The SNP’s Budget was nothing but cynical spin |
Yesterday, Shona Robison, Scotland’s finance minister, delivered her tax and spending plans for the coming fiscal year. The headline message from the SNP was the following: the majority of Scots will pay less tax than those living in the rest of the UK.
That’s thanks to a very slight lifting of the threshold freeze on the lower tax bands, resulting in whopping tax cuts of less than £1 per week for the lowest tax-paying earners. The result is that those taxpayers at the bottom of the rung will find themselves £24 a year better off than if they lived anywhere else in the UK. By contrast, those earning £70,000 are faced with a nearly £2,000 premium for living in Scotland.
The SNP are masterful at spin and so the message seems to have landed. Scots on the whole are genuinely grateful to live in a country........