Malcolm Robertson
Around every Scottish Government budget, there is much talk of hard choices.
The truth is that real hard choices – the kind that households and businesses make every day to live within their means – are almost always kicked into the long grass, to become problems with which some future administration – a braver one, perhaps – might contend.
And so it was that yesterday’s Scottish budget was an unremarkable pre-election affair – one that suits the SNP politically right now, but which – if we’re all honest – will do little to affect meaningful change in the country.
In her last budget before retiring from the Scottish Parliament in May, Shona Robison’s mandate was clear: no horses are to be scared before the election.
Anas Sarwar’s decision to have Scottish Labour abstain on the budget vote means we are all spared the weeks of policy haggling that generally goes on between the budget announcement and it being agreed by parliament. Sarwar obviously wants the election battle to play out beyond Holyrood, where more people may notice.
There are some eye-catching elements to this budget. There will be a private jet tax that won’t generate much revenue, but which provides headlines and a useful smokescreen to more fundamental changes to air departure tax that have alarmed the aviation sector.
There may be two new council tax bands for properties valued at more than £1m, notwithstanding the question of how those are valued relative to every other property in the country, an increase in the child payment only for children less than a year old and that evergreen promise to complete the dualling of the A9 by 2035.
Of course, there are – as ever – missed opportunities too. Many earners still pay more tax than counterparts elsewhere in the UK, making us less competitive. There is some tinkering with the business rates system, instead of proper reform.
There is disappointment that the increase in the child payment only applies to babies and the promised £1.5 billion of efficiencies in the three-year spending review period is significantly less than the £1 billion a year suggested by public finance minister Ivan McKee last summer.
While there is additional investment for the NHS in Scotland, there is still no indication that it will be contingent on its much-needed modernisation and no sign that politicians are embarrassed by the size and scale of Scotland’s welfare bill or the growing list of free (it’s not really free) stuff aimed at the middle classes.
The Fraser of Allander Institute, the Scottish Fiscal Commission and Audit Scotland – organisations that should command universal respect – occasionally use the word
“unsustainable” to describe Scotland’s finances.
At some point, we’re going to have to listen and do something about that. To create a budget that puts business and economic growth at its heart. That encourages and rewards ambition, enterprise, entrepreneurship and risk-taking as the means to generate wealth right across society, lifting people out of poverty and driving Scotland’s competitiveness and prosperity for the generations that follow ours.
But for now, there is an election coming and no horses are to be agitated.