 Rwy'n gwybod i'r next item of business, a debate on motion 16170, in the name of Kate Forbes, on local government finance Scotland order 2019. Can I invite all members who wish to contribute to the debate to press their request to speak buttons as soon as possible? I call on Kate Forbes to speak to and move the motion. Thank you, Presiding Officer. The purpose of today's debate on the local government finance order is to seek Parliament's approval to the guaranteed allocations of revenue funding for individual local authorities for the next budget year. It also seeks agreement to the allocation of additional funding for 1819, which has been identified since the 18 order was approved this time last year. While elements of the debate and my speech will be quite technical, at the end of the day, this is about ensuring that local authorities can deliver real services for real people the length and breadth of the country. The 2020 budget delivers a fair settlement for local government under the most challenging of circumstances. The funding package in 2019-20 provides local government with a real-terms increase in both revenue and capital funding to invest in our public services and to deliver our key priority of sustainable economic growth in partnership with local authorities. In 2020, the Scottish Government will provide councils with a total funding package worth £11.2 billion. That includes revenue funding of £10.1 billion and support for capital expenditure of £1.1 billion. Today's order seeks Parliament's approval for the distribution and payment of £9.5 billion out of the revenue total of £10.1 billion. The remainder will be paid out as specific grant funding or other funding that will be distributed later, as agreed with COSLA. The overall funding package for next year includes an additional £90 million to protect spending on day-to-day services, as announced on 31 January as part of stage 1 of the budget bill. It includes an additional £40 million of support for social care for the implementation of the carers act and extending free personal care for under-65s. It includes a further £120 million from health to local government to support health and social care. It includes an additional £210 million of revenue and £25 million of capital to support the expansion of early learning education and childcare to 1140 hours by 2020. It also includes £88 million to maintain the people-teacher ratio and secure places for all probationers who require one. Lastly, the flexibility for local authorities to increase council tax levels by up to 3 per cent in real terms is worth an estimated £124 million. The settlement plus the other sources of income available to councils through the increase to the council tax means that the overall potential increase in spending power to support local authority services amounts to £621.4 million. There remains a further £62.5 million of revenue funding that will be distributed once the necessary information becomes available, and that will be included for approval in the 2020 order. The amounts are involved, yes, I will. For taking that intervention, the minister has given us a list of money available, but why is it the case that every single council is cutting millions of pounds off their budgets and, in some councils, making hundreds of people redundant? Of course, the member has voted against in stage 1 and stage 3 of this budget for additional resources going to local authorities. That is real money going to real people for real services, the length and breadth of the country. You do not need to believe me, but I believe that independent analysis from SPICE makes it clear that the overall funding going to local authorities is going up. I also look at the comments by the president of COSLA after stage 3 or stage 1, which welcomed the empowerment of local authorities as part of the budget. We make it clear that we work in partnership with COSLA and local authorities. We recognise that there are commitments and challenges that they have identified, and we have ensured that, in the funding package, there are the finances to deliver the many services that I have just outlined, whether that is expanding care to the under-65s, whether it is ensuring that we can expand early learning and childcare, or whether it is ensuring that they have the basic capital that they need to invest in infrastructure. As I said, there is undistributed revenue funding, and it is important that, when it comes to distributing that in terms of teachers induction schemes, discretionary housing payments, mental health, school counselling services, that we do that in conjunction with COSLA. In addition to the revenue funding contained within today's order, there is also specific revenue funding that is paid directly by the relevant policy areas under separate legislation, and that amounts to just over half a billion pounds, £507 million, including—and the members will be aware of this—a hundred and twenty million of pupil equity funding, £86.5 million for criminal justice social work funding, funding for early learning and childcare expansion for the northern ferries and for Gaelic funding as well. The order also seeks approval for changes to funding allocations for last year of £54.1 million, which have been added to fund a number of agreed spending commitments. I will. Obviously, we all understand that some council has to be at the bottom of the league table, but Aberdeen City Council is at the bottom of the league table and has been for a number of years. Could you give an indication of when you expect Aberdeen City Council to receive a fairer funding settlement that will move it off the bottom of this league table? Contrary, all local authorities receive their needs-based formula share of the total funding available from the Scottish Government. They keep every penny of non-domestic rates to ensure that there is adequate funding. Although every local authority probably has a unique case to make for why they believe that there should be additional funding, it is up to COSLA to consider the distribution methodology. If all local authorities can agree to revisit it, then that is a totally different question altogether. I am grateful to the minister and, of course, she is technically quite correct to say that councils keep every single penny of additional business rates income. Will she accept that the Government claws back every single penny of additional business rates income from the general revenue grant? I agree that it is technically correct to say that Aberdeen Council and every other council keep every penny of non-domestic rates. That is reflected in the funding settlement that they receive and that is reflected in the money that they have to deliver their core services. Every local authority has the ability to keep every penny of council tax and every penny of non-domestic rates. The general revenue grant reflects the commitment that local authorities keep their non-domestic rates. On capital funding, although not part of today's order, the settlement for local government includes £1 billion of capital budget, which is an increase of £207 million on last year or 24 per cent. That is a significant boost to support local authorities' investment in their schools, in their roads and in other infrastructure. I touch briefly on business rates, but the distributable amount of non-domestic