiate directly with council bosses.

The minister will tell MSPs how much money will be allocated to schools, the NHS, housing and other devolved areas from a total cash budget of £28.4bn.

Ahead of his budget address, he said: "At a time when we face significant economic challenges this government is focussed on jobs, economic growth, protecting public services and supporting Scotland's household budgets.

"The government has argued consistently that we need to have a strong programme of capital investment to support investment in the Scottish economy, in particular the construction sector."

Scottish Conservative finance spokesman, Gavin Brown, warned though that the budget had to put the economy centre stage and not just pay "lip service" to it.

Growth and fairness

He said: "In the past the SNP has simply talked about prioritising the economy without actually doing it. It is time for them to stop harming areas that help economic growth such as housing and colleges, and stop introducing Scotland-only taxes such as the damaging retail levy."

Labour's finance spokesman Ken Macintosh said he wanted to see a budget for jobs, growth and fairness.

He added: "It is scandalous that rather than putting in place a substantial employment programme, the SNP have now laid off more than 30,000 public sector workers in little more than a year.

"John Swinney needs to stop hiding behind Westminster or trying to blame our local authorities and start taking responsibility for his own budget decisions."

20 Sep, 2012


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Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-scotland-politics-19653187#sa-ns_mchannel=rss&ns_source=PublicRSS20-sa
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