THE economy dominated the agenda yesterday as the leaders of four of Scotland’s political parties took part in their third debate in five days.

If the previous two debates between the politicians had been bad-tempered, they were only a warm up for the “stairheaid rammy” that took place yesterday morning on BBC Scotland’s Sunday Politics show.

Although there was little light in the debate, there was undoubtedly plenty of heat.

First Minister Nicola Sturgeon was asked to defend her party’s desire for full fiscal autonomy against figures from the Institute for Financial Studies (IFS) claiming the policy would force the

Scottish Government to make cuts of £7.6 billion.

Sturgeon said full fiscal autonomy, the policy that would see an end to the block grant from Westminster and the Scottish Government taking control of all taxes raised in Scotland and most of the country’s spending, was about Scotland taking “proper control” rather than being “at the mercy of Westminster cuts”.

During last Wednesday’s debate in Aberdeen, the SNP leader said that she would like Scotland to have full fiscal autonomy as soon as possible. The remark was leapt on by Labour, the Tories and the Liberal Democrats and has dominated the campaign in Scotland since.

UK Labour leader Ed Miliband and Shadow Chancellor Ed Balls came up for a special press conference in Glasgow on Friday to stress the cuts calculated in the IFS report.

Sturgeon defended the policy against their claims, and said the IFS figures were a “snapshot”.

“It’s a one-year figure,” Sturgeon said. “It takes no account of the fiscal framework that would be negotiated if fiscal autonomy was agreed.”

The First Minister said she did not accept the figure of £7.6bn and that any deficit would be met by growing the economy and through borrowing. “Full fiscal autonomy is implemented over a period of years. As you get more powers, you use those powers to start growing your economy, growing your revenues and get the deficit down,” she said.

“I don’t accept this point that deficits mean you shouldn’t be in control of your own fiscal affairs. Having powers means that you grow your economy to get your deficit down.”

In a statement after the debate, Labour’s Glasgow East candidate Margaret Curran said: “The SNP are engaged in ‘project hide the facts’ from the people of Scotland on the real costs of their policies”.

The language used by Curran was a response to a column by Sturgeon in the Sunday Herald where she claimed that the other three parties were working together again as the “Project Fear alliance” and that their arguments were “phantoms of 2014’s fearmongering”.

During the debate Scottish Labour leader Jim Murphy was asked about what cuts would be made under a Labour Government. Murphy replied that no cuts would need to be made, saying: “The IFS are pretty clear that we don’t have to make further cuts to achieve our spending rules.”

This contrasted with comments by Ed Balls last week that Labour planned “some sensible spending cuts as part of a balanced plan to get the deficit down”.

IFS analysis said Labour could increase departmental spending overall by £9.2bn if it planned on wiping out the current deficit by the end of the next parliament in 2020.

However, if the party was to try to balance the books for 2017/18, cuts of approximately £6bn would have to be made.

Speaking after the debate, the SNP’s General Election co-ordinator Angus Robertson said Labour’s lack of clarity on the issue showed they could not be trusted, adding: “His entire strategy seems to be about avoiding the question instead of being honest with the public.”

Ruth Davidson, leader of the Scottish Conservatives, clashed with Sturgeon over child poverty figures, claiming poverty was down and quoting a leaflet produced by the First Minister saying the same thing. Sturgeon retaliated by saying that the leaflet was old and the latest figures showed that due to the impact of Tory cuts to welfare and low wages, child poverty was increasing.

The BBC One debate, chaired by Gordon Brewer, was dominated by the heated, loud exchanges between Sturgeon and Murphy, with each accusing the other of lying. There were very few times during the debate when Sturgeon was able to speak uninterrupted, and at times Brewer seemed to give up trying to moderate.

The next debate between the Scottish political leaders will be on May 3. On Thursday Sturgeon will take part in an opposition parties’ debate with Ed Miliband, Nigel Farage, Leanne Wood and Natalie Bennet.