The SNP have become embroiled in another row over "ring-fenced" funding as a Scottish Government Cabinet Secretary failed to explain where £33m of agricultural funds had gone. This was "deferred" from the agricultural budget during the government's Emergency Budget Review in 2022 with then-finance secretary John Swinney promising the cash would be returned in future years. He said: "It was taken out of the agricultural budget and spent on something else. The £33m was taken out of the budget to be spent on something else, other than the agricultural budget. They removed all the money from a supposedly ring-fenced rural budget The SNP make it up as they go along."

Source: Express June 01, 2023 16:58 UTC