John Swinney was accused of outrageous behaviour akin to a Chicago gangster by Fife’s political leader.
Fife Council leader David Ross made the comparison as he announced that the region’s council tax freeze will continue.
He said “extremely punitive” sanctions threatened would have resulted in a penalty of £25 million on top of the additional cut of £17m in Fife’s grant.
He said: “This is outrageous behaviour more like that of a Chicago gangster than what I would expect from the Deputy First Minister of Scotland.”
Fife Council considered a small increase in council tax which, even after the loss of the Scottish Government’s £4.6m compensation for continuing the freeze, would have raised over £7m.
Mr Ross said feedback suggested two out of three people would be prepared to pay the increase to protect local services.
However, he said: “John Swinney’s latest letter makes it clear that should we go ahead with this increase we will lose not only the £4.6m relating to the council tax element of the settlement but a total of around £25m including funding for education and for health and social care that are totally unrelated to council tax.
“This effectively removes raising the council tax as an option and condemns Fife to enduring a further £7m in cuts.”
Mr Ross said he saw no alternative but to agree with the greatest reluctancy to comply with Mr Swinney’s terms in the budget settlement.
He said: “I agree with COSLA president David O’Neill that this settlement undermines the relationship between local and central government.
“It has been badly handled, will prove very bad for the most vulnerable in our communities and result in thousands of job losses across the country.
“And it’s all so unnecessary.
“John Swinney and the SNP voted down Scottish Labour’s proposal in the parliament to raise half a billion pounds to safeguard local services through a 1p rise in income tax, whilst protecting those on lower incomes.”