SNP pinching policies from opposition parties
Last week the SNP Scottish Government set out its Programme for Government for the coming year and what we heard from the First Minister was a Government lacking ideas and vision, resorting to lifting policies from Labour and other opposition parties.
On the economy, the SNP have performed a U-turn on the public sector pay cap after voting against Labour proposals to scrap the cap as recent as June.
Local MSP Derek Mackay, the Scottish Government Finance Minister, has finally listened to public sector workers and followed Labour’s lead on this issue.
It’s just a shame he didn’t listen sooner as public sector workers could have had a much-needed pay rise earlier.
At the last Scottish election, Labour’s policy on taxation was to use the powers of the parliament to tackle austerity and invest in our public services. The SNP and Tories attacked us on this and both committed to no tax rises. Our policies to raise tax by 1p and increase the top rate to 50p would have meant billions more for public services and an end to cuts to jobs, education and health.
Now the First Minister wants to have a “discussion” on the use of tax powers, despite spending all her political life for having the powers to make out own decisions.
Another Labour policy pinched by the First Minister is a Scottish National Investment Bank, however the SNP can’t provide any detail on what this would look like.
Labour wanted to create a National Investment Bank to boost our economy and support growth and we wanted to provide the Bank with lending power of £20billion. Instead we get no detail from a hapless First Minister scouring the pages of opposition manifestos.
On education, the Scottish Government are progressing with an Education Bill and governance review that is opposed by teachers, parents, pupils and unions.
The review will remove local democratic accountability and leave the burden of bureaucracy with head teachers.
This policy is a leftover ambition of the Thatcher Government. It will give schools no new money, instead increase the workload of head teachers.
The Pupil Equity Fund announced is Labour’ Fair Start Fund which we proposed in 2015 to tackle the attainment gap too many of our pupils face.
I welcome the announcement of Frank’s Law by the Scottish Government. This would extend free personal care to those with early onset dementia and hopefully other conditions.
However, there is little detail on what this will look like in the long-run but it is a welcome announcement by the First Minister.
Another welcome announcement is the Organ Donation Opt-Out. I should really say re-announcement as the SNP have previously said they would legislate on this, and while it has long been a Labour policy, the SNP voted against the Bill put forward by Labour last year.
According to one SNP MSP, they would have voted for the Bill had it not been for one of my Labour colleagues closing the debate. This showed the pettiness of the SNP and let down many people waiting on organ donor lists.