Protecting Public Services and Boosting Scotland’s Economy

As an amendment to motion S4M-12521 in the name of John Swinney (Protecting Public Services and Boosting Scotland’s Economy), leave out from "condemns" to end and insert "notes the publication of the Scottish Government’s new economic strategy and the abandonment of its previous policy to anchor its approach to the economy on a cut of 3p in the pound on corporation tax; further notes that the economic policy of the UK Government has created six times as many jobs in Scotland in less than a quarter of the time compared with the projections for the now-abandoned Scottish Government policy; understands that the Scottish Ministers defended to the Scottish Information Commissioner their right to withhold information on the cost in lost revenues of their corporation tax cut, including on the grounds set out by an official that it 'may lead to opposition parties starting a debate'; considers that, now that the policy has been abandoned, ministers should publish the information on the lost revenues for the initial years of implementation forthwith; calls on the Scottish Government to indicate if its u-turn on corporation tax now means that it will support an increase in the corporation tax paid by banks in order to increase the contribution of the banking system to balancing the UK’s books, and further calls on the Scottish Government to change its position on a further aspect of creating a fairer society and to support a further cut in income tax for those on low and middle incomes by raising the personal allowance to £12,500."