David Cameron has accused the SNP of “inventing grievances” before they exist.
Aberdeen South MP Callum McCaig yesterday asked for assurances Scotland would receive its fair share of the UK Government’s proposed apprenticeship levy.
It comes after George Osborne announced plans in the summer budget to impose a charge on “big companies” to help fund another three million apprenticeships.
But as yet, the Treasury has not provided details on the size of the levy or the firms that would have to pay it.
At Prime Minister’s Questions yesterday, Mr McCaig said the Scottish Government had estimated the levy would raise £391million from north of the border, with £146million coming from the public sector.
He added: “As yet there has been no confirmation that a single penny of that will come to Scotland to fund our distinct modern apprenticeship programme.
“Will you confirm that Scotland will receive our fair share of this funding or are we seeing another pig and a poke from this supposed one nation government?”
Mr Cameron suggested the former Aberdeen City Council leader was jumping the gun, and said no decision had yet been made on the rate or the size at which a business would have to start paying it.
The prime minister added: “The guarantee I can give you is that Scotland will be treated fairly and will get its full and fair share.
“But as ever with the SNP, they invent a grievance before it even exists.”
Apprenticeships are devolved, but the proposed levy would be UK-wide.
A Scottish Government spokeswoman said at the time of Mr Osborne’s announcement that a share of the money raised from
the charge would come to Scotland through Barnett consequentials, which Holyrood would decide how to spend.
Ian Armstrong, north-east regional director of the Scottish Council for Development and Industry, said after the announcement that his body would expect the UK and Scottish Governments to agree money raised in Scotland be invested
in apprenticeships in Scotland.