Labour's Budget will end Tories' austerity, mismanagement and managed decline

The first Labour Budget in 14 years will be based on fairness and focused on economic growth

Here’s a cheering thought – it has now been more than 100 days since the UK had a Tory government. Already we can see the difference a Labour government makes.

In a few short months, Labour has got to work undoing the damage inflicted by the Tories and fixing the foundations of our country. The Labour government has begun setting up GB Energy, which will be based in Aberdeen and will help to drive down energy bills, create jobs and secure Scotland’s place as a clean energy world-leader.

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It is taking forward a plan to make work pay, which will tackle the scourge of low pay and insecure work in Scotland and across the UK. This includes overhauling the remit of the Low Pay Commission to make sure the minimum wage reflects the cost of living, and introducing transformative legislation to end fire and rehire and scrap exploitative zero-hours contracts.

This is the single biggest upgrade to workers rights in a generation and will tackle poverty at its root. Lifting people out of poverty will be a driving mission for any Labour government, and that’s why Labour has already set up a Child Poverty Taskforce to take on the scandal of child poverty.

We have scrapped the Tories’ shameful Rwanda plan, set up a National Wealth Fund to drive growth and create jobs, established a Covid Corruption Commissioner, and started work to improve Scottish patients’ access to cutting-edge trials.

Historic Labour Budget looms

All this and more has been done within 100 days, and it is only the start. Later this month, the Chancellor will set out the first Labour Budget in over 14 years, which will bring a definitive end to the austerity, mismanagement and managed decline of the Tories.

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It will be a Budget based on fairness, focused on growth and delivering the change our country voted for. Across the UK, we have started the process of delivering change – but that is only half the job.

Here in Scotland, we still have a chaotic and dysfunctional SNP government doing untold damage to public services and public finances. After 17 years in power, the equivalent to almost one in six Scots are on an NHS waiting list, exam results are declining, and prisons are overflowing.

Scotland desperately needs change and only Scottish Labour is capable of delivering it.

Alex Salmond a ‘monumental figure’

Like people across the country, I was shocked and saddened by Alex Salmond’s sudden death at the weekend. My thoughts are with Moira, his family, his friends, and the countless colleagues and activists who will be mourning his loss.

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As someone who found myself campaigning on the other side of the argument on many occasions, I know all too well what a formidable adversary he was. His intelligence made him a fierce opponent and an impressive politician.

He represented his constituents and his country with dedication and fought for the future he believed in with an unfaltering passion. Scottish politics as we know it has been shaped by him, and his influence is difficult to overstate. He has left behind an enduring legacy and secured his place in the history books as a monumental figure in Scottish politics.

Jackie Baillie is MSP for Dumbarton, Scottish Labour’s deputy leader and her party’s spokesperson for health

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