UK Parliament / Open data

Treasury Spending: Grants to Devolved Institutions

Absolutely. The Chancellor said at the Dispatch Box during that Budget debate that his ear had been bent by the Scottish Conservatives. It was not bent by the SNP—not surprising, because they do not seem to turn up to debates about the economy in Scotland. It was the work of the Scottish Conservative MPs, working alongside our Ministers within Government, that achieved that for Scotland. The resource budget in Scotland has gone up by almost £100 million in the last year. Those real-term changes are positively impacting on people in Scotland and all we get from the SNP are more and more complaints.

I know that time is short, Madam Deputy Speaker, but I was interested that in the 20 minutes that the hon. Member for Aberdeen North spent introducing the debate, there was no mention of the recent reshuffle. This is important when we talk about the money that goes to Scotland to spend on the devolved Administration. She did not mention that in a decade of the SNP being in power in Scotland, the number of Ministers has gone from 16 to 26. The cost of Ministers in Scotland has gone up by £400 million. That does not include the extra funding that will go to their private offices or on their car hire. I notice that the hon. Member for Perth and North Perthshire (Pete Wishart) has just come in. Clearly, a message has gone out—“We must get more people on our Benches.” They have now gone up to three, and it will be interesting to see his contribution to the debate.

Type
Proceeding contribution
Reference
644 c261 
Session
2017-19
Chamber / Committee
House of Commons chamber
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