THE SCOTTISH Government must invest £1bn of unallocated Barnett funds in pandemic recovery, Scottish Labour has urged.
The party said Holyrood ministers have to use the money from the UK Government to support the nation through the crisis.
According to analysis by the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe), the Scottish Government is yet to decide how it will spend around a quarter of the £4.6bn it has received in Barnett consequentials, including £700m from Westminster's health and social care budget.
Scottish Labour is calling for up to £420m of the £700m to be spent on giving social care staff a pay rise of £12 per hour, and said the rest should be used to "remobilise the NHS and restart cancer services".
The party said the remaining £300m of the £1bnn yet to be spent should be used to regenerate the high street, protect jobs and boost the economy.
Scottish Labour finance spokesman Daniel Johnson said: “The Scottish Government must use every resource at its disposal to deliver a national recovery for everyone – we simply cannot afford to have £1bn sitting unspent.
“We are staring down the barrel at a looming jobs crisis and our NHS is in desperate need of re-mobilisation.
“The frontline social care staff, for whom we all clapped during the pandemic, are still going without the proper pay that they deserve.
“That’s why every penny of this £1bn must be used to deliver fair pay for care workers, help re-mobilise our NHS and stimulate our high street.”
The scale of the economic crisis facing the country means that there is no time to lose, the party said.
A Scottish Government spokeswoman said: “We have committed every penny of these consequentials to our pandemic response, notably to support Scotland’s businesses and their recovery, NHS, other public services and the rollout of vaccines.”
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