rates income for 2020 has been set at £2.8 billion in 2020. I can confirm, as I have said before, that all local authorities will retain every single penny of non-domestic rates income that is collected in their area. The Scottish Government will continue to guarantee each local authority the combined general revenue grant plus non-domestic rates income. In conclusion, although today's debate can become quite technical, at the end of the day, it is ensuring that local authorities have the funding that they need to deliver the services that they need for the people of this country who rely on them day in, day out. I move the motion. I think that it is a motion to be moved in my name. Thank you very much. I call Murdo Fraser to be followed by James Kelly. Thank you, Presiding Officer. The local government finance order comes at the tail end of the budget process. We seem to have spent weeks debating the Scottish Government's tax and spending choices, and it might seem at this point in the process that there is not much new that we can add, but this is still an important part of the parliamentary process. The finance order before us allocates funding to each of Scotland's 32 local authorities. We do not intend to oppose the order, as to do so would simply be to deprive the local government of much-needed resources for the coming year. However, we have concerns about the overall allocation of cash to local councils. Let me start by being generous with the Scottish Government, because I am, as the chamber knows, a very fair-minded person. As a very fair-minded person, I accept, with one important caveat that I will come to, the basic proposition being put by the minister that overall support from the Scottish Government to local councils has increased compared to last year. According to SPICE, it is up by 1.1 per cent in real terms, amounting to some £110 million for revenue. Once the capital budget is included, the increase is 2.8 per cent in real terms or some £298.9 million. However, that is not the full story, as the Scottish Government well knows. Some of that additional money is ring-fenced for specific purposes and cannot be spent flexibly by local councils. Although the total budget has increased, the core budget, which councils have discretion on how to spend, is down on last year by 2.5 per cent or £230 million. Those are the figures from SPICE and they are indisputable. The Conservatives do not agree with that, so I am puzzled by your statement that you are not going to vote against it. If you did vote against it and it did not pass, the Government would simply bring a new order. I think that us abstaining on that is a reasonable position to take. The Liberal Democrats voted it down. I think that if all Parliament voted it down, the real danger that councils, whom in many cases have already set their budgets for the coming year, would be left in a black hole situation. I am not sure that voting it down is a particularly wise political tactic, but given that it has been put forward by the Liberal Democrats, it is not going to matter anyway. In a very fair-minded fashion, the overall spending picture is being a very fair-minded person. I am sure that the minister, who is equally fair-minded, will, in her winding up, accept the basic facts as I have set them out and the fact that the core grant is down. In case there is any doubt about that, we see that right across the country, all that you have to do is open any local newspaper in any part of the country and you will see councils having to make cuts. Cuts to the number of teachers, cuts to the length of the school week, cuts to school crossing patrollers, closures of public conveniences, closures of libraries, closures of leisure centres—those are choices, not being made likely by local councils, but choices that have been forced upon them by the Scottish Government. At the same time, councils are having to make choices about increasing taxes and charges. Let us not forget that we have a Scottish Government elected on a manifesto commitment not to increase the council tax above 3 per cent, and yet we now know that there are at least 11 councils across Scotland of all different political persuasions, now increasing their council tax by the maximum permitted of 4.79 per cent. Of course, we will. Could the member explain why Tory councillors across the country have supported the maximum council tax rises? Signally, I do not know if the minister has checked, but in the finance secretary's own local council, SNP-run Renfrewshire, they have increased the council tax by the maximum of 4.79 per cent. I am not going to criticise any council when they have been given the unpalatable choice of making a tax increase or cutting vital services or having to make that difficult choice when protecting the services that local people rely on. At the same time, councils are looking at what other revenue they might raise, for example from a tourist tax, which the SNP said that they would never introduce, or from the new car park tax, which would hit lowest earnest the hardest as a regressive form of taxation. There is a real concern from local government that if they decide not to introduce new charges, they will in future years be penalised by the Scottish Government for not doing so. It would be good to hear from the minister in her winding-up speech confirmation that the Scottish Government will not seek to claw back money from councils who have made the choice not to impose either a tourist tax or the car parking charge. This is all against the scenario where the Scottish Government's block grant from Westminster is up in real terms compared to last year, so there was no need for cuts of this order to local government having to be made and no need for these hard choices to be forced upon local authorities. We would have taken a different approach. I was very interested to see the finance secretary saying at the weekend that an independent Scotland would eliminate its deficit in a few years by growing the economy more quickly. That just gives rise to the question why it is not growing the economy more quickly now, given all the powers at its disposal. However, if the Scottish Government thinks that it can eliminate a deficit of £13 billion in a few years by growing the economy, it can hardly argue that it is unreasonable for us to argue that by growing the economy just a little bit faster than it is currently growing, we could generate additional tax revenues to provide better funding for local authorities. We should never forget that, in terms of the fiscal framework, it is our economic performance relative to the rest of the United Kingdom that is what matters. The Fiscal Commission's projections show that, for each of the next four years, economic growth in Scotland and the consequence income tax revenues are expected to lag behind the UK average. That means that we will have less money to spend, and that is why the focus on growing the economy is absolutely vital. As I said at the start, we will not oppose this order today, because we do not want to penalise local government. That does not mean that we support the funding settlement. It will have a negative impact on councils across Scotland, where we are seeing increased council tax, increased charges and poorer services, and the responsibility for that rests firmly at the door of the SNP