By Bill Heaney
MSP Jackie Baillie has welcomed Chancellor Rachel Reeves’ inaugural budget as “a boost for Scots’ households”.
She said the Chancellor delivered an extra £3.4 billion for Scotland to improve public services but cautioned the wasteful SNP Scottish Government to spend the money wisely.
She also laid out a 10-year plan to improve the NHS, vowed to create thousands of extra appointments and offered the largest increase in NHS spending – outside of Covid – since 2010.
Rachel Reeves, left, maintained National Insurance and Income Tax contributions at the current rate, delivering on Labour’s manifesto pledge to Make Work Pay.
Fuel duty was also frozen for the next year, in a move which will help stretched household budgets, alongside freezing VAT.
Ms Reeves’ budget also delivered an increase in the minimum wage, which will rise to £12.21 an hour for workers aged over 21, from April 2025 – a 6.7 per cent increase to boost the wage packets of 200,000 Scots.
Young people aged between 18 and 20 will also see their wage increase to £10 an hour from £8,60, in the next financial year.
The budget also made provision for spending on the state pension to rise by 4.1 per cent in 2025/26 – a £470 increase for more than 12 million UK pensioners.
Thousands of carers in Dumbarton, Vale of Leven, Helensburgh & Lomond will also benefit from an increase in vital Carer’s Allowance funding, which will rise from £81.90 per week, to the equivalent of 16 hours worked at the National Living Wage.
A carer can now also earn over £10,000 a year whilst receiving the allowance. Universal Credit claimants will benefit from a cap on deductions from their benefit payments.
The new Fair Repayment Rate will limit the amount if money the government can take from a claimant’s benefit to help make debt repayments and see deductions capped at 15 percent – down from 25 per cent.
Jackie Baillie said: “The limit will be lowered by up to £420 a year – which will boost an estimated 1.2 million households around the UK – including 700,000 with children. “
Tax loopholes including the ‘Non-Dom’ scheme will also be closed said Rachel Reeves, who pledged she would “invest, invest, invest” to drive growth.
Jackie Baillie welcomed the Budget. She said: “Labour has promised to change the country and deliver growth in our economy and fund improved public services.
“Our pledge for government included our mission to make work pay, deliver economic stability, lift Scotland’s children out of poverty and drive economic growth.
“Rachel Reeves’ budget will help achieve that, as well as offering greater security for many low-income households.
“I am delighted that Labour is delivering on pledge to improve public services – and the Chancellor’s £3.4 billion of additional funding for Scotland will help to achieve that.
“It is now up to the SNP Scottish Government to properly target that funding to improve key priorities like Scotland’s crippled NHS and affordable housing crisis. Every single penny for the NHS must be spent on the NHS – nothing less will do from the Scottish Government.
“I am delighted that Labour has used this budget to deliver for the UK, for Scotland and for the residents of Dumbarton constituency”.
There has been no comment so far as to whether money pledged by Boris Johnston’s Conservative government under the levelling up fund will still be available under Labour.
Projects promised funding under this scheme include the industrial estate at the old Esso Bowling tank farm and the by-pass road from Dunglass to Dumbarton plus £40 million for regeneration work in Dumbarton, Alexandria and Clydebank town centres.
Meanwhile, responding to the UK budget, Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Alex Cole-Hamilton, pictured right, said: “I’m glad that the Chancellor has listened to Liberal Democrat calls for more investment in the NHS. Here in Scotland we will keep pressure on the Scottish Government to ensure that extra resource is directed to giving people fast access to NHS services like local GPs and dentists while alleviating the crisis in mental health.
“The Scottish Government now have some major choices to make. In the past they have chosen poorly, wasting hundreds of millions on ferries that have not been delivered and tens of millions on a bureaucratic takeover of social care which will probably now never happen.
“Scottish Liberal Democrats will press for the Scottish Government to deliver the fair deal that our communities need. First and foremost, this means funding for our NHS but it also means investing in rebuilding Scottish education, fixing crumbling infrastructure and social care.”
The green eyes that go with politics will be firmly focused on comparisons between what has been allocated to England, which is that:
- Concrete steps to fix the foundations and rebuild Britain’s public services to make them fit for generations to come.
- More than £2 billion to upgrade NHS technology and £1 billion to deal with massive NHS maintenance backlog.
- NHS will deliver 2% productivity growth in new commitment.
A statement this morning from Prime Minister Keir Starmer says technology and functioning hospitals will be the first priority in the Labour Government’s ambition to modernise the NHS and make it fit for the future.
More than £3 billion has been set aside to mend the crumbling wards and bring healthcare tech into the 21st century – to give patients the right care, in the right location, with the right technology.
It’s only with this new technology and functioning hospitals that the NHS can begin to reform in earnest – and create a health service that can thrive for generations to come.
This is part of the Chancellor’s record-breaking £22.6 billion increase in day-to-day spending and £3.1 billion capital boost for the Department for Health and Social Care from 2023/24 to 2025/26, which will reduce waiting times and rebuild the NHS.
Paired with reforms set out in the Government’s 10-Year Health Plan, this overdue injection of capital spending will fix the foundations and make the delivery of healthcare more efficient for generations to come. It will move us from hospital to community, analogue to digital, and from sickness to prevention.
It comes alongside a commitment to deliver 2% productivity growth to the nation’s healthcare system.
- Scotch whisky industry snubbed by Reeves. See earlier story in this issue of The Dumbarton Democrat.