Seamus Logan
Main Page: Seamus Logan (Scottish National Party - Aberdeenshire North and Moray East)Department Debates - View all Seamus Logan's debates with the Scotland Office
(2 days, 20 hours ago)
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Gregor Poynton
As I said at the start, not all the decisions in this Budget were easy. We had been left a horrible economic inheritance by the Tories, and we needed to make decisions to tackle that and clear the mess up that they made.
The decisions in the Budget mean that the Scottish Government are receiving more per person than the equivalent UK Government spending for the rest of the UK. As I said, in 2025-26, we will see the biggest financial settlement to the Scottish Government in the history of devolution. Sadly, however, we know from bitter experience that more money to the Scottish Government does not guarantee success, because the Scottish National party is taking Scotland in the wrong direction and being careless with Scotland’s money.
Seamus Logan (Aberdeenshire North and Moray East) (SNP)
The hon. Gentleman speaks about the ending of austerity, but how can he say that when we have seen the removal of the winter fuel payment and a refusal by the Labour Government to end the two-child cap?
Gregor Poynton
We have delivered the largest budget settlement in the history of devolution—that is the end of austerity. [Interruption.] Well, you have it to spend.
SNP decisions have left a black hole in Scotland’s finances. The billions in extra cash delivered in this Budget must not be used simply to cover up the SNP’s “buy now and pay later” policies. That money must reach the frontline, to bring down waiting lists and drive up educational standards. The SNP has nowhere to hide now.
John Grady (Glasgow East) (Lab)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Vaz. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Livingston (Gregor Poynton) for securing this debate, and for his excellent survey of the considerable benefits of the Budget for Scotland.
On economic forecasts, I am a somewhat boring Member of Parliament—I like to read the Financial Times. It wrote a leader a few days ago that was, in some parts, somewhat critical. However, the article pointed out that
“Britain’s economic outlook in fact looks quite robust compared to other advanced economies. According to the Financial Times’ annual poll, economists reckon that the UK will outgrow France and Germany this year…Labour’s strong parliamentary majority is another positive for investors as political uncertainty ramps up elsewhere.”
I could go on. I simply point out that this Government are pro-growth and pro-industry; people understand that and economists understand that.
The Budget delivered by my right hon. Friend the Chancellor delivers on our commitments to the electorate. It adds VAT to private school fees, providing more funds to state schools, including in Glasgow; it tackles poverty by increasing the national living wage, giving thousands of my constituents a pay rise; it provides pensioners with over £400 this year due to our commitment to the triple lock; and it reduces the level of deductions that can be made for universal credit payments—a boost to struggling families in Glasgow.
If one were to listen to the SNP, one might think that the Budget was terrible news for Scotland and an absolute disaster. In fact, it delivers the largest settlement ever for a Scottish Government, with £4.9 billion of additional funding over the next two years—a UK Labour Government and 37 Scottish Labour MPs delivering for Scotland. That significant boost to Scotland’s public finances is critical, with nearly one in six Scots on an NHS waiting list. As we heard just before Christmas, there are many people who have been waiting for more than two years for NHS treatment in Scotland—many more, proportionally, than in England.
One in three Scots children is regularly absent from school, and there are declining police officer numbers on the street at a time when people are petrified about crime. Scotland’s public services are in utter crisis after almost 18 years of SNP misrule. This Government have provided the SNP Government with the money. They have no excuses; they must use the funding wisely to clear up their mess.
SNP and Tory colleagues have repeatedly criticised the Government’s Budget, but failed to offer a credible alternative. Time and again, they say we should spend more money but fail to explain where the funding should come from. That is not credible. One hears about “magic money tree” economics—here we have a whole forest of magic money trees. Yes, we have made difficult decisions in our Budget, but government is about confronting difficult decisions to manage public finances carefully. Independent experts are clear that the SNP has failed to manage the Scottish public finances. There have been three years of in-year emergency budget cuts due to their mismanagement and £5 billion wasted on failed SNP pet projects, while, for example, ferries do not sail and the islands suffer from appalling connectivity.
John Grady
No, I will not. Time is marching on, and many people wish to speak.
