Anti-poverty campaigners have been left “bitterly disappointed” with the Scottish budget and the failure to increase the Scottish Child Payment by more than inflation.

Shona Robison, the deputy First Minister, announced during her first budget under Humza Yousaf as First Minister, that the payment would increase from £25 a week to £26.70.

It is a rise of 6.8%, in line with September’s CPI inflation, which campaigners said was the legal minimum it could go up by.

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John Dickie, Director of the Child Poverty Action Group in Scotland, accused the First Minister of breaking a key promise.

He said: “The First Minister said during his leadership campaign that he wanted to see the Scottish Child Payment rise to £30 per week in his first budget.

“It is bitterly disappointing for struggling families that he has failed to deliver.

“We know he had to make difficult choices but having chosen to fund a council tax freeze that financially benefits better-off households, it is hard to understand why his government couldn’t choose to boost the incomes of our hardest-up families.”

Save the Children also said the budget did not provide the “bold action” needed to “shift the dial” on child poverty.

Fiona King, policy manager at Save the Children Scotland, said: “Analysis shows the payment needs to be £40 a week to ensure child poverty falls in line with the government’s own targets.”

She welcomed the introduction of a new tax band for people earning more than £75,000.

However, she added: “This is only a progressive policy if we see the income generated from this being strategically targeted towards well-evidenced policies to create a more fair and equal policy.”

Robison said of the budget: “At its heart is our social contract with the people of Scotland, where those with the broadest shoulders are asked to contribute a little more.

“Where everyone can have access to universal services and entitlements, and those in need of an extra helping hand will receive targeted additional support.

“This budget is set in turbulent circumstances. At the global level the impacts of inflation, the war in Ukraine, and the after-effects of the pandemic continue to create instability. In the UK the combined effects of Brexit and disastrous Westminster policies mean that we are uniquely vulnerable to these international shocks.”