Jan 29th: SNP Budget Defeat - Greens Were Right To Stick To Their Principles

It was high drama yesterday as the SNP's 2010-2011 budget was defeated by just one vote with the two Scottish Green MSPs voting against it. You have to hand it to Patrick Harvie and the Scottish Greens. They put a price on their support for the SNP government's budget and they stuck to their guns.

It was a fair price too - a £100m per year package to insulate 1.5m homes in Scotland. From a similar scheme in West Yorkshire there is data to show that for a £500 one-off investment, each home in the scheme would save around £340 on energy bills per year. The figures say this would reduce Scotland's total carbon emmisions by 6% per annum. Those figures add up. This is the sort of scheme that we could hold up to the world and say Aye We Can. It's up to the SNP government to find the money and get a deal done.

There is another element to the Greens stance that has impressed me. When offered a compromise deal of a third of the money - £33m per year over ten years - the Greens could have accepted it and claimed a massive victory for themselves and for the environmental movement. Few would have doubted this and they could have plastered it all over their future election propaganda as a significant Greens victory. But the Greens refused the deal because they did not get assurances that the money would not be taken from, for instance, the poverty fuel fund. That is not a mere "technicality" as the media bods suggest, it is a principled stand.

Of course, there is an element of bluff and counter-bluff here. When Alex Salmond says that the SNP must now prepare for an early election few believe this will happen. It would be political suicide for the SNP if they resigned in protest against a progressive measure that is supported in principle by environmentalists as well as the building trade.

But a word of advice to the SNP Government: Get a deal struck with the Greens. Back up your pro-environment anti-nuclear credentials. Their scheme is a good one and worth supporting.

However if that cant be done, and a budget deal is to be discussed with the Lib Dems, the only acceptable deal - as a very last resort - would have to include the Lib Dems unequivocal support for the Independence Referendum Bill in 2010. Any other deal with these opportunistic charlatans would be an unprincipled sell out.