The SNP cannot be trusted with public money—remember that this is the public’s money. People in Glasgow East face much higher income tax rates than their counterparts in England because of the SNP Government’s mistakes. As my friend, the Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar, set out yesterday, after nearly two decades of SNP failure in government, Scotland needs “a new direction”. It needs a new Government, with
“new hope, new thinking, new solutions”,
not more of the same divisive politics of the last two decades.
On 4 July, the people of Glasgow made a choice: that our great city, in its 850th year, shall be represented by a Labour Government. That Labour Government have delivered for Scotland by providing a record funding settlement. Scotland chose a Labour Government, electing 37 Labour MPs. This Budget, with its record increase in funding for Scotland, demonstrates this Labour Government’s absolute commitment to Scotland.
Torcuil Crichton
I understand the hon. Gentleman’s passionate defence of his own position, but the truth is that, despite higher spending per head in Scotland, that money is inefficiently used on a massive management structure—boards upon boards and quangos upon quangos—that does not put patients first, as evidenced in the Western Isles.
There is no better evidence of these issues than the transport decisions made over my constituents. We have three companies—a Bermuda triangle—running ferry services: CalMac, Caledonian Maritime Assets Ltd and Transport Scotland, with hardly an island representative.
Seamus Logan (Aberdeenshire North and Moray East) (SNP)
I was not going to speak, but seeing as you have asked me to, Ms Vaz, I will speak briefly. I am grateful to serve under your chairmanship.
I thank the hon. Member for Livingston (Gregor Poynton) for securing this important debate. I have only one point to make, because we are short of time. Labour Members continually mention to us the ferries—I have heard the ferries mentioned more times than I heard Slade played over Christmas, and that was quite a lot—but they never mention High Speed 2. The people of Scotland are paying for that. They are also paying for Trident and for Hinkley Point.
Seamus Logan
No, I am not giving away—in retaliation.
Hinkley Point reactor 1 has now been delayed until 2029 or maybe 2031, we have no date for reactor 2, and as for reactor 3—
Torcuil Crichton
I hope the hon. Member will forgive me for not giving way to him when I was mid-flow during my own speech. We are waiting until 2031 or 2032 for our ferries. We need ferries this winter, not next decade.
Seamus Logan
The point I am trying to make is that Labour Members continually refer to fiscal mismanagement, when in fact I have described examples of fiscal mismanagement that the people of Scotland are paying for. I will leave it there, Ms Vaz; thank you very much for inviting me to speak.
Kirsty McNeill
I will make some progress. The Budget ensured the largest real-terms Budget settlement for the Scottish Government in the whole history of devolution, with an additional £1.5 billion for the Scottish Government to spend this financial year and an additional £3.4 billion next year. It means that the Scottish Government are receiving more than 20% more per person than equivalent UK Government spending in the rest of the UK. It delivered the most for those with the least, because that is what Labour Governments do.
Kirsty McNeill
At the election, Scotland was offered a choice—the politics of protest or the politics of progress. It chose the latter, and the result is a Budget that protects working people in Scotland and delivers more money than ever before for Scottish public services. That is what change looks like. The hon. Member for Edinburgh West (Christine Jardine) asked whether these were the choices that needed to be made, and to that I say an unequivocal yes, because this Government are simply not prepared to write cheques that we cannot afford to cash.
The spectacular recklessness of the last Conservative Government is something for which we await an apology, but in the meantime, it falls as ever to Labour to do the work of repair and renewal. It is our task to make whole what has been broken, and to make the long-term decisions that will ensure Scottish families can get on and not just get by.
Kirsty McNeill
I will in just one minute. The Chancellor has made it clear that, while protecting working people with measures to reduce the cost of living, difficult decisions would be required. Unlike the hon. Member for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine (Andrew Bowie), we are not prepared to shirk them.
Seamus Logan
The Minister speaks of broken promises and Labour keeping their promises, but what about the promise not to attack the whisky industry and the promise not to raise national insurance as a tax?
Kirsty McNeill
We have made responsible tax choices entirely in line with our manifesto. That is why the rates of employers’ national insurance will increase by just 1.2 percentage points. The smallest businesses will be protected as the employment allowance will increase from £5,000 to £10,500, allowing Scottish firms to employ four national living wage employees full time without paying any employer national insurance on their wages.