TWENTY years ago, when I was campaigning for a Scottish Parliament, I didn’t envisage that it would be a vehicle to simply pass on Tory austerity — in fact, I thought the exact opposite. 

It seemed at the time that the Scots had suffered enough under 18 years of a right-wing Tory government, in particular being used as guinea pigs for the hated poll tax.

It was thought that a devolved parliament would allow resistance to the worst excesses of Tory cuts in future.  

The parliament we voted for had tax-varying powers and now those powers are even stronger and more effective, if only the current SNP Scottish government would use them to their full effect.

With those new powers there is even more opportunity to do things differently — to be radical instead of tinkering at the edges and to begin to reverse the damage of years of cuts in our communities.

This Budget is particularly important as it’s an opportunity to use the new tax bands to begin to reverse the public-sector cuts.

It’s important to councillors who have already seen services reduced and it’s important to council staff who haven’t had a decent pay rise for years and who have watched as colleagues’ jobs disappear and they have to take on more duties.

And it’s important to the people of Scotland who depend on our public services, who directly suffer from cuts to those services.
Whether it’s a reduction in learning support in schools, potholes in our roads, loss of a meals service for elderly or closure of community centres, libraries and swimming pools, we are all affected by a cuts Budget.

Now is not the time for the SNP to be timid with its tax plans. It should use the powers of our parliament for a fairer Scotland.
Scottish Labour’s alternative Budget is fully costed and based on progressive taxation because, as socialists, we believe in the redistribution of power and wealth to eradicate the obscenity of poverty in a rich country.

This is the first Budget of Richard Leonard’s leadership and he has been very clear about stopping the council cuts, delivering a fair pay rise to all public sector workers, putting more into our NHS and beginning to address poverty through a child benefit top-up.
It’s long past time that the SNP took real action to eradicate poverty — in particular, child poverty — and the inequality that underpins it.

The Scottish government’s report on poverty and income inequality tells us that, after housing costs, 26 per cent of children in Scotland were living in relative poverty in 2015-16.

That’s nearly 260,000 children, and it’s 40,000 more than the previous year.

Forecasts also show that up to 100,000 more children will be living in poverty in Scotland by 2020.

The SNP government has introduced a Child Poverty Bill which provides a framework and sets targets for reducing child poverty, but it isn’t good enough to trot out targets without a proper and effective plan of action to achieve them.

Since, by definition, a child is living in poverty if the household income is insufficient to meet the child’s basic material needs, the Scottish government should understand that the most immediate and effective way of lifting children out of poverty is to directly raise family income levels.

Under the Tories, child benefit payments have risen just 2 per cent since 2010-11 and have not changed at all since 2015.

Coupled with the increased cost of raising a child, this is part of the reason that ever-increasing numbers of households with children are being pushed into poverty.

That’s why a coalition of charities, faith groups and trade unions back the Give me Five campaign, which urges the Scottish government to use the new powers to top up child benefit payments by £5 per week. Research shows that doing this would lift 30,000 children out of poverty.

Scottish Labour’s Mark Griffin MSP has lodged amendments to the Social Security Bill to make this happen.

It was costed in our Budget plans, but the SNP government is resisting it.

This top-up would fund a nutritious breakfast every day, a good-quality winter coat or taking part in a school trips. This would help to prevent children being hungry, cold or left out of school activities.  

It’s an extremely effective way to reduce material deprivation for all households that are struggling.

Some 56 per cent of children in Scotland who live in poverty live in a household where at least one adult is in work.

Low wages, insecure employment and zero-hours contracts mean that work doesn’t always provide a route out of poverty and, when wages are lower than expected, parents are often forced to use foodbanks or rely upon vicious payday loans.

Since child benefit is a universal benefit, a £5 top-up would provide a stable and reliable source of additional income for families.

The eradication of child poverty should be a priority for any government that calls itself progressive and the SNP Scottish government could use its taxation powers to meet the cost of topping up child benefit.

After 10 years in office it’s shocking that the SNP won’t use the powers of the Scottish Parliament to their full extent to redistribute wealth and power, eradicate poverty and create a fairer Scotland for the many. 

Scottish Labour undoubtedly would if in government.

Elaine Smith is Labour MSP for Central Scotland.