SNP at risk of fulfilling ‘Tartan Tories’ moniker after grimmest of weeks

This was of course expected, with Shona Robison having the unenviable job of announcing £500 million of cuts, something that will impact Scots immediately and in the long-term, despite the protestations of senior ministers. To make matters worse, Ms Robison also plans to draw down up to £460 million of unspent income from offshore windfarm licences to avoid further savings. If this is needed now, then even further cuts could come next year.

The First Minister and his colleagues tried to spin this as being tough decisions but still being capable of delivering transformational change, but this is of course nonsense. Things are going to get a lot worse.

Make no mistake, this week is a budget of austerity, an SNP Government tightening the belt and slashing public services, albeit with a grimace, rather than the traditional Tory smile, as they try to save pennies in the face of financial turmoil. 

Sure, the Scottish Government could probably do with more borrowing powers, and some of it stems from a lack of funding from Westminster, but that doesn't mean the SNP are blameless, or that they weren't warned.

It was not the UK Government that told Holyrood to freeze council tax, a decision that cost £147 million, and was so much a part of Humza Yousaf’s long-term plan, it was seemingly only decided on the day it was announced.

The other problem stems from public sector pay deals, with the money set aside for them, a derisory two to three per cent, never going to be enough to satisfy the unions. In short, the Scottish Government has underestimated how much it would have to pay out, and how much it could save. That’s not an ideological problem, or one from Westminster meddling, it’s one of basic arithmetic.

So Scotland now faces worse public services from a Government that has long insisted it was the progressive sister of its Westminster counterpart, the compassionate cousin to the morally malleable Tories. There may be some merit to this argument, especially around the language used to describe immigrants, transgender people, and even the elderly, but words mean little when you’re following the same decisions.

For so long in Westminster, it has felt like the SNP were able to bash the Tories by pointing to their own record, which is not without merit, and highlighting how they were different, how they were caring. With cuts at home, what is Stephen Flynn going to be able to draw on, on those rarest of days that he gets a question? Does the Prime Minister agree with me, cuts don’t count from nationalists?

Labour is of course making its own cuts, with October's budget expected to be bleaker than Rangers title prospects, but Sir Keir Starmer has consistently admitted things will be tough.

When the SNP have consistently insisted things can be fixed easily, when they aren’t, expect to hear ‘Tartan Tories’ a lot more as we approach the election.