Unsurprisingly, the big stories this week are going to revolve around the Scottish Government’s budget proposals, which have now been presented to parliament.
The key announcements – as per my colleague Rebecca McCurdy – are record NHS spending levels, a u-turn on the affordable homes budget (after a campaign by The Herald), the freezing of income tax bands, more cash for councils, and the end of the council tax freeze.
From the government’s perspective, they’ll be hoping that as much attention as possible is focused on the announcement that the hated two-child benefit cap will be mitigated north of the border.
As an education specialist who spent most of day dealing with the SQA’s disastrous committee appearance, I came to the budget announcements a little bit late and was, of course, most interested in any spending on schools, nurseries, colleges and universities.
The money to councils would be relevant here, as is the claim that the government is “increasing spending on education and skills by 3 per cent above inflation, which is an uplift of £158 million” – but neither are particularly specific or clear.
Fortunately, there was one very specific and clear education-related pledge from Shona Robinson, who told the Scottish Parliament:
“I will fund a £29 million ASN plan, which will deliver measures such as training, so that more of our teachers can become ASN teachers.”
So, we have a specific promise of funding, the explicit mention of a “plan”, and a........