Next year’s Holyrood election will be focused on who voters trust more to spend a £9.1 billion increase in funding for Scotland, Ian Murray has said.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves set out her spending plans for the next three years on Wednesday, pledging to increase funding for housing and the NHS south of the border – which will have an impact on Scotland.
She also announced development funding for the long-awaited Acorn carbon capture and storage facility in Aberdeenshire, as well as the reinstatement of up to £750 million to build the UK’s most powerful supercomputer at Edinburgh University.
According to the Treasury, the Scottish Government will see an increase of £9.1 billion over the next three years.
In a briefing for Scottish journalists, Chief Secretary to the Treasury Darren Jones said on average, the increase will mean £2.9 billion extra for Scotland each year – £2.4 billion of which will be revenue spending up to 2028-29 and around £510 million in capital for the slightly longer period of four years.
The funding will take effect from April next year, just weeks before Scots go to the polls in the Holyrood election.
In the same briefing, Scottish Secretary Ian Murray asked: “The question then becomes, who do you trust to spend that?
“The record of the SNP Government of the last 18 years has not been beneficial in terms of how they would spend it.
“In fact, I think there’ll be broad support for the view that the £4.9 billion that they got in the budget last year has not been spent wisely either.”
He said Wednesday’s spending review was “great” for Scotland.
One of the key announcements was confirmation of development funding for the Acorn project.
The project – which will store carbon emissions from across Scotland under the North Sea – was repeatedly overlooked by successive UK governments for funding.
But asked for clarity on how much cash the project will receive, Mr Jones was unable to say.
The 136-page document also said that while the Government supports Acorn, “a final investment decision will be taken later this Parliament, subject to project readiness and affordability”.
Mr Murray said: “We’re working with the Acorn partners and have been for some time now about what they need for the development of it and that’s what this commitment is for.”
The SNP pushed for more detail on Acorn following the announcement.
Accusing successive UK governments of having “dragged their heels” on the project, Westminster leader Stephen Flynn said: “The glaring omission in today’s announcement was any detail on the scale of funding and the timescales for delivery, which stands in stark contrast to the £22 billion commitment the Labour Government has already given to carbon capture projects in England.
“Westminster has had 20 years to hammer out the detail on Scottish carbon capture, so it must now deliver meaningful funding and concrete support at pace.”
Scottish Finance Secretary Shona Robison said the overall funding increase does not match that of Whitehall departments, claiming Scotland has missed out on more than £1 billion.
“Today’s settlement for Scotland is particularly disappointing, with real-terms growth of 0.8% a year for our overall block grant, which is lower than the average for UK departments,” she said.
“Had our resource funding for day-to-day priorities grown in line with the UK Government’s overall spending, we would have £1.1 billion more to spend on our priorities over the next three years. In effect, Scotland has been short-changed by more than £1 billion pounds.
“It is also disappointing that despite apparent briefing to media in advance, we are still awaiting clarity on funding for the vital Acorn project in the north-east of Scotland.
“We made extensive representations to the UK Government on our priorities for the spending review, including calls for an end to spending that bypasses devolution, but there has been limited opportunity to engage with them.
“It appears that the continuation of local growth funding – which fails to match the European Structural Funds it was supposed to replace – will come directly from Whitehall, yet again bypassing devolved governments.”
The Scottish Government will respond to the announcement in the medium-term financial strategy on June 25, the Finance Secretary said.
But Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar praised the spending review as “game-changing”, adding: “The plans set out today will bring billions of pounds of investment to Scotland, on top of the record budget settlement delivered in the budget.
“From the Acorn Project to a national supercomputer in Edinburgh to our defence industry, this Labour Government is investing in Scotland’s future while the SNP carps from the sidelines.”
Scottish Conservative finance spokesman Craig Hoy described the spending review as a “spend-now-tax-later statement” which will result in the Chancellor “almost certainly” having to raise taxes.
