LABOUR is proposing a tax rise to halt cuts to local councils and protect education services.

Scottish Labour leader, Kezia Dugdale, has said Finance Secretary, John Swinney, should use new powers available to set a Scottish rate of income tax at 11p in the pound, increasing the rate in Scotland by 1p.

Ms Dugdale is outlining her proposal today in a speech on protecting public services.

She will say that the 1p tax rise would protect the lowest paid while raising half a billion pounds to avoid cuts to education and other public services.

Mr Swinney set the Scottish rate of income tax at 10p, leaving income tax the same in Scotland as in the rest of the UK.

When he set the budget for 2016/17, last month in Holyrood, he said: "I hope that from 2017/18 this parliament will have more flexibility in setting income tax rates.

“However, that will depend on reaching agreement on a new fiscal framework and final passage of the Scotland Bill."

Ms Dugdale said the SNP budget should be ripped up and that Labour would not support it.

She said: “Given the choice between using our powers or making cuts to our children’s future, we choose to use our powers.

“We will tear up this SNP budget that simply manages Tory cuts and instead use the power we have to set the Scottish rate of income tax one pence higher than the rate set by George Osborne. This will provide an extra half a billion pounds a year to invest in the future.

“We don’t do this because we want to use the powers for their own sake. We do it because there is no other alternative to cutting into our nation’s future.”

The plan would see Scots pay higher taxes than the rest of the UK but Ms Dugdale said those on low earnings would not lose out.

She said more than 800,000 workers would not pay a single penny more and those on less than £20,000 would get £100 back from local authorities.

Labour’s plan she said would see a tax payer on £30,000 pay less than £4 a week extra, but someone on almost £150,000 a year would pay an additional £28 a week.

Ms Dugdale will say: “The cuts the SNP have decided to inflict will be felt in every community in Scotland. The hundreds of millions of pounds taken from local services are cuts to things that we all rely on.”