The Scottish Government budget was voted down yesterday in a 64-65 defeat (I thought last nights Utd-Celtic game was going to end up the same score).
If the Budget doesn’t go through at the next vote, it will mean that Scotland will have to accept last years budget which is a cut of £1.8bn or in other words about 5%. That’s not acceptable in the middle (or maybe just the start) of the worst recession for many a year.
Of course the government would have to resign and we pick a new one, which I doubt would be a success for those who voted down the budget. So who voted against?
Labour: 46
Lib Dems: 16
Greens: 2
Presiding Officer: 1
Seems pretty clear who voted this down/who is to blame… Unless you are the editor of a “Scottish” newspaper…
Headline in the Scotsman:
Salmond puts SNP ‘on election footing’ after Budget defeat by Greens.
“PATRICK Harvie, joint leader of the smallest party at Holyrood, yesterday brought down Scotland’s entire £33 billion Budget, plunging the SNP government into chaos.
At the end of a day of extraordinary drama in the chamber of the Scottish Parliament, the Green MSP voted down the Budget because of a technical dispute over funding.”
The headline in the Daily Record
Crisis for Alex Salmond as £33bn budget gets the boot
ALEX Salmond was last night facing his biggest crisis as First Minister after MSPs voted down his budget. The SNP government’s £33billion spending plans were thrown out after Green MSPs rejected a last-minute deal.
I’m not even going to print here what the Sun says…