Government. The minister in her opening statement tried to put a good gloss on the settlement that has been given to local government in terms of the figures that were presented. However, the reality is that the situation that local government faces is that, in spite of what money will be allocated as a result of today's order, local councils are facing increased responsibilities in terms of delivery on childcare and health and social care partnerships. What that means is that, in terms of core funding, day-to-day responsibilities that councils have had to deliver on year on year, those will be reduced by £230 million a year in real terms. The member seems to be criticising the increase in childcare. Can he confirm that he is opposed to the 1140 hours of childcare? He is inaccurate, Mr Mason. I merely described the situation where councils have increased responsibilities on childcare. What I was criticising was the decrease in core funding for £230 million. The reality of the situation is that the funding that has been allocated from the Government means that councils—you can see the evidence of that across the country—are having to make cuts in their budget. It is undermining some of the main policy commitments of the Government. We have a Government that is committed to jobs and growing the economy, something that Scottish Labour agrees with. However, analysis from Unison shows that, over a period since 2011, 30,000 jobs have been lost. That is 30,000 people, less people working in communities and contributing to local businesses and local shops and making a contribution. That is detrimental to the economy. In education, the Government and the First Minister have made great play of education being the number one priority, but we see in Dundee that the education budget has been cut by 3 per cent. That is going to reduce teacher numbers in that city council alone by 26. Added to that, if you look at Moray, for example, where there are going to be library closures and today, of all days, is a World Book Day. That undermines the educational effort in which the Government has been so keen to promote something that, again, the Scottish Labour supports. The Government is also keen, quite rightly, to support vulnerable people in Scotland. However, if you look at Clackmannanshire, for example, we are going to see the ending of support to the Citizens Advice Bureau and food banks undermining help to vulnerable people. Health and wellbeing is another big policy area for the Government, but we see in Moray that the sports development programme is going to be closed down. That undermines efforts in order to promote health and wellbeing and tackle issues such as obesity. On a number of key policy areas that the Scottish Government has set out, the local government settlement is going to undermine those who are seeking to make progress or achieving targets in those areas. Murdo Fraser pointed out that we are now reaching the end of the process. I think that it is useful to look at how we would move forward. Labour consistently, throughout the budget process, argued that we should be more progressive in terms of taxation. One of the things about this year's budget process is that it is the first year of the new budget process, which tries to take a longer-term view of the budget. It is fair to say that that is still set on in, but, in the year ahead, we need to avoid the approach where all the effort on the budget gets concerted and tenoured in between December and February. On that point, in terms of parties putting forward their own proposals, costing them being clear about the tax proposition, there is a lot of things in our budget. I imagine that the Labour Party might welcome some aspects of it. Are there elements? How do they suggest that we improve the budget process when it comes to party negotiations next year? The reality of the budget negotiation process this year is that the Government focused their efforts on the Greens, because it clearly concluded that that was the party that they were best placed to do a deal with. I met the cabinet secretary. I outlined what Labour's budget priorities were. I outlined areas in which I thought that tax should be more progressive in order to fund those priorities. However, the cabinet secretary only afforded me 10 minutes, and I just do not think that that is proper respect to the process. In terms of local government, we all need to acknowledge that, year on year, local government has been reduced, and that has made it difficult in local communities. If we want to adopt a different approach, which will help local government and the Scottish Government in terms of achieving its policy objectives, then the negotiations and discussions need to start earlier—I am certainly prepared to be a part of that—that the Government has to respect all the opposition parties in the Parliament and not simply just focus on it. I take the point, but the Government needs to respect the other parties that are having discussions. A 10-minute discussion is just simply disrespectful, and it is not taking the process seriously. Let us have a different approach from everyone next year. I thank James Kelly for his comments regarding the budget process and negotiations. As he will be well aware, I outlined some thoughts about that in the stage 3 debate, and I hope that we can work together perhaps not to ensure that all parties will support the budget next year, but we certainly give far greater prospect of the different priorities that different parties attach to the budget being secured. As Murdo Fraser said, it is an important debate. It comes at the end of the process, but we are being asked to approve an order that allocates almost £9.5 billion to local government money, which will, as the cabinet secretary said, be used to deliver a wide range of vital public services from education to social care leisure, recreation, transport and housing. As members know, following last year's budget, Greens made it very clear that no negotiations could take place this year, unless there was, first of all, a serious, credible and substantive process begun to increase the financial autonomy of local authorities, to reform local taxation, shift the balance of funding from the centre to the local, and put in place the same sort of fiscal framework that exists between the UK and Scotland in relation to devolved budgets in place for local government. That is why, in the 21st of February last year, we wrote to the First Minister to outline why we need local tax reform. It is why, last March, we published a paper outlining what a fiscal framework for local government might look like, and it is also why I will be introducing a bill to Parliament to incorporate the European Charter for local self-government into Scots law. It is also why we will be supporting the motion today, since we agreed a deal with the Scottish Government to do so, and in any event to vote against the motion is to deny revenue support to local government. Following Greens' engagement with the budget process, the settlement mitigates some of the cuts to the general revenue grant and distributable NDR that had been planned. It does not eliminate them, but that was not for want of trying. Those years' negotiations were genuinely difficult, but those parties, with alternative ideas about how things could realistically have turned