Responding to the Cabinet Secretary for Finance’s statement in the Scottish Parliament announcing in-year spending cuts to the 2024-25 Scottish Budget, Jamie Livingstone, Head of Oxfam Scotland, said:
“More hardship and hollowing out of public spending are the very last thing Scotland needs when economic inequality is rising, poverty rates are stubbornly high and climate change targets are crumbling.
“We simply can’t afford to keep being shortchanged by an unfair tax system – whether at UK or Scotland level – that favours the wealthiest.
“As Scottish Ministers prepare next year’s Budget and a critical new tax strategy, they must swap these cuts with courage and launch far reaching reforms to devolved taxation to help deliver a fairer, more prosperous country that benefits everyone, not just the privileged few.”
/ENDS
For more information please contact: Rebecca Lozza, Oxfam Media and Communications Adviser, Scotland and Wales: rlozza1@oxfam.org.uk / 07917738450