Meeting of the Parliament 12 February 2026 [Draft]
Revaluation is an independent process, as agreed by the Parliament. There are always winners and losers in such processes, but I am sure that there will be reflection on how we ensure that transitional relief is received when it is required. There are always lessons to be learned.
Although the budget is rooted firmly in the Government’s priorities, it has also been shaped by meaningful engagement with others, with whom we identified many areas of common ground. That included a shared priority across parties to support our Scottish colleges. I welcome the positive recognition of the 10 per cent uplift on last year’s core budget by the Finance and Public Administration Committee, which reflects the response from commentators and the sector.
Some parties and members advocated for specific areas in the budget. I thank those members for their constructive approach. It means that we will deliver improvements in neurodevelopmental assessments and care of children and young people, which will see investment of more than £7.5 million in 2026-27 and growing future investment. We will also invest £9 million in the next three years to support communities that are impacted by the closure of the Fife ethylene plant at Mossmorran, and we will provide a three-year settlement for disabled people’s organisations, with £3.5 million of funding in 2026-27 and in each of the subsequent two years.
The draft budget set out an initial commitment of £6.5 million for hospices in 2026-27, with further engagement planned to understand what support would be required to deliver pay parity for hospice staff with the national health service’s agenda for change. I confirm that we will prioritise an additional £2.9 million for that sector.
In that spirit of listening and engagement, I can also confirm that—provided that the bill passes stage 1 today—the Government intends to lodge amendments at stage 2.
The fair settlement for local government came through cross-party discussions. We are proud that the budget includes almost £15.7 billion of funding for local government, which is a 2 per cent real-terms increase in 2026-27, compared to last year’s budget. However, since the budget was published, I have continued to engage with COSLA and listen to its concerns. As a result, I can confirm my intention to allocate a further £20 million to the local government settlement for social care, which councils can use to fund the real living wage for the adult and childcare sectors.
The investing in communities fund supports community-led organisations and deprived and fragile communities to tackle disadvantage and poverty on their own terms, delivering projects, services and activities that are identified and developed by communities themselves. Like members across the chamber, I have seen the value that those community projects have in our constituencies across Scotland. We recognise calls to provide stability for those organisations, which is why we propose to allocate a further £5.33 million of new resource funding and prioritise a further £1.6 million from within the budget, taking the total available funding to £9.13 million and extending the fund in full for 2026-27. That is in stark contrast to the UK Government, which has cut funding for local growth in Scotland.
As the First Minister announced earlier today, another amendment that the Government proposes is the delivery of a freeze to all ScotRail fares, including season tickets and flexipasses, until April 2027. That will be welcome news for many commuters. I will allocate £4.3 million of additional resource funding in 2026-27 to the transport portfolio to deliver the freeze to ScotRail fares. That will build on other measures in the budget, such as the removal of peak fares on the northern isles ferries for our island communities and the continued removal of ScotRail peak fares for good.
This afternoon, I will write to the Finance and Public Administration Committee to set out the detail of the proposed amendments that will be lodged at stage 2 for its consideration.
I remind members that, although the Government has set out a budget that delivers a strong economy, strong public services and stronger support for families, it remains a shared responsibility to deliver that for the Scottish people by supporting the budget bill.
I move,
That the Parliament agrees to the general principles of the Budget (Scotland) (No 5) Bill.