SNP ministers could learn from Britain’s shopworkers how to balance a till, Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar said today in a speech to retail union Usdaw’s annual delegate meeting.

Addressing members in Blackpool, the Glasgow Region MSP hit out at scandal-hit governments in both Edinburgh and London for “failing to deliver the change that working people need.”

His intervention came amid open calls from some Tories to “politicise” the Civil Service following Dominic Raab’s forced resignation from the posts of deputy prime minister and justice secretary after an independent investigation found that he had acted in an “intimidating and aggressive way” towards officials across Whitehall.

In Scotland, a police investigation into the funding and finances of the SNP is ongoing.

Mr Sarwar told delegates in the Empress Ballroom: “Friends, Britain’s shopworkers know the importance of having a balanced till at the end of the shift.

“Perhaps they could help the SNP out with their missing £600,000,” he joked, to laughter and applause in the hall.

The former Glasgow Central MP, who replaced Richard Leonard as Scottish Labour leader in 2021, added: “We have two governments who actually want you to believe that managed decline is as good as it gets.

“They want you to believe that politics can’t fundamentally change anything. It’s on the Labour Party and the wider union movement to recognise that change is possible if we put our shoulder to the wheel.

“It’s on this generation to believe that we can deliver a fairer and more equitable country, that we can end poverty, that we can deliver workers the rights that they deserve and that victory is possible.”

Mr Sarwar urged Usdaw members to help Labour win a probable general election next year “not just because the SNP and the Tories deserve to lose, but because Labour deserves to win.”