 We turn now to topical questions, and we have one question today. It's from Bruce Crawford. To ask the Scottish Government what its response is to the UK budget. Cabinet Secretary, Derek Mackay. Yesterday's UK budget failed to live up to the Prime Minister's commitment to end austerity, with the continuation of UK welfare reforms and less funding than had previously been promised to Scotland. It is a budget of broken promises and falls short on the £600 million commitment to the NHS. The Scottish Government has already set out plans to support the NHS in the years to come, but has already identified a £50 million shortfall in the funding uplift for 2019-20 that was promised by the Tory UK Government only four months ago. There was little in the way of new funding for our wider public services, and even including the NHS funding uplift, Scotland's resource block grant will still be almost £2 billion lower in real terms in 2019-20 than it was in 2010-11, i.e., when the Tories came into office. Bruce Crawford. Does the cabinet secretary agree with me that, although there are elements of the budget that should be given a cautious welcome, it's also equally true that, pointingly, the chancellor failed to respond to the very legitimate concerns of the waspy women from the 1950s who feel cheated and betrayed by the UK Government in regard to their pensions. Does he agree that the chancellor also failed to address the fundamental flaws in the miserable universal credit system, particularly as new analysis by the resolution foundation today has shown that three quarters of the £12 billion cuts to social security announced by the UK Government in 2015 will remain in place after yesterday's budget? First of all, the chancellor could have gone much further in terms of stimulating the economy, giving justice to the waspy women and investing in public services, and he could have done so while staying within his own fiscal mandate and his own fiscal targets. According to the OBR, he had a fiscal headroom of around £15.4 billion and has chosen to keep that in reserve rather than spend it in a way that he could have done there above. I do say it is galling that, in this climate, the chancellor has chosen not to give justice to the waspy women. More than two million women paid their national insurance contributions throughout their lives in the expectation that they would receive their state pension and receive that at a certain age only for the goalpost to have been moved by the UK Government. In relation to welfare, the Tories continue their pernicious welfare policies and in terms of tax, the independent analysis from the resolution foundation reveals that overall impact of Tory tax and benefit policies will once again help the rich at the expense of the poor with the poorest fifth of households set to be £400 a year, worse off by 2023-24, while the richest fifth are set to gain £390 a year. Bruce Crawford. In regard to income tax, the chancellor also announces his intention to raise the higher-rate threshold to £50,000 earlier than expected. Given that decisions on the higher-rate threshold are devolved to this Parliament, the chancellor's plans do not apply in Scotland. Therefore, people are asking what is the Scottish Government's position on this matter and when will we make it clear what his Government's intentions are in regard to the higher-rate threshold? Of course, in essence I will make that clear in the Scottish budget as a presenter on 12 December, but I take some pride in the fact that I have been finance secretary that has ensured that we have the fairest income tax system anywhere in the United Kingdom and for a majority of people they pay less tax and this is the lowest tax part of the UK. The Tories have once again chosen tax cuts for the richest in society and we will choose a fairer, a more progressive path. I will set out the details in the Scottish budget on 12 December. For information, there are seven members who have indicated that they would like to ask questions. First is Dean Lockhart. Despite what we have just heard, this is a UK budget that delivers for the people of Scotland. The cabinet secretary himself acknowledged yesterday that the Scottish Government's future budget will be increasing as a result of the UK budget. In fact, this UK budget will deliver £1 billion in additional funding to Scotland as a result of Barnett consequentials, £550 million of additional resource for Scotland's NHS, £43 million of additional spending for Scotland's high streets, £41 million of additional funding to fix pothholes across Scotland. Let me ask the cabinet secretary this. Does he welcome the £1 billion of additional funding coming to Scotland from the UK Conservative Government? Will he follow the chancellor's lead and invest the additional £43 million for Scotland's struggling high streets? Can he guarantee today that every penny of the £550 million coming to Scotland as a result of record NHS spending will be spent on Scotland's NHS? Last year, at the Tory party conference, it was the staging that fell apart. This year, it is the Tory party prime minister's commitment to end austerity that is falling apart. No, I do not welcome the figures that have been announced by the chancellor because it represents just putting NHS aside for one moment real-terms reductions for the rest of Scotland's public services. In relation to the national health service, the Tories promised £600 million, and within four months have already shortchanged the NHS in Scotland by £50 million. It does not undo the damage of the last eight years of Tory government. It does not undo the £2 billion real-terms reduction that we have endured. It does not undo the pernicious welfare reform that is pushing so many people into poverty. No, I do not welcome that. The Pothole Fund south of the border will not fill in the huge crater that has been created by the economic and regulatory mismanagement and the Brexit bungling that is going to cost this whole country dear. James Kelly, to be followed by Patrick Harvie. Thank you, Presiding Officer. The Cabinet Secretary must accept that under this SNP Government, public services are in crisis. It is demonstrated by the fact that NHS patients are stranded on waiting lists, not able to get the treatment they deserve, and the fact that thousands of teachers go to the streets on Saturday to demand a fair pay settlement. Will the cabinet secretary use his Scottish budget to reverse the chronic underfunding of public services and alleviate the pain being piled on local communities? Cabinet secretary. I will deliver a balanced and competent budget compared to the incompetence that I saw from the Labour Party last year. What is really interesting is that, as I have heard from Shadow Chancellor John MacDonald, he will not even overturn the Tory tax cuts for the richest in society. The Labour Party is going to accept the Tory tax proposal. I think that the Labour Party communications system has broken down in the same way that their calculator never worked in the first place. In relation to more money for the NHS, we are allocating more than the Labour Party proposed at the last Scottish Parliament elections. In relation to local