Council tax will remain frozen, teacher numbers will be maintained and probationary teacher places secured under an agreement by all councils to sign up to the Scottish Government's budget priorities, the Finance Secretary has said.
Local authorities had until March 11 to indicate whether they would accept the full council budget allocation in exchange for agreeing to the SNP-administration's demands on council tax and teachers. Failure to do so would have resulted in a smaller budget allocation.
Speaking at Holyrood, Finance Secretary John Swinney said all 32 councils have signed up, but Labour insisted the local authorities had "no real option".
Mr Swinney said: "In setting the budgets for next year, all local authorities were asked, in return for the full funding package available, to freeze council tax for the sixth consecutive year and to maintain teacher numbers in line with pupil numbers, while securing places for all probationer teachers who require one.
"The deadline for receipt of communications was March 11 and I have received no indication from any local authority that they do not wish to take forward these provisions. I am therefore pleased to report that all 32 local authorities' budgets for 2013-14 should contain full provision to enable these commitments."
Each local authority will now share in the £70 million set aside to "compensate councils for the council tax income foregone".
But Labour local government spokeswoman Sarah Boyack said the commitments are an example of "the Scottish Government's centralisation agenda", and insisted the freeze is "underfunded".
"Every single council leader would rather accept this deal than no deal," she said, adding: "We know that local authorities have no real option to sign up, and in every part of Scotland there will be negative consequences. One academic noted that it is a tighter squeeze than even the Tories managed.
"The council tax freeze that John Swinney is so proud of is underfunded, and the strings that come with today's package means that the Scottish Government doesn't just set the money for every local authority but they require a commitment on how revenue is actually spent and they set the parameters."
Conservative MSP Margaret Mitchell also welcomed the continuation of the council tax freeze because it means "Scottish households will have certainty that at least one bill will not rise over the coming year".
