LABOUR/LIB-DEM...RETURNED MONEY TO WESTMINSTER WHILE SCOTLANDS POOR WENT WITHOUT............. The Scottish Government cant borrow money, and operates with fixed resources in the form of a block grant from Westminster. The SNP have successfully balanced that budget in each of the last Seven years, despite the problems caused by having to offer other parties concessions in order to secure the support of at least two of them to get the budget through Parliament. (In the previous administration no one party alone – other than Labour, who pathologically opposed the nationalists on principle and voted against every budget bill even when it contained their own amendments – could give the SNP enough votes to reach 65, the figure needed to pass any legislation.) Theyre also helped by some degree to the fact that while Labour were in power in the UK Parliament they kept Holyrood fairly generously supplied with cash (leaving aside for a moment the greater morality of the situation with regard to Scotlands net contribution to UK finances) by regularly increasing the block grant in real terms, in order to keep the Scottish voters who provide Labour with a large block of Westminster seats happy. That led to considerable profligacy (the Lab-Lib coalition that ran the first two Scottish Parliaments ACTUALLY RETURNED HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF POUNDS to the UK Treasury unspent), which in recent more straitened times has enabled a substantial degree of slack to be found and cut out with efficiency savings, without damaging frontline services too badly (so far). Pressure on budgets is even greater now, but David Cameron cant afford to be too stingy with Scotland because with the SNP having the ability to pass their referendum bill unchallenged at whatever time they consider the most advantageous, anything perceived as harsh London treatment of Scotland will increase the chances of a victory for independence.
Posted on: Mon, 25 Aug 2014 09:22:05 +0000
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