Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes challenges Labour on Scotland’s missing half a billion

Questions to answer for Alexander on local growth funding

Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes has written to Douglas Alexander on Scotland’s missing half-a-billion pounds– after £547 million of Local Growth Funding was confirmed for the Welsh Labour Government to manage and distribute, with no equivalent funding for the Scottish Government.

Writing to the Secretary of State for Scotland today, Kate Forbes posed a series of questions on the funding – and demanded clarity on why the Welsh Government was offered UK Government funding to manage and distribute, whilst the Scottish Government has not been allocated an equivalent share.

Ms Forbes asked the Secretary of State for Scotland what representations he has made to senior Labour ministers to ensure Scotland was not treated as an afterthought – and expressed concern that there could be a perception that public money was being used for party political purposes.

Finance Secretary Shona Robison has previously raised the issue with Treasury ministers but has received no satisfactory response.

The Welsh Government has been told it can manage and distribute £500 million UK Government funding, but there has been no equivalent scheme for the Scottish Government. This runs completely counter to the principles that underpin the Barnett Formula.

Whilst considerably smaller funding allocations have been made to Scottish local authorities, bypassing the devolution settlement, we need urgent clarity from the UK Government on when the Scottish Government will receive our equivalent share of this investment. So far, the Treasury has provided no useful answers.

There was widespread outcry when former Prime Minister Theresa May allocated £1 billion to the DUP-led Northern Irish Executive, without any Barnett consequentials for Wales and Scotland. It looks like history is repeating itself under the Labour Party.

The UK Labour Government must now confirm that the Scottish Government will receive an equivalent share of this funding, with the same conditions for managing and distributing the funding. Scotland has been short-changed by Westminster, and treated as an afterthought, far too many times.

With every decision this utterly incompetent Labour government makes, it becomes clearer that Scotland needs the fresh start of independence.

– THE DEPUTY FIRST MINISTER