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Pre-Budget Report and Comprehensive Spending Review

Let me respond to the various points the hon. Gentleman makes. First, most people might think that an increase of the budget in Scotland to £30 billion was not only the right thing to do, but that it also provided the Scottish Executive—even one currently led by somebody whose ambitions far exceed his ability to deliver them—with sufficient resources to spend on health, education, transport and many of the other things that Scotland needs. Scotland got its full share of Barnett expenditure; absolutely nothing has changed in relation to that. That means, for example, that Scotland—as well as Wales and Northern Ireland—also got its Barnett share of the expenditure on Crossrail. Although Crossrail is largely a railway line and tunnel in the middle of London, Scotland got the Barnett consequentials of it. I would have thought that the nationalists—whose own policy would mean that the sums would not be available, because of all the disruption that would be caused to Scotland by tearing it away from the rest of the United Kingdom—would be able to see that, on any view, the settlement is very good, especially when they consider the amount of public spending per head of population in Scotland compared with that in the rest of the United Kingdom. I shall say one other thing. As an Edinburgh MP, I follow closely what is happening in the Scottish Executive. It is increasingly clear to me that the reason why the nationalists are blustering and complaining so much is that they cannot afford, and are not able to deliver on, the promises that they made earlier this year.