Scaremongering over austerity
TOM Peterkin reports Mr Swinney stating “the Chancellor is planning to impose a further £25 billion of cuts and austerity on the people of Scotland” (News, 16 March).
This is nonsense. The spending plan for the Scottish Budget projects £2.7bn of cuts by 2017-18, whilst Scotland’s share of cuts in welfare reform would be around the same amount.
This dodgy accounting takes Scottish Government scaremongering to new heights, following on from the First Minister’s fictional “£8bn relative surplus” last week. Perhaps the finance secretary could set out his budgetary arithmetic for the benefit of Scotland on Sunday’s readers.
Professor Arthur Midwinter, Falkirk