Why MSPs must reject scandal-ridden SNP's Budget and push for snap election

Opposition parties need to band together to reject the SNP Budget

Should the SNP minority government’s Budget be passed when it comes before the MSPs next year? That is the fundamental question our elected representatives have to ask themselves and reach a firm conclusion on before the vote in February.

We all know the SNP members will vote to save the power and privilege they exercise, not to mention their salaries, expenses and pensions, but what about their divided opponents who, by banding together for a day, can create a political crisis that could lead to the collapse of the SNP administration?

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The odds are likely to be against it, I fear. No matter how appalling the outcomes of SNP policies are (and the evidence of failure just gets worse every week), the Greens and Liberal Democrats keep showing an ankle or giving a wink to suggest they can be bought with a few amendments to the Budget.

It's time for the people to decide who should run Scotland (Picture: Andy Buchanan)It's time for the people to decide who should run Scotland (Picture: Andy Buchanan)
It's time for the people to decide who should run Scotland (Picture: Andy Buchanan) | AFP via Getty Images

Tory-SNP deal?

Even the Conservatives have made noises suggesting they would be willing to agree a deal that would get it through. Maybe they are trying to present themselves as reasonable, mature, serious politicians and need to show willingness to help avoid a Holyrood crisis? Or maybe they fear the spectre of facing an early election when they are languishing in the polls and will undoubtedly shrink in number?

The truth is, politicians can always find reasons to avoid facing the electorate. Nothing is certain and we have seen, in many cases over the years, that what looks like a safe election can turn into a disaster.

Few expected Ted Heath to beat Harold Wilson in 1970, while Ted Heath certainly didn’t expect to lose to Harold Wilson in 1973 when he asked “who governs Britain?” Neil Kinnock was expected to beat John Major in 1992 until his Sheffield Wednesday moment, when he came over all smug and triumphalist and the public mood changed.

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More recently, we had Theresa May calling a general election with a 20-point lead in the opinion polls – only to end up campaigning so poorly that she threw away a working majority and needed DUP MPs to keep her in power.

Electoral calculations

Passing the SNP’s Budget would be an opportunity missed, but not unsurprising as it all comes down to MSPs making calculations about whether they will be re-elected or not. And technically it is a complex and uncertain way of bringing about an early election, as the SNP can always come back with a new Budget and try again until John Swinney runs out of time in March when tax rates need to be set.

A cleaner way would be for a two-thirds majority of MSPs to back an election but that would need SNP rebels to suddenly appear to help reach a total of 86 votes (currently the opposition totals only 66 against 63) so that’s certainly not going to happen.

The greater likelihood is the SNP will find some ways of enticing support from the Greens and Liberal Democrats, for all their protestations of being devoutly opposed to the SNP due to their record in government.

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Another way of putting it is to ask whether the Scottish public should have the opportunity to remove the floundering, incompetent, scandal-ridden, self-serving rump through a new Holyrood election.

In that context – of letting the public decide – you might think the resolve of opposition MSPs would be robust. There’s certainly enough reason within the Budget itself to reject it. Last week I wrote of the shameful political chicanery of claiming the Budget will end the two-child cap on benefit payments – when it does no such thing – but there are many other reasons to send it back.

Cliff edge for care homes

The appalling indecision and underfunding the Scottish care sector faces remains to be resolved with no clarity forthcoming from Finance Secretary Shona Robison. With private care homes facing a painful hike in National Insurance contributions as well as the minimum wage increasing, they go into the year without the state purchasers of the majority of their beds committing to cover that increase. And yet the state sector will have that cover provided by public funds.

Squeezed by state-inflicted higher costs but not receiving a corresponding uplift in state contributions to the overheads – even though additional funding from London has been provided – means there will be a tsunami of care home closures, according to Dr Robert Kilgour, who runs a dozen facilities across Scotland. Not attending to the financial cliff edge they face is short-sighted as it means that without the beds many more people will remain in NHS hospitals waiting on beds becoming available in local authority care homes.

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There’s a similar story in the case of business rates relief not being passed on by the SNP government, even though the money was again provided by Westminster. Shona Robison has decided to only pass on the rates relief being deployed in England to the hospitality sector – but not the retail sector – keeping the money back for its own purposes. When faced with the same decision, the Welsh Government decided to pass it on so Welsh businesses were not put at a disadvantage – but not the Scottish Government.

With criticism raining down on the Budget detail from many quarters, local authorities still facing a huge squeeze that will force them to raise council tax, and a likely fall in the number of teachers and police officers, there are many reasons for MSPs to demand a better Budget.

The SNP has run out of ideas but has not run out of scandals – and there is still the possibility of various police inquiries eventually coming to court. Waiting on Labour becoming more and more unpopular might on the face of it seem attractive, but John Swinney should be careful what he wishes for – as nothing is inevitable in politics.

Brian Monteith is a former member of the Scottish and European parliaments

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