John Swinney has warned Scotland faced a "new age of austerity" as a result of "reckless" spending cuts by the UK Government.
The Deputy First Minister made the gloomy assessment of the country's finances while speaking at the SNP conference in Aberdeen today.
He told delegates the Scottish Government budget was already worth £1.7 billion less than when it was set in December last year as a result of inflation.
SNP ministers were forced to launch an emergency budget review after Tory Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng announced a raft of tax cuts last month.
Swinney has already announced £500 million worth of cuts from the Holyrood budget and signalled more savings will need to be found.
He told the conference that new Tory PM Liz Truss had "decided to transform a punishing cost crisis in to a full blown economic and financial crisis".
He continued: "In an act of fiscal recklessness, the Tories have threatened the financial security of millions of our people, jeopardised the homes of many through higher mortgages and shredded in one fell swoop the fiscal credibility of the United Kingdom.
"That is just the latest disaster the Tories have delivered. And what will this recklessness bring for us – it will bring a new age of austerity.
"A new age of austerity that will cripple public services and create misery for those on fixed incomes. I came to my first SNP Conference when Margaret Thatcher was savaging our public services and our industrial base in the 1980s.
"I was Finance Secretary a decade ago, when David Cameron and George Osborne, unleashed the last round of UK austerity.
"The damage of that programme is still being felt in communities across Scotland. It put our public finances under tremendous strain.
"While the challenges of protecting Scotland’s people and public services were great then, they pale into insignificance with the scale of the challenge we face today."
Swinney claimed the Scottish Government would work to protect public services but admitted its room for manoeuvre was "limited".
And he took a swipe at the Conservatives for trying to cut the top rate of tax for high earners.
He added: "Perhaps the most predictable, if depressing, comments in the aftermath of the mini-budget were the chorus of calls from the Scottish Conservatives urging me to match the UK Government’s reckless tax cuts.
"The Tories at Westminster had set fire to the UK economy, and their counterparts in Scotland were urging me to pour petrol on the flames.
"And of course at the same time as demanding we cut tax, the Tories constantly demand we spend more money. If you didn’t know already, let me tell you this. The Tories really are a bunch of reckless hypocrites."
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