BUDGET: SCOTTISH TORY RESPONSE NO MORE THAN DAMP SQUIB

October 30, 2024

By Bill Heaney

Russell Findlay may well have a reputation as a tough, foot-in-the-door journalist – but he revealed himself yesterday as a powder puff politician.

In an uninspiring response to the Budget, Findlay maintained that Labour’s tax-raising budget will hammer workers and businesses already reeling from years of SNP tax hikes. 

Tory leader Findlay never laid a glove on his Labour opposite number Anas Sarwar and instead turned the clock back to disgraced Nicola Sturgeon’s political incompetence.

He described Labour’s plans as “straight out of the SNP playbook”, which he said saw Nicola Sturgeon and her successors make Scotland the highest taxed part of the UK. 

Whatever was in that “playbook” is now history and has little or no relevance in today’s parliamentary affairs. Scotland is sick of Nicola.

Findlay said Chancellor Rachel Reeves had increased the pain on Scots “by breaking Labour’s election promises not to raise taxes”. 

The Chancellor outlined “an eye-watering” £40billion in tax rises, he said, including hikes in employers’ national insurance contributions and capital gains tax, along with an end to investment allowances in the North Sea. 

Given that Guy Fawkes Night is just around the corner, this speech was a damp squib.

Budget debate – Russell Findlay, Anas Sarwar, Rachel Reeves and Keir Starmer.

The Budget came in the wake of the Chancellor and the Prime Minister having already ditched universal winter fuel payments for pensioners, while agreeing double-digit public-sector pay deals with Labour’s union paymasters. 

Findlay said: “We know what Sir Keir Starmer is going [guising] as for Halloween – Nicola Sturgeon. 

“Labour’s tax-raising budget is straight out of the SNP playbook and will terrify hard-working Scots. 

“Starmer’s Labour have played a cruel trick on working people by breaking election promises not to raise taxes, just like the nationalists in Edinburgh. 

“Anas Sarwar calls Rachel Reeves his ‘friend’, but many in Scotland won’t feel that way when Labour snatch more of their hard-earned money. 

“Labour’s budget will hammer businesses, punish strivers, and leave pensioners worse off. This is not the change they promised – this is the same old Labour. 

“It’s basic common sense to keep taxes low so we that we reward aspiration, encourage economic growth and workers can choose themselves what’s best for their families.”