John Swinney admits he will have to make at least £250m of public spending cuts

dailyrecord.co.uk:

First Minister John Swinney has admitted he will have to make hundreds of millions of pounds of cuts this year to fund public sector pay deals.He said he had “no choice” but to balance the Scottish Government’s books by slashing services by at least £250m.Swinney’s government will announce on Tuesday how the axe will fall, but Ministers have already imposed emergency spending controls.He told STV: “The challenge we’ve got during this financial year is that we are wrestling with very significantly higher pay demands than we anticipated.“We’ve got to find that money from within our existing resources and as we work our way through the year we are trying to get to a position of greater financial certainty.“And this is a crucial point, the Scottish Government has to balance its budget, we’ve done that every year since 2007 – we have no choice.“We’ve got to do it this year and we have to make a set of decisions to make that the case”.The First Minister admitted that the total cuts figure would be at least a quarter of a billion pounds.Asked if hundreds of millions would have to be cut to fund these pay deals, he confirmed: “That’s correct, yes.”He said ministers were “wrestling with very significantly higher pay demands than we anticipated”.The SNP Government has blamed the Labour administration for the financial mess. To sign up to the Daily Record Politics newsletter, click here.