out differently, need to reflect on how much effort was made and what they might have achieved that we could not. However, I would stress that that is not a funding allocation that we would like to be voting for. It is fundamentally wrong that so much of the revenue and capital budgets of local government is determined by this Parliament. In 2014, Cossola's commission on strengthening local democracy published its final report in which it argued that, and I quote, the case for much stronger local democracy is found in the simple premise that it is fundamentally better for decisions about those aspirations to be made by those that are most affected by them. If that is a familiar argument, I am sure that the minister will recognise it from the 2014 independence debate, when much of the same argument was made by those on the yes side in relationship to Scottish independence. However, now, for more than 50 years, local democracy in Scotland has been eroded to the point where Scotland is now one of the least democratic countries in Europe, with the weakest structure of local governance and with the least fiscal freedom. Across most European countries, at least 50 per cent of the budget of municipalities and communes is raised locally, delivering a sense of accountability that is entirely missing in Scotland, where the local politicians who make the decisions about raising and spending money are the politicians that you elect to local government and that you meet on a daily basis on the street in the shops in the school playground. It is particularly an affront to local democracy that the limited and regressive tax power that it has, the council tax, remains the most regressive tax in the UK based on a tax based last assessed 25 years ago and with rate capping in place that, in my view, is unlawful and would not be allowed in most other European countries. I do not feel comfortable sitting in this Parliament and voting on how much money local government should receive, but we are where we are, we reached a deal and we will be supporting the order at decision time. Willie Rennie to be followed by Kenneth Gibson Thank you, Presiding Officer. This year was supposed to mark significant movement on the reform of local government finance. It was supposed to empower local councils. It was supposed to mark the end of harsh budgets. It was supposed to mark the end of the council tax, yet the council tax has not been scrapped. It has been increased. That is the green party folly number one in this budget process. The budgets for councils were set to be cut by £230 million as a result of this budget. The green said that it could be fixed with £90 million. Social care budgets are even under threat to the tune of £50 million. Apparently, it is flexibility, but it could be a cut to social care. Green party folly number three. I will take one second. What was the supposed new tax powers dressed up as reform, the grandest folly of them all? Handing councils a bunch of taxes that they do not want, that will not work, that will not raise the money that they need, is certainly not reform. It is another example of this Government treating councils with disrespect. The Greens have sold out local government because they are too afraid to stand up to their allies in the SNP. I will take an intervention. He mentioned at the beginning of his contribution the council tax. He is well aware that the council tax is defined in law. It will require primary legislation to get rid of it. There was never any prospect that the budget would scrap the council tax. What the budget deal has done is to reach an agreement that I hope Willie Rennie and his party will join us in sitting down and agreeing a future that can lead to published legislation with a commitment to legislate in two and a half years' time. Willie Rennie predicts what I was going to raise. The Greens sold out for a ropey promise. It was nothing more than a ropey promise on local government finance reform, but there is no commitment from the SNP—absolutely no commitment. It is a promise to hold yet more talks to do some work that new legislation might be possible possibly after the next election if there is a possible agreement. If that is a cast iron agreement, I think that it is particularly rusty. I think that the Greens should be ashamed that they have been sold out on this and that they have accepted this deal. Not just now. The SNP and the Greens tell us that they have got more money for local government, but if that is the case, why is SNP-run Dundee Council increasing the cost of Brexit clubs from £1.25 to £10 a week? If there is more money for councils, why is Conservative-run Murray Council charging families £370 for school transport? If there is more money for councils, why is SNP-run Fife Council slashing education spending by millions of pounds? If local government settlement is so good, why is SNP-run Falkirk Council increasing charges for childcare and social care meals? I will take an intervention from the minister. I was just going to ask what the Lib Dems have delivered in two and a half years of this Parliament through the budget. The Greens have delivered a lot more than the Lib Dems have. The Greens have sold out local government. Liberal Democrats have stood up for a variety of different things, including making sure that mental health services are the top priority despite the Government's opposition to that proposition. The Greens have sold out for that ropey promise on local government financial reform. I can tell the minister today that, of course, we will work together for change. We want to see the end of the council tax. We want local government financial reform, where councils have the freedom to raise the majority of the money that they spend, just like Collarwood. However, we refuse to be duped again. We wasted our time in the last talking shop, where the SNP ignored 16 out of the 19 recommendations. Only if the SNP set out precisely what they are prepared to support, and if that support is for substantial change, will we sit down and take part. We have talked endlessly over the past decade and we have seen nothing for it. The SNP has shown no signs of changing, and it is about time that they recognise that. If I could finally return to Aberdeen and Edinburgh, my favourite subject of the last few financial settlements for councils. We were promised that Aberdeen and Edinburgh would have 85 per cent, at least, of the average of national spending for councils. For years, the SNP flouted that promise and that commitment. It provided money for Edinburgh and Aberdeen that was below 85 per cent. What did the SNP do? It did not give more money to Edinburgh and Aberdeen. It fiddled with the figures. It changed the formula. It took the highest spending councils out, so now that the average is now lower. That is a con for Aberdeen and Edinburgh, and the SNP and the Greens should be ashamed of it. Kenneth Gibson, to be followed by Tom Mason. Thank you, Presiding Officer. Today, Parliament will, I trust, approve guarantee 2019-20 revenue funding allocations for local authorities, ensuring that we deliver on the settlement reached through work, undertaking all three stages of the Scottish budget process. The Scottish Government has been pushed towards ever more difficult choices when it comes to public spending and finance, thanks to successive