SNP budget: 'It's the one that got away for the sake of £11m'

Published on Thursday 29 January 2009 09:10

FOR the political anoraks the failure of the SNP to win support for its £33 billion budget proposals for next year will go down in history as the one that got away for the sake of £11 million in the form of a firm commitment to the Greens to provide this as additional funding for home insulation projects.

The failure of John Swinney and Alex Salmond to do so lost the SNP two crucial votes that would have seen them home and dry and their minority government now faces the biggest challenge to date. They have only themselves to blame.

Leadership is all about the ability to convince others to do what you want. Mr Salmond and Mr Swinney have had ample opportunity to do so in preparing their budget but were unable to close a deal. Instead, they attempted to rely on last minute horse-trading to secure the vital votes they needed and they just ran out of time.

They were unlikely ever to get Labour's support, so even if they had accepted their request for the funding of thousands of apprenticeships they would probably have fallen out over something else. But their refusal to consider Lib Dem plans for a 2p cut in the basic rate of income tax lost them a further 16 votes.

The Tories, like lame sheep, dutifully fell in behind the Government in return for promises on city centre regeneration funding and more police officers.

But despite being aware of the likelihood of the voting intentions of the bigger players, the SNP leadership failed miserably to secure the crucial support of the Greens. It is a sad indictment on both Mr Swinney and Mr Salmond and an embarrassing setback for a party that has looked in control for most of its 21 months in office.

No doubt over the next few days a salvage plan will be put in operation. Mr Swinney has another two weeks to present a new budget but says he plans to re-submit fresh proposals as quickly as possible. It is likely that deals will be brokered that will see it passed at a second attempt, but it should never have come to that.

To date the SNP has managed to get by making woolly compromises, such as more police officers, which have proved devilishly difficult to pin down.

But yesterday the gloves came off. While Labour abstained to allow last year's budget to be passed they were clearly in the mood to pick a fight. They may not have been capable of landing too many heavy punches in opposition, but yesterday they didn't have to.

The SNP was put on the canvas by a sucker punch of its own making.