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Alex Bell: SNP could help struggling Scots – but talk of Tory cuts suits the independence agenda better

The SNP throws blame around when it could be taking steps to help Scots, writes Alex Bell
The SNP throws blame around when it could be taking steps to help Scots, writes Alex Bell

The UK government is in the process of spending an extra £800 million over and above Scotland’s usual budget on Scottish projects.

It is our share of the “levelling up” fund announced last November by the Chancellor of the Exchequer.

Alex Bell

The money is to be spent by constituency, which means about £13.5 million per Westminster seat.

There is an obvious and important flaw in this policy. If it is meant to “level up”, it should not be spread over the country, but targeted at the poorest constituencies or communities.

It is, then, a nice idea poorly executed. I doubt any Scottish constituency will notice the cash, attribute it to the largesse of the UK government or feel equal to Kensington as a result, or wherever the benchmark for levelling-up is meant to be.

Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak announced the levelling up funding

That however is not the SNP critique. Apparently the extra £800 million, along with an additional £6 billion in Covid recovery funds, adds up to “austerity”.

That is despite Scotland enjoying the highest level of spend in its history.

So much for austerity

Austerity is that unusual word used to describe the Conservative cuts of 2010. In theory these savaged Scottish spending in an ideological purge of the public sector. Economic data actually shows a dip in the Scottish block over the last decade but nothing like as severe as stated at the beginning.

However, it is central to the SNP’s independence argument that Scotland suffers from Tory cuts.

Never mind that all governments reduced spending around 2010, or that an independent government would also have to make cuts, according to SNP economic guru Andrew Wilson.

Former chancellor George Osborne and PM David Cameron – architects of austerity

Covid borrowing makes the banking crisis of over a decade ago very small beer. We are in a much worse situation.

Government finances are a mix of super high borrowing, lots of spending and, now, a bit of frantic clawing money back.

A valid critique of the UK government approach is that it is incoherent, flawed (see levelling up) and desperately optimistic for a bounce back. But austerity it ain’t.

Boost it like Biden

Yet Alison Thewlis, the SNP’s finance spokesperson in Westminster, insists it’s just the same big bad wolf come to eat your granny.

“The Tory government is threatening Scotland’s recovery by imposing more damaging austerity cuts – when it should be delivering a major fiscal stimulus to create jobs and boost the economy,” she says.

No mention of the nearly £7 billion in extra funds that have come to Scotland in the last 12 months, equivalent to an extra 25% on the Scottish block. She wants spending equivalent to President Biden’s multitrillion dollar package.

US president Joe Biden

The SNP have even found a slogan for this: “Boost it like Biden”.

Because nothing spells economic literacy more than adapting a film puff – Bend it like Beckham – from 20 years ago.

What is really odd is Thewlis’s explanation of austerity.

“Tory plans to slash Universal Credit, impose a public sector pay freeze, and end furlough prematurely will act as a roadblock to recovery and leave millions of people struggling to get by,” she says.

Pity the poor people in England who have no choice but to suffer this fate. However, Scots are not helpless victims. Thewlis doesn’t seem to realise that the SNP government was offered more social security powers in 2016 but declined them.

These did not include Universal Credit, but, had they been adopted, the powers could have been used to funnel more money to people struggling to get by. If this is now “austerity”, it is of the SNP’s choosing.

Public sector pay in Scotland is decided by Scotland

Thewlis’s colleague Shona Robison attempted the same deception when calling for more powers to tackle poverty. To which sensible nationalists thought: “Why doesn’t she use the ones already there?”

Thewlis seems happily oblivious to the fact that public sector pay in Scotland is decided by Nicola Sturgeon, not Boris Johnson. That’s why NHS staff are on different rates either side of the border.

The SNP govern in poetry and campaign in prose. The impression of socialism is given in office, but it defaults to conservatism in elections

The Scottish Government does not control furlough, but that doesn’t stop it coming up with other schemes to help people.

Most egregious of Thewlis’s misdirection is that Scotland had an election last month, where the phrase “boost it like Biden” was never used, nor was there any suggestion of a huge spend.

SNP silence on foreign aid speaks volumes

The SNP have borrowing powers they could max out, and tax-raising ones they could deploy. They could have done a Biden, but did no such thing.

The SNP govern in poetry and campaign in prose. The impression of socialism is given in office, but it defaults to conservatism in elections. If Thewlis is disappointed by this, she can join the queue.

When listing “austerity”, she didn’t mention the issue of the week – the cut to foreign aid spending by Johnson. Unusual for the SNP not to take a swipe at Boris.

Unless, of course, she and the party know cuts are inevitable under her plans, and they just don’t trust Scots with the truth.

Just when Scotland thought it was out, they pull us back in again. We wanted intelligent debate but it’s a return to the word vomit that passes for policy.

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