Labour, coalition and Tory UK governments whose cuts have ensured we now have a budget £2 billion less in real terms than in 2010. It is in that challenging context that, in 2019-20, the Scottish Government will provide councils with funding of £11.2 billion, a £287.5 million or 2.9 per cent increase on this year, and will add £54.1 million to this year's current funding. That will allow councils to continue delivering front-line services to the most vulnerable people in their communities, ranging from health and social care to transport, environmental health, leisure, recreation, housing and education. Funding includes an additional £88 million to maintain pupil-teacher ratios, £25 million capital to fulfil our commitment to expanding LLN childcare to 140 years by 2020, and £50 million new town centre fund to support economic improvement in our towns and drive inclusive growth. Council tax at Band-D in the current year is £453 on average less than in England, and from April will be £456 a year on average less than south of the border. Those are some examples of how the Scottish Government is determined not just to maintain the status quo, but to build a fairer and better Scotland. Of course, some members would rather exclude some funding from their calculations, however important day-to-day services such as nursery provision should never be considered to be anything else. The finance order means that the resource and capital available to North Ayrshire Council will increase my £26.66 million from £279.842 million to £306.502 million and a 9.5 per cent uplift. In Cunningham North, my constituents will also benefit from increased health spending as NHS Ayrshire Nan's budget increases 3.6 per cent to £720 million. The 2019 budget also seeks to empower local authorities, for example with the power to apply a transient visitor levy. The Convention of Scottish Local Authorities made a strong case for councils to have this power. It was a key issue for the Greens. While an amendment to the Transport Scotland Bill will enable local authorities to exercise a workplace parking levy and the devolution of empty property rates relief to local authorities delivers more fiscal freedom so that decisions can be made closer to communities. In recognition of the need for longer-term budget stability for local authorities, the Scottish Government is also committed to working with COSR to move towards three of budget settlements from 2020-21. That will furnish councils with the ability to pursue more long-term sustainable financial planning. When asked Cabinet Secretary for Communities and Local Government Aileen Campbell MSP last week about Scottish Government action to protect local government from the near collapse that experienced in England Wales, she pointed out that, while councils in England Wales faced real-terms budget cuts of 28 per cent between 2011 and 2018, we have sought to treat local government fairly. In Cardiff, population third of a million, this week the Labour council cut 55 jobs to add to the 1,632 lost in the last seven years. It will cut a further 93 million from its budget over the next three years, adding to the 218 million cut over the last decade. It will also put the council tax up by 4.9 per cent in April. We would say that Tory austerity is to blame, but even when the Welsh Labour Government is forced to reduce council budgets, I still expect Labour MSPs to blame the SNP Government. It is grossly hypocritical for Labour and Tory MSPs to claim SNP ministers are squeezing Scottish councils when their own parties are crippling local authorities in England Wales. Presiding Officer, strong and stable is perhaps a much maligned phrase in recent years, but stability that we have delivered. A local authority settlement that delivers certainty to our public services cannot be underestimated at a time when the UK Tory government appears to be self-destructing. We are using our powers in a progressive way to protect and invest in our public services, boosting funding for north-easter council and across Scotland. That means greater resources for our schools, hospitals and all the vital services that should protect some of the most vulnerable in our communities. By voting for the finance order 2019, we will vote to protect Scotland's local government services and its recipients. Presiding Officer, first of all, I declare an interest as an Aberdeen City councillor. In a year where the Scottish Government has more money to spend on public services in real terms, the situation that is faced by local authorities is difficult to say the least. Across the board, the councils are facing funding gaps. These are not just numbers on a page, they are people's jobs and services on which we rely. It must be mentioned that the lack of a revised financial circular before our debate seriously hampers the ability of this Parliament and MSPs from across all parties to scrutinise decisions by the Scottish Government in a proper and effective way. It is not acceptable, and I urge ministers to review the way in which the process operates before the MSP reaches its budget deal with the Greens next year. However, we must work with the figures that are available. According to the version of the financial circular that we have, every single councillor in Scotland faces a reduction in their revenue support grant. Every single one is, apart from renverture. I forgot what constituency the financial secretary represents, but I am sure that that does not really matter. In any case, the information that we have indicates a cut to the discretionary spending made available to councils from this Government, down from nearly £6.8 billion last year to just over £6.6 billion this year. I reiterate, for the benefit of the chamber, the Scottish Government has more money to spend than last year, therefore cuts to local authorities are not just entirely avoidable. They have only come about for the political choice of the SNP Government. It is rich indeed to say that councils are a priority, but to leave places like Aberdeen City in my own region facing cuts of £41 million in one year. That had to be decided just last few days. That is just to stand still. It would have been better if we could have kept the non-dibystic rate of £28 million. You will let us have £28 million, will you? Through the chair, please. I will comment through the chair. I may have asked the minister to make sure that, if something up she guarantees, we get the £28 million back. The resulting cuts were more than 200 jobs lost and cuts to community organisations such as Sport, Aberdeen, Visit Aberdeenshire and Aberdeen performing arts. One of the proposed savings was even cutting £2,000 by reducing colour photocopying. Local authorities have taken back to the black and white era, because the SNP Government will not fund local councils properly. It was unfortunate then that, when faced with such general budget cuts, the minister responsible for sporting local government was missing in action. Even for his own area, his silence was, unfortunately, deafening. It is not sufficient to take an axe to central revenue funding and then to invent some new and unparatable tax ideas, such as the hated carpax tax, so that councils can take the hit in cleaning up the mess made by the Government. We will not oppose this order today, but ministers should not mistake that