Greens do their bit to reverse cuts

Together with my Green MSP colleagues last week I was delighted to secure an extra £2.8 million of funding for Stirling Council as part of a budget deal for councils worth £170 million nationally.

The Tory Westminster Government only handed Holyrood extra money for loans, while their revenue budget ignored inflation, effectively delivering a £199 million cut in the money that pays for services. The draft budget put forward by the SNP Scottish Government on the back of this would have handed down a 1.5 per cent cut to Stirling Council budgets.

The Green deal reversed this and I personally raised the impact of proposed local cuts in the Stirling area in our constructive negotiations with Derek Mackay. Our case was only strengthened by the huge response shown by local people to the proposed cuts to the Smith and Big Noise.

I welcome the news that Stirling Council has now moved quickly to use this additional expenditure to shelve these two cuts and urge them to go further by scrapping other proposals such as shared school headships.

The Green deal also delivers a three per cent pay rise for 75 per cent of public sector workers across the country and will see all those earning a salary lower than the national average pay less income tax.

A £2 million community rail fund has also been set up as part of the

The Green deal also delivers a three per cent pay rise for 75 per cent of public sector workers

deal which could help progress projects such as the proposed Stirling – Alloa – Dunfermline route.

Mark Ruskell MSP Mid Scotland and Fife Region