Ministers' £20k pay rise won't cost public a penny, claims...minister! (2025)

Ministerial pay rises will not cost the public purse a penny, Holyrood’s social care minister has claimed.

Maree Todd also insisted the £19,000 boost given to Cabinet members and junior ministers was fair.

The First Minister decided to partially end the pay freeze for ministers which has been in place for 16 years.

Junior ministers will now be paid £100,575 a year while Cabinet secretaries will earn £116,125.

John Swinney has said he will not accept the £19,126 increase.

A voluntary pay freeze has been in place since 2009 when Alex Salmond was First Minister.

Ministers have since declined to accept the rise, instead donating it back into the public purse, with around £2.2million raised.

The latest decision means they will now be entitled to their full MSP salary, although their ministerial salary will remain at 2009 levels.

Appearing on BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme, Ms Todd said the move does not count as a pay rise.

The MSP for Caithness, Sutherland and Ross said: ‘It’s not a pay rise, it won’t cost the public purse a penny extra, and I think it’s very important that people understand that.

‘Since 2008 ministers have been, instead of accepting their pay rise every year, they have been taking it off their pay and putting it back into a public pot.

‘So ministers have donated £2.2 million to the public purse since that pay freeze came in.

‘That means ministers like me were paid £55,000 a year for their MSP work.

‘What’s happened now is that I am now going to be paid the same as my other backbench colleagues.’

Mr Swinney said the decision to raise ministerial salaries was made out of ‘fairness’, but added he will not take the increase to ensure Scots do not think he made the change to benefit personally.

Opposition parties have attacked the Government over the rise, with Scottish Labour describing it as a ‘reward for failure’.

Ms Todd’s comments came as one of Scotland’s largest trade unions warned the Government of its impact on public sector workers.

In a letter to the First Minister, the Scotland Secretary of GMB, Louise Gilmour, said the increase was ‘unjustifiable’.

She said: ‘This increase sends a clear message to our members, particularly the lowest paid in our public services who are still fighting for a £15 an hour minimum which was promised years ago.

‘They have endured 14 years of Tory austerity, a global pandemic and a cost-of-living crisis where they watched the rich get richer during national and global crises whilst those on the front line of our public services - our waste workers, social carers and school staff to name a few - continued to attend their work.

‘Now, at the first opportunity, their political leaders have stuffed their pockets.’

Alex SalmondJohn Swinney

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