KATE Forbes has become the first woman to deliver the Scottish Budget at a moment's notice after the Finance Secretary was forced to quit.
Derek Mackay resigned after it emerged he had sent hundreds of messages to a teenage boy.
READ MORE: Derek Mackay resigns as Finance Secretary over texting scandal
While Mackay's sudden resignation – and subsequent suspension from the SNP – dominated proceedings at Holyrood, the Scottish Government pressed ahead with its budget.
READ MORE: Who is Derek Mackay – the man who resigned as Finance Secretary?
Public Finance Minister Forbes unveiled the tax and spending plans for 2020-21 which include cash to tackle the climate emergency and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Forbes promised Police Scotland would get the "money they require to maintain officer numbers at current levels".
With Scotland having recorded its highest number of drugs deaths in 2018 at 1187, she said there would be a rise of almost 60% in funding to tackle the harm caused by drugs and alcohol.
The budget provided for record spending of £15 billion in health and care services, with £645 million of cash going towards expanding the provision of free nursery care for youngsters With governments across the world taking action against climate change, many of the announcements were focused on that.
Forbes said: "We promised this would be a budget that steps up the delivery of our ambition to tackle climate change.
"Today we deliver on that."
The minister announced £1.8bn of capital spending would go on specific projects aimed at cutting emissions.
To encourage more Scots to use public transport, she said funding for rail and bus services would rise by £286m to £1.55bn in 2020-21.
In addition, more than £85m will be spent promoting active travel –such as walking and cycling – while a loan fund that helps people make the switch from petrol and diesel to low-emission vehicles is being upped to £35m.
Spending on forestry is be increased to more than £64m after expert advisers at the Committee on Climate Change highlighted the need to increase tree planting levels.
The Scottish Government also pledged £2bn of "transformational infrastructure investment" in measures aimed at tackling climate change in the next parliamentary term – with Forbes saying ministers would "prioritise multi-year investment in low carbon measures at the scale required to help tackle the climate change emergency".
She confirmed there would no increase in the rates of income tax Scots pay next year.
While the threshold at which workers are required to pay the higher and top rates of income tax has been frozen, the amount at which people start to pay the basic and intermediate rates will rise in line with inflation.
Overall, 56% of Scottish taxpayers will pay less than they would if they lived elsewhere in the UK, Forbes said.
Ministers will provide £21m to fund the new Scottish Child Payment –a £10 a week grant aimed at helping poorer families, which is being brought in later this year.
Overall, Forbes said ministers would spend no less that £1.4bn next year in helping low-income households.
She told MSPs the budget "delivers for our public services, invests in the path to net-zero emissions, boosts our economy and through the new child payment delivers a game changer in the fight against poverty".
Why are you making commenting on The National only available to subscribers?
We know there are thousands of National readers who want to debate, argue and go back and forth in the comments section of our stories. We’ve got the most informed readers in Scotland, asking each other the big questions about the future of our country.
Unfortunately, though, these important debates are being spoiled by a vocal minority of trolls who aren’t really interested in the issues, try to derail the conversations, register under fake names, and post vile abuse.
So that’s why we’ve decided to make the ability to comment only available to our paying subscribers. That way, all the trolls who post abuse on our website will have to pay if they want to join the debate – and risk a permanent ban from the account that they subscribe with.
The conversation will go back to what it should be about – people who care passionately about the issues, but disagree constructively on what we should do about them. Let’s get that debate started!
Callum Baird, Editor of The National
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel