Jackie Baillie has backed Scottish Labour’s plans for a Barnett-style funding formula to determine local government budgets.

In a bid to end the “daylight robbery” of councils, Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar has called for a new independent mechanism to make sure councils get their fair share of funding based on the services for which they are responsible.

The call came ahead of the launch of the Scottish Labour’s latest paper setting out the party’s plans to reform and renew the United Kingdom. This paper will set out the Party’s plans to push power out of Holyrood and into communities.

The Scottish Labour leader said the current system has been left in tatters by the SNP’s “contempt” for local government, which has seen £6 billion removed from local government’s core funding since 2013/14. These catastrophic cuts go even further than Tory cuts to Scottish budgets.

In West Dunbartonshire, the Labour Administration which won control in May’s local council elections have already announced a £5million cost of living package to help residents but their support could go further if they hadn’t been left with a £15million budget deficit by the previous SNP administration.

Local Labour councillors have been calling for fairer funding for councils for years while the SNP Government’s Block Grant from Westminster has increased but this hasn’t been passed onto local authorities.

Dumbarton constituency MSP Jackie Baillie said: “For years now Scotland’s councils have been cut to the bone despite repeated calls to ensure local authorities delivering frontline services are properly funded.

“The SNP and the Greens receive increased funds from Westminster but instead of passing it on, they are siphoning it away from essential services and into Ministerial vanity projects.

“Councils are facing even more impossible choices and it is local people and the local workforce who are suffering due to this selfishness from the SNP. Their relentless contempt for local government has left the current funding system in tatters.

“We must put a stop to this daylight robbery and guarantee truly fair funding for councils with a new independent system.”