By Steve Bargeton, political editor

THE SNP claimed yesterday more than 800,000 workers in Scotland will pay more tax as a direct result of the Budget— including half the workers in Chancellor Gordon Brown’s own constituency of Kirkcaldy and Cowdenbeath.

Finance spokesman John Swinney said doubling the tax rate for the low-paid from 10% to 20% will mean 395,000 full-time workers who earn less than £17,000 per year and 441,000 part-time workers earning less than £17,000 per year paying more tax.

The SNP analysis of the impact of the Budget shows more than half the workers in 22 Westminster constituencies will be worse off as a result of the Chancellor’s decision to scrap the 10p tax threshold.

Among them are his own Fife constituency as well as Angus, Dunfermline and West Fife, Glenrothes, North East Fife, and Ochil and South Perthshire.

The SNP calculate 39% of workers will be worse off in First Minister Jack McConnell’s constituency of Motherwell and Wishaw.

Last night Mr Swinney said, “Within 24 hours of the Budget, it is already unravelling, particularly in Scotland.

“And that’s because it is not a budget for Scotland—it is a budget for Gordon Brown to get into Downing Street.

“The Budget doesn’t give much to anyone—it gives with one hand and takes with another.

“But what it does do is hammer over 800,000 low paid and part-time workers.”

Yesterday the Chancellor vigorously defended his budget, claiming it was “ridiculous” to say people will be generally worse off under the new tax package.

Mr Brown said, “For people who are lower earners the tax credit wipes out the income tax liability and that’s why lower-income workers are better off now as a result of what we have done as a government.”

He said it was “completely untrue” Scotland will be particularly hit by the Budget because its high proportion of small and medium-sized businesses will pay more tax.

“Nobody can deny that over the last 10 years 200,000 new jobs have come to Scotland, and the Scottish economy is a growing economy, focusing on some of the innovative areas where we can sell to the rest of the world,” he said.

Mr Brown said an SNP administration would mean instability and a loss of jobs.

Last night Labour and the SNP also clashed on North Sea oil and gas revenues as the fallout from Wednesday’s Budget continued.

Trade and Industry Secretary Alistair Darling warned against the “absolute madness” of SNP plans to base Scotland’s future on unpredictable oil revenues.

But the SNP rejected Labour claims that North Sea revenues are falling.

They say the Chancellor’s predictions show six years of North Sea revenues of £55 billion from 2006/07—more than the £34 billion from the previous six years.

Mr Darling said Budget figures show a “dramatic reduction” in oil revenues.

He said, “Lower levels of production and higher costs have reduced tax revenues from £13 billion predicted in last year’s Budget to £8 billion.

“For every year in the future it’s cut them by an average of about £4 billion a year.”

The strength of the UK economy means the country can “take that sort of reduction in our stride,” he said.

But SNP leader Alex Salmond condemned “political games” with oil.

“When Brown talks about falling revenues, they are not real falls—only corrections from his own previous forecasts.

“Indeed, the Chancellor is becoming as bad as forecasting oil and gas revenues as he is at estimating the cost of the London Olympics,” he said.

“The reality is that Scottish oil revenues are on a rising curve—as the Treasury’s own figures show.”