Ricky Bell: hard-pressed citizens will suffer most from Labour’s recklessness  

As city treasurer I’ve made addressing the scourge of child poverty in Glasgow one of the council’s key priorities.

So, I was particularly pleased to see the commitment to scrapping the iniquitous two-child cap.

That will make a huge difference to the everyday lives of thousands of our hardest-pressed families.

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And the £200 million increase to Scotland’s house-building funding can have a real positive impact on our efforts to address Glasgow’s housing emergency.

But for all that, we continue to find ourselves in a really challenging financial situation.

Because what the Scottish Government is delivering with one hand, Labour chancellor Rachel Reeves is taking away with the other with her rise to Employer National Insurance Contributions.

And unless the UK Government changes tack – and very soon – next year we’re looking at an additional £30m gap in Glasgow’s finances.

What’s also alarming is that it’s not just Glasgow City Council whose essential services are being placed in jeopardy by the Labour Government.

Housing associations and social landlords have indicated that they may have to increase rents, scale back repairs and maintenance, and roll back on their plans for new affordable homes just to meet their increased National Insurance costs.

That certainly won’t help address Glasgow’s housing emergency.  

And our third sector partners who provide such fantastic and essential services to those struggling in our communities will also face an increase in running costs which could push many to the edge.

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With extremely few sources of income available to the third sector to meet the estimated £75m increase in National Insurance Contributions, yet again it’s Scotland’s hardest-pressed citizens who will suffer most from Labour’s recklessness.  

Tomorrow, I’ll take a motion to Full Council demanding the UK Labour Government reverse this rash and ill-thought through policy and instead make choices which will create a fairer society and economy rather than repackaging failed ideas.

Instead of being the changemakers they promised, Sir Keir Starmer and Reeves have proven to be incompetent bookkeepers.

Unless they suddenly see sense and either scrap it for the public and third sectors or compensate us for it, this rise will be calamitous for councils and our partners, and calamitous for Scotland.    

Polls showing a further plunge in support for Scottish Labour make it loud and clear that voters are continuing to see right through Anas Sarwar’s duplicity, gas lighting and increasingly ridiculous political contortions.

Since the branch office’s bosses came to power in July promising change, the universal fuel allowance for pensioners has been scrapped and the Tories’ two-child cap retained.

Yet despite each and every one of Labour’s Scottish MPs voting for these policies, Sarwar has said he’d reverse them in Scotland if he becomes First Minister.

Well, guess what Mr Sarwar? Last week the SNP put forward a Budget doing just that, committing to helping keep Scotland’s pensioners warm and lifting 15,000 children in our poorest families out of poverty.

And yet Labour have indicated that this is a Budget they won’t be voting for.

This would be funny were the stakes not so high for so many. And the indications from the weekend’s polls are that the Scottish public agrees. The problems in Sarwar’s in-tray are rising by the day.  

He should do himself a favour and lighten his load a bit by backing a Budget which delivers for those most in need and which the public knows takes us on the right road.