for endorsement their understanding of local government is a story of cuts to public services and only because this Government took the conscious decision to make them necessary. However, simply presiding out for the Scotland deserves better, vital local services need a funding settlement that recognises their needs rather than being treated as an afterthought. In time, I hope that ministers will be able to do that. I hope that ministers will be able to do that, and I hope that ministers will be able to do that. In time, I hope that ministers will be able to take responsibility for the mess that they have created. Lewis MacDonald to be followed by Maureen Watt. Today's debate marks the final conclusion of the annual budget process for local government funding, but, as members have said, it is the tough decisions that councils have had to make up and down the land that are the real-life outcomes of the process. Local councillors are rightly accountable to their electorates for the decisions that they make, but this year, once again, those decisions are largely about what cuts to make to which services, rather than how to grow or enhance the services that councils provide. That is a very limited accountability. Responsibility for the larger decisions on local government finance lie here, and that is why this debate can never be a mere formality. If the funding that ministers choose to provide means cuts to services or to jobs, then ministers, as well as councillors, have to be accountable for those cuts. This year's settlement also highlights wider issues around accountability of local councils to local people. Year on year, ministers have reduced central government's contribution to local government funding, but they have failed to loosen their grip on local government's ability to make their own decisions. In my home city of Aberdeen, local council taxpayers, local business ratepayers and citizens paying fees and charges for council services now contribute a whopping 87 per cent of the city council's revenue budget. There is a case to be made for councils to be self-sufficient. The problem here is that, despite being funded almost entirely from local resources, the city council still cannot make its own funding and spending decisions in full. When an additional £28 million comes in from non-domestic rates, none of the benefit stays in the city, as the minister has acknowledged. Every single penny is clawed back through a reduction in the general revenue grant. That is the context in which the general revenue grant for Aberdeen this coming year has been cut by a third in a single year and is now in a par with the smallest mainland and island councils, rather than with Scotland's other cities. Despite those challenges, I am delighted that Aberdeen City Council this week was able to protect the community projects supported by the fairer Aberdeen fund and rejected the suggestion of making savings at the expense of staff terms and conditions. Those were the right choices to make in the face of a multimillion-pound funding gap, but tough choices still are to be made and some options remain effectively closed off by Scottish ministers. Take one example. Aberdeen City Council owns the largest fleet of hydrogen-powered buses in Europe, but those buses are operated by private companies. The council would like to have the option of creating its own bus company, but ministers have so far refused to contemplate a public bus company competing with private operators in spite of amendments being tabled to that effect to the transport world. Visit Aberdeenshire has been mentioned that it is an effective, innovative and well-respected agency that promotes city as well as shire, and I am sorry that its funding from the city council will be cut to avoid other cuts elsewhere. However, that funding gap could have been filled by a transient visitor levy had that been in place by now. If only ministers had not spent so long resisting a tourist in a moment, even though that was strongly supported by so many members of the minister's own party in local government. We are already over time, I am afraid, so minister, if you wish it to be moved from your own time. Yes, it was just a very quick one. Why then did the member vote against the budget and the agreement with the Greens, which would have enabled Aberdeen to get that? Because the minister has acknowledged that in real terms the money that is being provided by her Government to the council is clawed back in another way. We all recognise the need for local government funding to be reformed both in relation to council tax and business rates. More than that, the whole relationship between central and local government must be revisited so that councils either get the funding that they need from the centre or have the freedom to make their own decisions, preferably both. At the moment, a dynamic and progressive council like Aberdeen has neither the funds nor the freedom that it needs, and that must change if we are to have truly accountable and effective local government in the future. We are already over time, due warning. I probably have to cut the closing speeches. Last of the open debate contributions is from Maureen Watt. I am pleased to be taking part in this short debate this afternoon to confirm the cash settlement for local government this year, which will see an increase of £287.5 million in cash terms, a 2.9 per cent increase, bringing the total revenue spend for local government to £11.2 billion, which is almost a third of the total Scottish budget. It also delivers an increase in capital spend of £207.6 million, which is a 23.7 per cent increase, in all a budget £620 million higher than it is currently. That is done against a backdrop of continuing austerity, which we must not forget, is a political choice of the Westminster Tory Government. Indeed, it is introduced when it was in coalition with the Liberal Democrats, and we know that it hits those who can least afford it most. We have been told that austerity is about to end, but we have not seen a single bit of evidence of that. There is much nonsense spread around local government funding, and it was perpetrated by Mike Rumbles again today. I do not know how many times in this chamber the minister has reiterated that councils retain all the monies raised in non-domestic rates and that this has taken into account in the local government settlement and the distribution to individual local authorities. I have heard that this should not be taken into account, but we only hear that it should not be taken into account when income from this source is rising, not when it is in falling. It is absolutely essential that the Scottish Government can use its powers to deliver equity across the country. Of course, the Scottish Government, along with COSLA, keeps the distribution formula under constant review. I hope that the minister can confirm that the distribution formula indicators are updated every year to ensure that each local authority receives its fair share of total available funding. I have not seen any indication recently from COSLA for a desire to change the formula. Indeed, once a few years ago, at a COSLA meeting in Aberdeen City and Aberdeenshire, I could not even agree to support each other to bring that forward. When we talk about a funding floor, that was fought for by my late colleague Brian