Scottish Greens: Tory budget is an "international embarrassment"
Rishi Sunak’s budget is an embarrassment from the COP26 hosts just a week before the international climate summit, the Scottish Greens have said.
Commenting, Scottish Greens Finance Spokesperson, Ross Greer MSP, said: “This is a budget written for the Tories' corporate donors, not for the millions of people across the UK who desperately need help after a decade of Westminster austerity and a disastrous Brexit process. It certainly wasn't written with the planet's future in mind either. To cut aviation taxes just days before hosting COP26 has confirmed the UK Government's reputation as an international embarrassment.
"The negative effects of the pandemic are still being felt by families across the country. Far too many people have been forced into debt and have had to work multiple jobs on low pay just to make ends meet. Many of these workers have been hit hard by the Tories' cruel Universal Credit cut which these changes do little to mitigate.
"Unsurprisingly, there is nowhere near enough on the environment. The investment in green tech does not go far enough, and the plans to spend £21 billion on roads while cutting air passenger duty for domestic flights, as well as freezing fuel duty, take a wrecking ball to the UK's climate obligations when we are only days away from COP. The Tories are a clear and present danger to our planet.
"The minimum wage rise and spending increases that have been announced will not compensate for an increased inflation rate that even the Chancellor has said he is concerned about. The minimum wage should be set at a level above the poverty line, not below it and it should be the same for all workers, regardless of their age. It is long past time for young people to get equal pay for equal work.
"That is why Scotland must have full powers over our economy, so that we can invest in the services that we all rely on and end the scandal of poverty pay, with a higher and fairer living wage for all workers."