Scotland politics: Spending cuts laid bare as Shona Robison confirms £500m in cuts
Follow along live as MSPs return to Holyrood for the first day back after the summer recess.
There is lots happening in the Scottish Parliament this afternoon, not least because Finance Secretary Shona Robison is due to make a statement on the Scottish Government’s finances, after announcing several cuts in recent weeks.
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Hide AdShe is expected to make hundreds of millions of pounds of cuts.
This comes ahead of First Minister John Swinney’s Programme for Government on Wednesday.
It is not just Ms Robison’s statement we are looking ahead to this afternoon. There will also be ministerial statements on community cohesion, gender identity healthcare for young people, the Clyde and Hebrides ferries, and mobile phones, behaviour and relationships at schools.
Scottish politics: Spending cuts laid bare as Shona Robison to make statement to Parliament
Key Events
- MSPs are back in Holyrood after an eventful summer
- Finance Secretary Shona Robison is expected to announce hundreds of millions of pounds of cuts
- Numerous cuts have already been announced to make way for public sector pay deals
Welcome to The Scotsman's live blog!
Hello! My name is Rachel Amery and I’m The Scotsman’s political correspondent.
I will be in Holyrood all day today to bring you the latest as MSPs return to parliament after an eventful summer recess.
The highlight of today’s proceedings will be an update on the Scottish Government’s finances from Finance Secretary Shona Robison.
She is expected to announce hundreds of millions of pounds worth of cuts to try and plug a financial black hole.
This is ahead of First Minister John Swinney’s programme for government which will be unveiled tomorrow, and Chancellor Rachel Reeves’s budget, which will come at the end of October.
Last month Ms Robison halted all but essential government spending and civil servants have been told to put all options for cuts on the table.
Millions of pounds of cuts to be announced today
The highlight of day is the upcoming financial statement from Finance Secretary Shona Robison.
She is due to give an update on the Scottish Government’s finances this afternoon.
This is quite unusual as it comes before First Minister John Swinney’s programme for government, which will be unveiled tomorrow.
We are expecting her to make hundreds of millions of pounds worth of cuts to public services as she tries to plug a financial black hole.
Cruel Summer
It’s been an eventful summer, not least because of the general election back in July.
But the Scottish Government as already announced a series of cuts to government budgets, including:
Cuts to universal winter fuel payments
Reintroduction of peak rail fares
Cuts to culture funding
Cuts to nature restoration funding
Scrapping free bus travel for asylum seekers
Shelving active travel projects
Halting all non-essential advertising
Pausing pledge to hand out free iPads
Freeze on non-essential recruitment
This comes after Finance Secretary Shona Robison wrote to all cabinet secretaries stopping all but essential government spending (i.e. spending on services the government is legally obliged to deliver, or moves to avoid an economic crash).
Civil servants have also been told to put all options for cuts on the table, including universal benefits such as free prescriptions and free university tuition fees.
Lots coming up today
It is not just the financial update we are expecting from this afternoon’s Holyrood schedule.
As it is the first day back after the summer recess, there’s plenty for the MSPs to be getting busy with.
We are also expecting ministerial statements on community cohesion, gender identity healthcare for young people, the Clyde and Hebrides ferries, and mobile phones, behaviour and relationships in schools.
It won’t be a very demure statement from Finance Secretary Shona Robison this afternoon.
Ahead of her statement, Ms Robison says we are entering a “new era of austerity” which will have “a profound effect on our ability to deliver for the people of Scotland”.
She said: “The SNP government has delivered a balanced budget in every year that we have been in office - and we will continue to do so.
“I am proud to serve in a government which is investing hundreds of millions of pounds to lift children in Scotland out of poverty, and is ensuring our police, our nurses and our teachers are the best paid in the UK.
“We have taken many tough choices, including asking those on higher incomes to pay a bit more income tax, in order that we can invest more in public services like our NHS.”
She added: “But the fact is, the Scottish Government operates with a largely fixed budget determined by Westminster - and under the Labour government it is clear that we are entering a whole new era of austerity.
“The cuts that they are proposing to make will have a profound effect on our ability to deliver for the people of Scotland, but the SNP government will do everything we can to protect people and public services from the cuts that Westminster is making to our budget.”
You can read Deputy Political Editor David Bol’s analysis of what’s coming up in parliament in today’s paper.
Fight for Scottish Conservative leadership
Last night the three candidates vying to become the next Scottish Conservative leader clashed in a televised hustings on STV.
Russell Findlay MSP, Murdo Fraser MSP and Meghan Gallacher MSP are all standing for leader.
Our Deputy Political Editor David Bol was watching the debate, and gave his scores on the doors.
'Our expectations are low'
The Fraser of Allander Institute is accusing the Scottish Government of not being transparent enough with its budgets.
Economists at the institute say they are expecting to see £600 million of cuts in today’s emergency budget controls.
There are three things they are most keen to hear about:
Clarity on what has changed since the 2024/25 budget was set
A rundown of where spending is being reduced
Evidence of how these decisions have been made.
However the institute added: “Will we get this level of detail today?
“We’ll be honest, given the Scottish Government’s track record on budget transparency, our expectations are low.
“We’ll be doing what we can to get under the figures and we’ll have our initial analysis up on our website later this afternoon.”
The bin strikes are not over just yet!
In some early bad news for the Scottish Government on what could be a day of plenty of bad news, the bin strikes that threatened Edinburgh’s festivals are not done with just yet.
Council workers have voted overwhelmingly to reject the latest pay offer from employers, Unison has announced.
The union said 86 per cent of those balloted rejected the latest offer from Cosla which includes an hourly uplift of £0.67 or a 3.6 per cent increase, whichever is higher.
Unison has mandates for strike action by waste and recycling workers at 13 councils, and for education and early years staff at five councils.
The union’s local government committee, made up of senior stewards from across Scotland, will discuss next steps over the next few days.
Unison Scotland local government committee chair Colette Hunter said: “Cosla and the Scottish government need to understand the anger among council staff.
“They want a fair increase to stop their pay consistently falling behind, and for their wage increase to be in line with other areas of the economy.”
Remember it is exactly these enhanced pay deals that are leading the Scottish Government to have to make “tough decisions” around spending, starting with Shona Robison’s statement this afternoon.
Looking ahead to tomorrow, First Minister John Swinney will set out his programme for government on Wednesday.
He is under pressure to restore hope and optimism for the SNP in what will be his first programme for government since becoming First Minister.
However it is poised to be curtailed by a lack of funding.
Over the weekend at SNP conference he said there would be “John Swinney approaches to tackling child poverty” in the programme for government, and said his priorities will be child poverty, climate change, growing the economy and improving public services.
But there is unlikely to be room for anything else given the government’s ever-tightening purse strings.
You can read Deputy Political Editor David Bol’s analysis of the upcoming programme for government in today’s paper.
I’ve taken a look ahead at some of the big talking points as MSPs return to Holyrood after the summer recess.
Take a look before this afternoon’s business gets underway.
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The boards tasked with integrating health and social care services are facing their biggest ever funding challenges as the Scottish Government deals with its “most extreme financial crisis since devolution”, MSPs have heard.
Holyrood’s Health Committee received a report from professor David Bell of Stirling University, examining the finances of Integrated Joint Boards (IJBs).
Created in 2014, the 30 IJBs across Scotland are intended to improve health outcomes and provide person-centred care.
Prof Bell’s report noted they face a number of challenges: including inflation; wage rises; workforce pressures; increasing demand due to an ageing population; and uncertainty around the role of the forthcoming National Care Service.
The weekly NHS statistics were published earlier on today.
It shows there were 1,961 delayed discharges in July, which is higher than the number in both May and April this year.
The average delay for these patients is 28 days.
Dr Sandesh Gulhane MSP, the Scottish Conservatives’ health spokesman, said: “The SNP are continuing to fail miserably to meet their pledge to eradicate delayed discharge.
“Shona Robison made this promise almost a decade ago when she was health secretary, yet the problem only continues to worsen on her party’s watch.