Adam and was implemented by the SNP administration, not in the previous Liberal Democrat to Labour administration. Yes, of course. Lewis MacDonald? Does more than what mention the 85 per cent funding floor? Does she acknowledge that this year the funding settlement for Aberdeen City Council is at 81 per cent of the national average? I acknowledge that the percentage change in Aberdeen City Council is an increase of 5.7 per cent for Aberdeenshire 4.34 per cent when the Scottish average is 4.03 per cent. I think that people of Aberdeen City Council can see that they have had a higher increase than the average. After that, it is up to local authorities themselves how to spend the money. I do not know if the Tories, Labour and Liberal Democrats read what comes into their inbox and read the public sector online, which every day shows that councils south of the border are facing bankruptcy and we have not got that in Scotland. I hope that the minister will agree that it ill-behaves Aberdeen City Council administration of Tories and excluded from Labour party councillors to moan about their settlement when they continue to mismanage their funds. For example, their council debt repayments are £42 million, an increase of £9 million this year alone. They have been unable to keep projects within budget, the broad-strait redesign, and the luck side of Canterbury. I could go on and on, and an eight million overspend on union terrace gardens before they have even started. That is what Aberdeen City residents face. We now move to the closing speeches. I call Alex Rowley. No more than four minutes, please. I was first elected to five regional council back in 1990 and became the chair of the finance on 1994 and then the leader of five council. Over all those years, what I have seen is local government becoming much more efficient and much more effective. Key to the way that local government works is that the finances and the budgets are linked to the policies and to the strategies so that you know what it is that you are actually focusing your spend on. I am not sure that the same could be said for the Scottish Government, who has a budget of around £37 billion. Within that budget, I think that there is room to start to look at how effective and efficient the budget is being spent and how it is contributing to the strategies and policies that the Scottish Government says are its priorities. There are many examples of that. We have strategies and legislation. I believe that, as James Kelly says, the budget decisions undermine a lot of those strategies and legislation. You have legislation on child poverty targets. We have seen fuel poverty targets coming forward. The Government says that closing the educational attainment gap is a key priority, yet, as Willie Rennie says, in £5 million are being stripped out of secondary education budgets right now. Tell teachers, pupils and parents that there is a real-terms increase to the budgets and that they will not be left there. Two quick points. First, on the local government's out-turn figures of 17 and 18, it should quite clearly show that the education figures of spend were up. Secondly, in terms of this year's budget, there is much talk about a real-terms increase to our budget, but we have passed that on to health, which means a cut to every other area. What would the Labour Party suggest that we do in terms of the efficiency of the Scottish Government process? Where would we find the money to do all that the Labour Party wants to do? I will give you up to four and a half minutes. I will come back to that point, but the first point I have made is that, in real terms, the budget has increased. As Derek Mackay acknowledged when he came to the local government committee, the Scottish Government has brought forward £400 million of new spending commitments that local authorities have had to pick up. That is why the core budget has received a cut. However, rather than politicians arguing back and forward this room about whether it is a cut or an increase, the fact is that, out there in the doorsteps across the Holy Scotland, people themselves are seeing the cuts to local government services. They are experiencing the cuts to local government services, so they do not have to listen to politicians going back and forward in here with those arguments. James Kelly has said that, let us try and learn from this, let us move forward from this and let us look at how the parties in here can come together. Let us look at how we can have some meaningful debate and discussion and how we can ask the question, is the Scottish Government expenditure of £37 billion being spent in the most effective and efficient way? Is that expenditure actually tuned in to the strategic goals and objectives of the Government when it comes to tackling poverty, when it comes to increasing educational opportunity? The answer that I would have to say from a local government perspective is no, it is not. Those council cuts are impacting on the ability to deliver the very strategies that you have put forward. Let us get some kind of consensus at the end of the process, and that consensus can be, as Andy Wightman says, look at the process of how this Parliament reaches its conclusions on the budget, and let us start to work together, because that is what the people of Scotland want. They want an end to the cuts to front-line services, they want investment in their communities. We can do that if we start to look at working together on a budget process, and that is the challenge that I think the minister and the cabinet secretary need to address. As my colleague Murdo Fraser indicated in his opening remarks, we will not be opposing today's local government finance order, but it is absolutely clear that this is to ensure that councils receive their funding and certainly does not mean that we agree with the content far from it. As I have mentioned many times before in this chamber, the Scottish Government's attitude towards local government has been one of disrespect and contempt, while funding from the Scottish Government from the UK has increased the SNP continue with their programme. Time is tight, I want to make some progress. Despite repeated cuts on the core budget, councils are still being asked to do more. A report in the Herald in January this year suggested that 58 per cent of funding for councils was now ring-fenced. While ring-fenceding is to be protected in many ways and we rely on education, childcare, health and social care, it means that funding reductions are being dealt with across other areas. Cultural roads, economic development planning are all being hit. It is quite unbelievable that the spending that we have is ensuring that many of those functions are being eroded and removed. The local government benchmarking framework shows that, in 2010, 11 and 1718, there was 22 per cent reduction in culture and leisure services, a 34 per cent reduction in planning budgets, a 15 per cent reduction in spending on roads and a 10 per cent reduction in environmental services. Those have massive impacts on communities across Scotland. It is difficult to know what the full impact on non-ring-fencing in the current situation is. The taxpayer wanted a fair deal. The minister talked about having a fair settlement, but they did not get a fair settlement. What they have is that they pay more and they get