THE Scottish Government has confirmed a freeze in public sector recruitment in all but "essential frontline" posts as the UK Government's squeeze on finances begins to take hold.
The announcement comes as ministers struggle to fund pay demands from across the public sector, with the Scottish Finance Secretary Shona Robison criticising the UK Government for failing to ensure rises for those such as NHS workers and council staff are fully funded.
Chancellor Rachel Reeves has required “about a third” of the cash needed to cover such rises to be “funded through departmental cuts”, Robison said.
She added that that “has led to the position where we are having to take these exceptional measures in order to constrain spend and create the headroom to manage”.
For filling vacancies in the public sector, Robison told BBC Radio Scotland: “We have said essential frontline posts will be able to recruited.”
She added the Scottish Government would be “making sure that the controls on recruitment are enhanced to make sure we prioritise only those essential frontline posts”.
It comes after the Scottish Government found extra cash for local government workers’ pay in a bid to avert strike action by refuse staff – with the 4.2% offered to workers to suspend this action more than ministers at Holyrood had budgeted for.
Speaking on the Good Morning Scotland programme, Robison said: “To be clear, we are going to have to take some very difficult decisions about what we can afford and what we can’t afford going forward.”
The Finance Secretary has already imposed emergency spending controls across Scottish Government departments, with further spending in 2024-25 said to be only permitted if it is “truly essential or unavoidable”.
The Times reported she instructed additional money could only be spent if “the Scottish Government would otherwise breach its legal obligations or fail to provide essential support to emergency situations or cause significant economic damage across Scotland”.
Meanwhile the Scottish Government confirmed on Wednesday that its new payment, coming in to replace the Winter Fuel Payment, will not be made available to all pensioners.
With the UK Government restricting the Winter Fuel Payment to pensioners on certain benefits, the Scottish Government said it was left with "no choice" but adopt the same stance when its pension age winter heating payment comes in.
That was due to replace the current UK payment from winter 2024-25, but Robison appeared to indicate a delay.
She said: “We are asking that essentially it is delivered by the UK Government this winter and we will manage a very similar benefit for the following winter.”
The Finance Secretary added the decision to means-test the new payment had been done “with a very heavy heart”, adding that “we know fuel poverty levels are higher in Scotland and the north of Scotland, in particular, have very cold winters, so it is absolutely the last thing we wanted to do”.
She was also unable to say how many pensioners in Scotland would now not receive the payment, but accepted: “I know a lot of pensioners will no longer qualify.”
