1.1M SCOTS TO PAY HIGHEST TAXES IN UK

SNP’s ‘grubby deal’ with Greens to pass Budget signals punishing new tax raid on middle classes

MORE than a million Scots will pay the highest taxes in the UK following a ‘grubby’ Budget deal between the SNP and the Greens.

Yesterday’s last-ditch agreement added an extra £169 a year to the bills of middle-class workers on the higher tax rate.

Combined with reforms in December’s Budget, it means everyone earning more than £26,000 will pay higher rates of tax than people in other parts of the UK, while every Scot on £33,000 and above will see their pay packets shrink in April.

The savage hikes will result in 1.1million people paying higher rates of income tax than those elsewhere in Britain.

A worker in Scotland earning a £60,000 salary, for example, is set to pay £924 more per year than someone earning the same

in England. Last night, Scottish Labour branded the agreement between the SNP and the Left-wing Greens a ‘grubby deal’.

Finance Secretary Derek Mackay announced the final tax plans, which were shaped by the need to secure a majority of MSPs for his Budget.

It was the second year in a row that the SNP had had to rely on support from the Greens to get the plans through the parliament.

Murdo Fraser, finance spokesman for the Scottish Conservatives, said: ‘The SNP has decided today to rub salt in the wounds with yet another tax grab. Only a government as arrogant as the SNP would pick people’s pockets, and then come back for more.

‘This SNP Budget sends out a clear message: don’t bother trying to get a pay rise, or get a better paid job because we’re coming for your pay packet. It’s a tax on aspiration.

‘Mr Mackay also announced today that he has found nearly £115million to pay for local authority spending. While welcome, this extra funding demolishes the SNP’s claim it is being starved of funding.

‘The SNP’s budget from Westminster is going up this year and it turns out Mr Mackay had a rainy day fund to help buy off the Greens. Instead of this tax-rising Budget, the SNP should have cut waste, binned the vanity projects and focused on delivering real economic growth.’

To secure the Greens’ support, £170million extra will be handed to councils. But people paying the higher rate of income tax will partly fund the increase. The threshold for the 41p higher rate is set to start at £43,430, instead of £44,273 in the original plan.

That will take another £55million from 395,000 taxpayers, with everyone earning more than £43,430 set to pay an extra £169 per year.

Ministers say the rest of the cash for councils comes from under-spends and reserves.

SNP ministers argue that 70 per cent of taxpayers will pay less from April. But someone earning £50,000 will pay £84 more, rising to £584 for a salary of £100,000, £884 for £120,000 and £1,343 for £150,000.

Scottish Greens co-convener Patrick Harvie hailed the deal as ‘just the latest example of Greens leading the change in Scottish politics’.

The agreement, the SNP said, means public sector workers earning up to £36,500 will receive a pay rise of 3 per cent in 2018-19 – with Mr Mackay adding that this would include 80 per cent of NHS staff and the ‘vast majority of teachers’.

Labour finance spokesman James Kelly said there was a lack of investment in public services and a ‘growing NHS crisis’. He added that ‘the grubby deal’ struck by Mr Mackay, ‘just does not cut it’.

Mr Mackay said: ‘We have a deal that works for Scotland. We are building a better country in the face of Tory cuts.’