less. The SNP has simply passed the buck to local authorities to make up their funding shortfall by raising taxes, increasing fees and charges. As I have said before, they are paying more to get less. New taxes, as we have already heard today, have been introduced by the car park taxing levy. The tourism tax will be introduced. That can be seen most clearly. The SNP has broke its own 2016 election manifesto pledge that allowed councils to raise council tax beyond the 3 per cent cap. Many councils have suggested that the reduction in core funding has forced them into proposing increases beyond the 3 per cent, and that is directly at the best of this Government. In some cases, council taxes have increased by the new maximum by 4.79 per cent, while it comes to local government, the SNP is taking with one hand, but it is asking councils also to take with the other. Councils have been forced to borrow more from the capital projects, which, overall, the level of council debt across Scotland is increasing to £15.1 billion by the end of this financial year. That was an increase of 4.3 per cent on the previous financial year. That leads to increased borrowing costs and puts yet more pressure on already difficult revenue budget situations. The funding settlement is neither fair nor necessary one. While funding for the Scottish Government has increased, core funding for councils has decreased. The present crisis for the local government finances is entirely the SNP's making and is one that they are forcing councils and councillors to take the blame for the Scottish Government's cuts. As I have said, the Scottish Conservatives will not oppose today's order, not because it is a good one but because it ensures local government at least to get something from this deal. Education, tourism, culture, social care and leisure planning have all been affected. In my own region, person can rise, Stirling, Fife, Clackmannan—all of them are suffering from this Government's cuts—and they believe that they are being sold out. Many constituents whom I meet across my region are telling me that. I cannot take on board that the SNP Government here today believes that it is a fair and certain one because it is not. I call Kate Forbes to close this debate for five minutes. Thank you, Presiding Officer. I think that it has been a good debate and I am delighted that this is the last one of the budget process, so congratulations to us all for getting to this point. However, as we much talk about the overall quantum overall funding that is going to local authorities and for the Opposition parties to make their point about cuts, they have got to deliberately exclude ring-fenced funding that presents a distorted picture of the resources that are available to local councils. That is real money to be spent on real day-to-day services, for example, in our schools and in our nurseries. Those are areas that councillors and COSLA identified as areas of challenge, and we have ensured that there is funding available. It is important to view the settlement package as a whole. SPICE has confirmed that it provides an increase in local government day-to-day spending for local services in cash terms and in real terms. I am grateful to the minister for giving away. If the situation is as rosy as she just paints, why is it that in every local paper in the land we hear about the sort of cuts that we have heard about in the chamber this afternoon from all different members, where councils are having to make really, really tough choices about cutting what people would regard as vital services? I thank the member for that question, and I am certainly not trying to present a totally rosy picture. I said in my opening statement that those are challenging financial circumstances. For result, it is a challenging financial circumstance for the Scottish Government. As I said, there is talk about the Scottish Government's budget going up. If you remove the health uplift, the Scottish Government's fiscal resource block grant funding goes down by £340 million, or 1.3 per cent, in real terms. That means that we have to make difficult decisions when it comes to other areas, but we have ensured that we protect local government funding and we ensure that, in terms of core services, they have the spending that they need to be able to deliver those core services. We have treated local government fairly, yes. Andy Wightman For taking intervention, is it not somewhat contradictory to argue that, on the one hand, if you ring-fence Barnett consequentials, it means a cut to the Scottish budget and yet not reply the same argument to the Scottish revenue grant for local authorities? Kate Forbes No, I do not think that it is—I do not know what the word you used was—but I think that when it comes to the areas of challenge that we have got, we recognise that health is a challenge. We are delighted to pass on the health consequentials to the health service, but it does mean that when it comes to the other finances that we have available, we have got to make sure that we use it well and wisely and that we work in partnership with local authorities to deliver the services that the people of Scotland expect us to deliver. There is talk, too, about the 85 per cent floor in Aberdeen and in Edinburgh. We, of course, were the Government that introduced the 85 per cent funding floor, and all local authorities receive 85 per cent of the Scottish average revenue funding per head. When it comes to ensuring that every local authority, every part of this country gets a fair deal, we want to make sure that that is why all local authorities receive their needs-based formula share of the total funding that is available from the Scottish Government. There have been a few points made about council tax, and it is important to note that those increases come after a 10-year freeze in order to protect families, and the rises this year are still, on average, lower than the rises in council tax that are being seen in England. In terms of a challenging fiscal environment, we have tried to protect local authorities, we have tried to ensure that they get their fair share of funding, and we have tried to ensure that the services that people rely on are protected. Of course, there has been much talk, too, about actions to empower local authorities. When it comes to this budget, we have agreed that we will consult on a number of different actions to empower local authorities, which is perhaps the most significant empowerment of local authorities since devolution. That includes a locally determined transient visitor levy, and it includes an amendment to the transport bill. It includes the devolution of non-domestic rates, empty property relief, and it also will include cross-party talks on replacing the current council tax. However, I want to conclude with a point about the process, which was well made by James Kelly and well made by Alec Rowley. My request to the other parties is that, if they want a better process next year, they can commit to bringing forward sensible, costed proposals that we can all consider well and early in the process, and that would certainly improve the process from the Government's perspective. That concludes the debate on local government finance, Scotland Order 2019 draft. It is now time to move on to the next item of business. If you could find your seats quickly, please.