With a Scottish Parliament election on the horizon, the Fraser of Allander Institute hosted an event in Edinburgh to examine what the parties are – and aren’t – saying about the fiscal challenges ahead.
Professor Mairi Spowage, Dr João Sousa and Ciara Crummey unpacked the real fiscal challenges facing the next government, put the party manifestos under the microscope, and set out the fiscal context facing the incoming government.
Access the slides from our Edinburgh election event.
This event is part of the series 2026 Scotland and Wales Election Analysis. In a series of reports, manifesto analysis, regular podcasts and events in Scotland, Wales and London, The Fraser of Allander Institute is partnering with the Wales Governance Centre at Cardiff University to cut through the complexity and highlight what the challenges are, what there is common across Wales and Scotland, and where approaches and priorities have and look set to differ.
This work is supported by the Nuffield Foundation. The Nuffield Foundation is an independent charitable trust with a mission to advance social well-being. It funds and undertakes rigorous research, encourages innovation and supports the use of sound evidence to inform social and economic policy, and improve people’s lives. The Nuffield Foundation is the founder and co-funder of the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, the Ada Lovelace Institute and the Nuffield Family Justice Observatory. Find out more at: nuffieldfoundation.org.
The views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the Foundation.
Authors
João is Deputy Director and Senior Knowledge Exchange Fellow at the Fraser of Allander Institute. Previously, he was a Senior Fiscal Analyst at the Office for Budget Responsibility, where he led on analysis of long-term sustainability of the UK's public finances and on the effect of economic developments and fiscal policy on the UK's medium-term outlook.
Ciara is a Knowledge Exchange Associate at the Fraser of Allander Institute. Her main area of focus is macroeconomic and fiscal analysis. She has recently completed a secondment to the Scottish Fiscal Commission, where she worked as an Economic and Fiscal Analyst in the economy team forecasting macroeconomic conditions.
Mairi is the Director of the Fraser of Allander Institute. Previously, she was the Deputy Chief Executive of the Scottish Fiscal Commission and the Head of National Accounts at the Scottish Government and has over a decade of experience working in different areas of statistics and analysis.