“It is a damning indictment of the SNP’s mismanagement of Scotland’s NHS that there was a huge increase in the number of days spent in hospital by those whose discharge was delayed, compared to the same time last year.
“These delays have a devastating knock-on effect for patients and staff across our NHS, including operations being canceller and lengthier waits at A&E.
“Neil Gray needs to get a grip of this crisis and take urgent action to tackle delayed discharge.
“He should start by adopting our plans for a modern, efficient and local health service.”
The weekly NHS statistics show there were nearly 40,000 patients in Scotland waiting over four hours to be seen in A&E in July 2024.
The statistics also show 8.4 per cent of planned operations (1,998) were cancelled the day before or on the day a patient was due to be treated.
Over 480,000 fewer operations have now taken place since the coronavirus pandemic began in March 2020.
In the 53 months prior to the pandemic, between October 2015 and February 2020, a total of 1,522,842 operations took place in Scottish hospitals - but in the 53 months since then, between March 2020 and July 2024, a total of 1,042,409 operations took place.
This is a difference of 480,433 operations.
Mental health treatment targets have also been missed, with 2,163 people waiting over a year for treatment.
The proportion of children waiting more than 18 weeks for a referral also rose from 14 per cent to 15.9 per cent in the quarter ending June 2024, meaning nearly one in six children are waiting more than four months to get help.
Scottish Labour says the SNP is “betraying a generation” as the government has never met its own target of 90 per cent of CAMHS patients being seen within 18 weeks.
Paul Sweeney MSP, Scottish Labour’s mental health spokesman, said: “Behind these numbers are families who are desperately trying to help their children but have ended up in limbo instead.
“Four months is a long time for any young person - and for some, it may be the most critical time in their life.
“The SNP must wake up to the mental health crisis on its doorstep and act now before a whole generation is betrayed.
“Scottish Labour will invested in our NHS and bring waiting times down so that every child or young person who asks for help can get it.”
SNP MSPs have been spotted in the pre-debate briefing room in Holyrood - getting ready for what will be a busy afternoon with five ministerial statements to come.
We’ve got some updated details on what’s happening this afternoon.
2.20pm - First Minister John Swinney will give a ministerial statement on community cohesion
2.50pm - Finance Secretary Shona Robison will give a ministerial statement on emergency spending controls
3.35pm - Public Health Minister Jenni Minto will give a ministerial statement on gender identity healthcare for young people
4.05pm - Transport Secretary Fiona Hyslop will give a ministerial statement on the Clyde and Hebrides ferries, ports and harbours
4.35pm - Education Secretary Jenny Gilruth will give a ministerial statement on mobile phones, behaviour and relationships in schools.
The Scottish Children’s Coalition says the Scottish Government needs to stick to its promise to help young people with their mental health.
This comes after new statistics released earlier today show 84.1 per cent of young people start CAMHS (child and adolescent mental health services) within 18 weeks of referral.
This is down from 86 per cent in the previous quarter, but is an improvement on the same period last year.
A spokesman for the coalition said: “We are in a mental health emergency, with an increasing number of children and young people experiencing mental health issues.
“The increase in waiting times for children and young people to access CAMHS in the latest quarter (ending June 2024) when compared with the previous quarter is disappointing but is a welcome improvement on the same period last year.
“However, it should be noted that 111 children and young people have been languishing for over a year on the waiting list for treatment.
“Behind each one of these numbers lies the story of a child, young person and family, struggling to get the support they are entitled to.
“With 84.1 per cent of children and young people starting treatment within 18 weeks of referral, this still does not meet the Scottish Government waiting times target that 90 per cent of children and young people be seen within 18 weeks of referral, which has never been met.
“The Scottish Government in its NHS recovery plan 2021-2026 committed to increase direct investment into mental health by the end of the parliamentary term in 2026, ensuring that 10 per cent of the frontline NHS budget is invested in mental health, with one per cent directed specifically to children and young people through CAMHS.
“It is vital that this commitment is maintained, if we are to give our children and young people the care and support they so desperately need.”
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