FMQs: Salmond ‘failing’ jobless youngsters

ALEX Salmond clashed with his Labour counterpart Johann Lamont yesterday over the SNP Government’s policies for tackling youth unemployment.

Ms Lamont claimed that economic policy had “clearly failed” citing recent figures which disclosed that 102,000 16 to 24-year-olds are jobless.

At First Minister’s Questions the Scottish Labour leader accused the SNP leader of wasting time on the independence referendum and failing to address job losses.

She said: “The First Minister needs to realise that these are real people and real jobs. The First Minister’s Plan MacB, the one he boasted about to all who would listen, has clearly failed.

“So can he tell us today why one in three of all jobs lost in the United Kingdom in the last three months were Scottish jobs?”

Official figures published on 15 February show that unemployment in Scotland increased by 16,000 to 231,000 between October and December last year.

But Mr Salmond retorted saying four strands of Labour’s five-point plan for the economy relies on action from the UK government. He said: “The unemployment problem in Scotland, indeed across these islands, is extremely serious. Of that there is no question whatsoever.”

He called on the UK government to provide increased capital spending and more funds for small and medium-sized businesses.