Fact check: SNP manifesto

The SNP was the largest Scottish party at Westminster during the last parliament, and has launched its manifesto as it aims to maintain its position. 

Scottish independence is the primary pledge in the document, but the party makes several claims about its time in government in Scotland. 

We’ve built 40 per cent more affordable homes per head than in England, and over 70 per cent more than in Wales.

Scotland’s affordable housing statistics are published quarterly, and include a comparison with other UK countries. 

To reach the figures used in the manifesto, the SNP has looked at the average affordable house building across the 15 years across the party’s time in government between 2007-08 and 2022-23. 

The average annual rate of affordable homes built in Scotland across that period was 14.2 per 10,000 people. In England the rate was 9.8 homes per 10,000, and in Wales it was 8.2 per 10,000 population. Scotland’s building average was 44 per cent higher than England and 73 per cent higher than Wales. 

Scotland has maintained a higher rate of house building per head than England and Wales across the last 15 years. Northern Ireland had a higher rate of affordable home building in 2012-13 to 2014-15, and again in 2020-21.

Ferret Fact Service verdict: True

There’s been a “£1.3bn cut to our capital budget”.

The capital budget is the amount available to the government to spend on long term public assets, like school buildings, transport infrastructure and NHS equipment. It’s different to resource spending, which is for the day-to-day upkeep of services like the NHS and education system. Scotland’s capital budget is mostly funded by the block grant, the package of funding that the Scottish Government gets each year.

The SNP manifesto urges the UK Government to reverse an alleged £1.3bn cut to Scotland’s capital budget, stating: “In the UK Spring Budget, the Tories cut capital yet again, this time by almost 9 per cent – or a cumulative loss of £1.3bn by 2027-28.

According to analysis by the Scottish Parliament Information Centre (SPICe), the 2024-25 Scottish budget included £6.2bn in capital funding which, in cash terms, is £170m less than budgeted for in 2023-24. “In real terms, this represents a 3.9 per cent annual decrease,” it writes.

There is a 20 per cent real terms decrease, which would equate to nearly £1.3bn, in capital spending that is currently “pencilled in.” This is down to a freeze in cash terms spending the UK Government has put in place. 

Richard Hughes, Chair of the Office for Budget Responsibility told the House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee this was very uncertain, as financial projections are subject to change. 

He said: “Beyond , we know virtually nothing. It is just two numbers—one for total current spending and one for total capital spending by department.” The next UK spending review is due to take place after the general election, and could change the level of spending available. 

Ferret Fact Service verdict: Half True

We have the best performing core A&E units in the UK.

Accident and emergency performance data is gathered across the UK. 

According to the Office for National Statistics (ONS), we can accurately make comparisons between the A&E performance of Scotland, England and Wales, but not Northern Ireland, because it has a slightly different policy that may result in slightly longer waits.

The four countries in the UK use the same target for measuring their A&E performance –  the four-hour target. To hit this target, 95 per cent of patients who come to A&E should be admitted for treatment, transferred or discharged from hospital within four hours.

‘Core’ A&E departments are Scotland’s larger services that usually provide 24-hour consultant-led service. These are also referred to as emergency departments. In England they are referred to as Type 1 facilities and in Wales as major emergency departments. 

Scottish, English and Welsh A&E departments have struggled to hit the four hour target in recent years, and the latest data for April shows 64 per cent of patients were treated within the target in Scotland, 60.4 per cent in England, and 59.2 per cent in Wales. 

Ferret Fact Service verdict: True

Under the SNP, Scotland’s economy is already one of the best performing parts of the UK with both GDP per head and productivity growing faster in Scotland than the UK as a whole. 

GDP stands for gross domestic product, and is a measure of the value of the goods and services in a country. GDP per head tells you how the economy is doing per person, and can be an indirect indicator that wages are improving or declining. 

Scotland’s GDP per person has increased by 3.8 per cent in 2022, the most recent year measured. This is the highest of any UK nation, and higher than the UK as a whole, which increased by 3.2 per cent. 

The ONS has sounded caution on taking too much from Scotland’s increasing GDP per head in 2022, as it was primarily down to a drop in population in Scotland, rather than highest growth in GDP. 

This is because Scotland’s census was taken later than the rest of the UK, impacting the comparable figures between UK nations. The ONS notes this, stating: “We strongly advise users to exercise caution in the use of Scottish GDP per head until the entire time series is available on a consistent basis”. 

Scotland’s total GDP is lower than the UK as a whole, at £34,299 compared to £36,844.

The manifesto also states productivity is growing faster in Scotland than the UK as a whole.  

This claim comes from the Scottish Government’s labour productivity statistics 2022 report. It states that between 2008 and 2022, “productivity in Scotland has increased by an average of 1.0 per cent per year. This compares to average annual productivity growth of 0.9 per cent for the OECD as a whole, 0.9 per cent for the EU 27 as a whole, and 0.5 per cent per year for the UK as a whole.”

However, the most recent statistics for productivity from the ONS, covering 2021, paint a different picture. They show Scotland 4.7 per cent less productive than the UK average in terms of output per hour worked. Scotland was 5.3 worse than the UK average in output per job. 

Ferret Fact Service verdict: Mostly False

Scotland was the first developed nation in the world to commit funding to address loss and damage.

In 2021, Scotland announced a £1m fund to address “loss and damage” from climate change. This was the first of its kind from a developed nation.

Loss and damage is a term used to describe the economic, infrastructure and social impacts of climate change. These are already occurring across the world, and are likely to worsen as climate change continues.

Examples of loss and damage include islands losing land to rising sea levels, or the impact of extreme weather on a country’s crops or infrastructure. 

Loss and damage refers to issues which nations cannot adapt to, and are often already occurring. Funding is often seen as direct compensation for climate impact, often from richer nations to the developing world. 

In 2022, UN member states Denmark, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Ireland, New Zealand and Canada pledged money for loss and damage.

Ferret Fact Service verdict: True

Ferret Fact Service (FFS) is a non-partisan fact checker, and signatory to the International Fact-Checking Network fact-checkers’ code of principles.

All the sources used in our checks are publicly available and the FFS fact-checking methodology can be viewed here.

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Images: Working together to realise Scotland’s economic potential. Credit: Scottish Government