The SNP government has been accused of carrying out an “eye-watering” raid on Dundee City Council’s budget since 2013.
New analysis shows the city council’s budget was reduced by £231 million in the last 12 years.
It comes as the local authority set out its latest budget – including a council tax rise of 8%.
SNP council leader Mark Flynn blamed the UK Government’s increase in employer’s National Insurance contributions as he set out a series of cuts.
Dundee council cuts
City councillor Lynn Short said that if Scotland had become independent in 2014, the council would “not be facing the atrocities we are today”.
As well as a reduction in the funding given to Dundee Rep, DCA and Dundee Science Centre the councillors will also reduce the funding for secondary schools and scrap the small skip service.
The nationalist government at Holyrood previously said large council tax rises were unnecessary.
John Swinney insisted the £1 billion extra his government was providing meant the increases were not needed.
But embarrassingly for the first minister, in Tayside and Fife it has been SNP-run local authority’s that have opted for the largest increases.
His local Perth and Kinross Council backed one of the largest increases in Scotland, with local residents’ tax bill set to rise by 9.5% this year.
In comparison, the Labour-run administration in Fife opted for an 8.2% rise.
Labour MSP Michael Marra says councils have to make difficult choices as a result of Scottish Government decisions over the last decade.
He said: “Services in Dundee are under immense pressure because of the brutal cuts that the SNP has inflicted on local government.
“The SNP government has short-changed councils year after year, raiding an eye-watering £231 million from Dundee City Council coffers in total.”
The figures are even larger in Fife, standing at over £300m.
Angus and Perth and Kinross councils each saw their budgets cut by £132m and £102m respectively.
Stirling Council has recorded the smallest reduction, according to the analysis, at just over £100m.
Mr Marra, who serves as his party’s finance spokesman, claimed his party would end cuts.
He added: “The UK Labour government decisively ended the era of Tory austerity, but Scots are still being forced to pay the price for SNP failure.”
A Scottish Government spokesman insisted the local government finance settlement had increase by £5 billion since 2013, but Labour says its figures are based of the cumulative, real-terms cut to the resource grant and non-domestic rates.
The spokesman said: “We recognise the crucial role councils and their employees play in communities across Scotland.
“That’s why the Scottish Government has made available over £14 billion to local councils this year, with a record £15 billion for 2025-26 set out in the Scottish Budget, a real terms increase of 5.5%.”
The Scottish Government is also providing an additional £144 million towards the cost of the employer National Insurance contributions – the equivalent of a 5% council tax rise.
Conversation