Nicola Sturgeon’s plan to address the cost of living crisis has suffered another blow after it was criticised by her own policy chief.
Tony Giugliano said ministers had to “do better” than giving most households £150 and accused the Scottish Government of being in a “comfort zone”.
Finance Secretary Kate Forbes last week unveiled a £290m package to help Scots cope with soaring energy bills and inflation.
She announced £150 for households in receipt of Council Tax Reduction, which benefits the poor, and the same amount for those living in band A-D properties.
The latter policy, which is not targeted at people on low incomes, means that a high earner could get the same assistance as a worker on minimum wage.
The Poverty Alliance claimed the measures were “not only inadequate and poorly targeted”, but also evidence of a “lack of imagination”.
Giugliano, who is the SNP’s policy development convener, tweeted the criticism made by the group:
“This quote from @PovertyAlliance really needs to make Scot Gov stop and think. Do better.”
Speaking to the Record, he said of the £150 policy: “I don’t think we should be sticking to a comfort zone on things like this.”
He said the Government had to help the “poorest in society” and criticised wealthier people being entitled to the cash:
“I completely agree that anybody on £80,000 in council band D getting this support is not quite the same as people at the other end of the scale.
“There are people who are seriously struggling and that’s who I think we need to be targeting.”
He said: “Sticking with what we know can appear as the obvious solution, but I think we need to think outside the box and not just simply replicate what Westminster has done down south.”
Giugliano said the pro-independence SNP/Green Government had an opportunity to showcase different approaches:
“I just don’t think that we’ve done that.”
Asked if criticisms by anti-poverty groups should set alarm bells ringing in the Scottish Government, he said: “Absolutely...when organisations like these make a nice powerful case then you do need to stop and listen.”
He said resources had to be targeted better: “We are all in the same boat, as they say, but we are not all in the same storm.”
Scottish Labour MSP Pam Duncan-Glancy said: “It is a damning indictment of the SNP’s failed policy that even their own policy convenor can’t support them.
“This adds to the widespread criticism of the SNPs approach. It has badly failed people struggling the most with the cost of living crisis.
“Labour’s plans would target help at those who need it, providing them with up to £600 worth of support.
“The SNP have missed an opportunity to use Scotland’s powers to make a real difference. Their failure to do so is a betrayal of households struggling across Scotland.”
Scottish LibDem leader Alex Cole-Hamilton said:
“Toni Giugliano is an ambitious chap who has repeatedly tried to get elected as an SNP parliamentarian so for him to split from the party line on this should be read as a stinging rebuke.
“Neither of Scotland’s governments are doing anything like enough. The Conservatives must deliver much more to help with the soaring costs of energy and scrap their unfair national insurance hike.
“The SNP/Green Government must get more money to those most in need, rethink their own hike to rail fares and stop dawdling on retrofitting homes to insulate people from rising energy costs.”
A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “The cost of living crisis is causing huge concern and people are struggling, including many households not in receipt of benefits or other financial support.
“We are therefore providing a £150 payment which will reach 73% of households, as well as a further £10 million to continue the Fuel Insecurity Fund – part of an existing £41 million winter fund. This will help prevent those households and families on the edge of the poverty line, from falling over it.
“This is all additional to the annual £2 billion support we invest in low income households, including providing 530,000 people in receipt of CTR with a £130 payment last year, unpaid carers an additional carers allowance supplement, and an annual £120 million in housing support and the Scottish Welfare Fund. In addition, we will double the unique Scottish Child Payment from April and provide Bridging Payments worth an annual £520 to around 150,000 children and young people.”
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