SCOTTISH Deputy First Minister Kate Forbes slammed the squandering oil revenues today before calling on Chancellor Rachel Reeves to scrap the windfall tax on North Sea profiteers.

Ms Forbes, used her last speech to SNP conference before standing down in May to slam successive UK governments’ handling of North Sea tax receipts over the decades.

She said: “Billions in tax revenues here have bankrolled the UK Treasury for years. These tax revenues frittered away on unjust wars and pet projects, rather than being invested in future generations.

“In Norway, child poverty is low, welfare support is fair. They can weather economic instability. 

“Meanwhile what has happened here in the energy capital of Europe in the last year under a Labour government?

“Higher fuel bills, cuts to welfare support, and months of worry for pensioners in fuel poverty. We can’t unpick the past, but we can write a better future.”

Ms Forbes’s vision of a better future included a demand that North Sea oil and gas giants, who have enjoyed a multibillion-pound profits bonanza in recent years, have a tax cut.

Urging Ms Reeves to axe the North Sea windfall tax in her forthcoming budget, she said: “Labour have followed the decades old pattern of exploiting Scotland’s energy revenues by extending and increasing the Tory energy profits levy, making hundreds of workers redundant and creating an unjust transition.

“In a classic move by this Labour government, they accept the 78 per cent tax rate is costing jobs, but they won’t do anything about it for five years.

“So, we call on the Chancellor today, don’t wait, replace this destructive fiscal regime at the next Budget with a fair one that protects workers and enables the energy transition.”