THE Scottish Government will make sure public services “don't crumble away”, the Finance Secretary has said as she raised the prospect of major cuts amid Labour's “austerity” agenda.
Shona Robison suggested that the SNP government would be forced to consider options such as reducing the “size of the public sector” through amalgamations, office changes, and potentially voluntary redundancies.
Robison was at Edinburgh Napier University to discuss the impact of the annual GERS figures, which were published on Wednesday and showed a notional Scottish deficit of £22.7 billion – the gap between what is spent for Scotland and the tax receipts from Scotland.
The Finance Secretary said that the notional deficit was largely due to the impact of UK Government decisions as she raised the prospect of major public sector cuts.
Robison said: “We do have tough decisions to make, and we need to make sure that our public finances, we tackle the in-year pressure that is here due to the Chancellor's statement, that will have a tail that will impact for the foreseeable future.”
In late July, Labour Chancellor Rachel Reeves unveiled a package of spending cuts to make up for what she claimed was an unforeseen £22bn shortfall in public finances.
Among the cuts, the Winter Fuel Payment was made means-tested in a widely criticised move that the Scottish Government said on Wednesday that it had “no choice” but to follow.
Speaking to media, Robison suggested more cuts would have to be made.
Asked about public services, she said: “We'll make sure they don't crumble away. Our priority is clear around making sure we sustain public services, that we can continue to tackle poverty, and that we continue to invest in net zero and transforming our economy.
“Those are the key priorities. But it will have an impact, and we will have to decide what we deprioritise and that work is ongoing.”
Robison added that there “are challenges that we will need to address in terms of what the size of the public sector is going forward and to make sure that we can ensure it's sustainable and affordable, so there are absolutely tough decisions”.
Asked if changes to the size of the public sector would mean cuts to jobs or redundancies, Robison said: “There is inextricably a link between headcount and pay. Now we will have to work through that and we want to be absolutely fair to the public sector.
“We value our public sector workforce, and we want to work with them in making sure that going forward, we get to have a sustainable position, but that we take our workforce with us.”
Pushed on whether the public sector can expect to see redundancies between now and 2026, the Finance Secretary said: “We are putting in emergency controls and strict controls … for the foreseeable future, only recruitment in those absolutely critical areas like, for example, blue light services can go forward.
“So there is absolutely going to be a restraint on any recruitment.”
She added: “We obviously have a position of no compulsory redundancy, so we will want to work with the workforce around what voluntary measures can be taken.”
Robison highlighted how First Minister John Swinney and the Institute for Fiscal Studies had “warned during the election campaign that austerity was going to be ushered in … And here we are”.
However, she wouldn’t be drawn on specific cuts that may need to be made, saying: “We want to set that out all in the round, and we will. We'll be fully transparent about that.
“We'll set out all of the detail when we come back to parliament. There will be a fiscal statement, and I will set out all of the detail that will be required to be known by parliament. But it's going be tough.”