government, we are giving more than the Labour Party gives while they are in power in Wales. In relation to the pay-up lift, we departed from the public sector pay cap even though the chancellor didn't fund it. Although we are in Labour Party, our empower will only lift it if the chancellor pays for it. All talk with the SNP you get real action and real investment in our public services. Patrick Harvie is fulfilled by Willie Rennie. That should have been not only a budget to end austerity but to repair the harm done by austerity. It should have been a budget to respond to the climate emergency. Instead, yet again, we see a UK Government giving away the biggest tax cuts to the richest. People are continuing to pursue recklessly an unsustainable economy. Will the Scottish Government acknowledge that it needs to respond not only by providing the resources that local communities need but the powers that they need as well to be able to invest for the future? Will the cabinet secretary give a commitment that we will continue the progress toward a fairer tax system for Scotland? Cabinet Secretary. What Patrick Harvie is referring to is the wider discussion around reform and local authorities. My door is open to that dialogue. I have described that and I am open to constructive suggestion in that regard. I agree with Patrick Harvie in the regressive nature of this UK budget and how it has failed to invest in our public services and stimulate the economy. It is absurd that the chancellor has in reserve £15.4 billion that could have been unleashed to help stimulate our economy invest in our public services undo some of the pernicious welfare reforms that the Tory party has hammering the poor with and has chosen not to. I agree with Patrick Harvie that we should continue to look further as to how we can use our powers to ensure that we get the fairest deal possible for all of Scotland's public services and in relation to climate change of course we have to look at the spend that we are undertaking to ensure that we can make that transition to a low-carbon economy. Willie Rennie to be followed by Ruth Maguire. With the head to the economy and others in the threat to future investment it is Brexit that casts a dark shadow over this budget. The chancellor is even now openly talking about an emergency budget in the spring. What plan does he have to respond to that possibility? Does all this chaos not just show that we need a people's vote to get us out of this Brexit mess? First of all in terms of the Prime Minister what I would point out is the figures that we have received from the chancellor are contingent upon a deal with the European Union in terms of Westminster parliamentary arithmetic. If there is no deal, that calamity of a no deal, then yes the chancellor will have to return to an emergency budget. I think that it just represents the economic mismanagement at the hands of the Conservatives and the Tory chancellor. In terms of the position of European Union that is well understood we wanted us to stay within the European Union short of that we want to stay within the single market and the custom union and if we had a deal that achieved that those numbers would have been better the chancellor would have greater economic growth and more resources to allocate so yes I do agree we need to do everything possible to get the least worst Brexit and this Government has made its position clear on how we think we get there and we will continue to push for that. Ruth Maguire to be followed by Jackie Baillie. Just four months ago the UK Government trumpeted a swath of additional health consequentials would be available to the Scottish Government to spend on our NHS here. Can the cabinet secretary set out following yesterday's budget by just how far the Tories' promises have fallen short on delivering what they said they would? Cabinet secretary. I've heard this slogan that says never trust a Tory why. The Tories promise £600 million to Scotland's NHS. I challenged the chancellor and I challenged the chief secretary to the treasury. Will that be net? £600 million for Scotland's NHS. It transpires after only a matter of minutes that we've found out that we've already been shortchanged by around £50 million a year and I hear the Tories grumbling saying well it's not a lot in the context of £50 million. Five years that will be over a quarter of a billion pounds over five years denied to the Scottish NHS that was promised by the Tories. You cannot trust the Tories with Scotland's NHS. Jackie Baillie to be followed by Tom Arthur. The SNP gross commission said that the Scottish Government should operate the same or lower rate of co-operation tax than the UK Government. So do the SNP support 17 per cent or below for big business? Or will you support income tax cuts for ordinary families? Can I ask the cabinet secretary whatever happened to people before the profits of big business? First of all, independence is the genuine alternative to austerity and with all those economic levers we could deliver greater economic growth. What we propose of the Government is targeted investment that is safe to stimulate the economy and no, a direct answer to the question is I do not support a race to the bottom on tax and that is exactly what this Government has done with the tax powers at our disposal and incidentally the gross commission figures propose far higher public spending and stimulation of our economy than the chancellor has announced yesterday. Tom Arthur. The UK Government Tory budget failed to implement a real living wage and it perpetuates state sanction pay discrimination against young people. With a pay gap between a 16-year-old and a 25-year-old now standing at a staggering £3.86 per hour. Does the cabinet secretary agree with me that this UK Government budget fails to deliver for people who are trapped and in work poverty and it is a budget that fails the young people of Scotland? Yes, it does fail people in that regard. The welfare reforms are a disaster. It is pushing people to food banks. It is not making work pay and the UK Government should have stepped back from the implementation of universal credit and some of the other pernicious policies like the two child cap. In relation to living wage I think that we can take some comfort but we have got more to do to reach 100 per cent. We have the highest proportion of people paid the living wage of any UK nation but, of course, the Tories have played games with the living wage. We need to read a substantial minimum wage and a real living wage and a quality for our young people in that regard. It is very telling. If you look at the resolution foundation work here those who are the biggest beneficiaries of this UK budget are the richest in society telling you that the Tory image may have changed but their policies and pernicious approach have not. I thank the minister and the members for getting through all those questions. That concludes topical questions. We will move on now to a statement by Jeane Freeman, the Cabinet Secretary for Health on NHS financial overview. I would encourage all members who wish to ask a question of the health secretary to press their request to speak buttons as soon as possible.