John Swinney scrambled to defend the SNP's soaring taxes, hitting out at "Tory spending cuts" in a major campaign speech in Scotland.
The SNP leader claimed that a "vote for the Labour Party is a vote for the continuation of Tory spending cuts".
He criticised Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves' promise to deliver "iron fiscal discipline", saying it will "do significant damage to public services in Scotland".
Workers in Scotland who earn more than £28,850 pay more income tax than their counterparts in the rest of the UK as a result of frozen thresholds and higher rates.
The average person earning £50,000 in Scotland pays £1,500 more than their equivalent in England. And last year, the Government introduced a new "advanced" income tax rate aimed at high earners.
Despite Scotland's comparatively high taxes, a report from economists at the Frazer Allander Institute published in December suggested that the Scottish Government must address a £1 billion funding gap on resource spending.
The figure is expected to rise to £1.5 billion when capital commitments are included, the report said.
It warned that the fiscal situation in Scotland is likely to be "quite tight" in the years after 2024/5.
But defending the situation, Swinney said: "The Labour Party has signed up to a conservative outlook on expenditure, which is going to do significant damage to our public services.
"A vote for the Labour Party is a vote for the continuation of Tory spending cuts.
"We know what tory spending cuts lok like. And what the Labour Party has signed up to, by signing up to the iron fiscal discipline that Rachel Reeves set out on her visit to Scotland this week - what that translates into is a continuation of Tory spending cuts in Scotland if there is a Labour Government.
"And people in Scotland need to be aware of that reality.
"And they are going to hear that reality from me, day in day out for the remainder of this election campaign."
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He added: "Over the last few years, we have chosen to introduce an approach to progressive taxation, which has acknowledged that people of higher earnings should make a greater contribution to the public purse.
"As a consequence, there is £1.5 billion available to spend on public services in Scotland today that wouldn't be available had the SNP Government not taken the decisions we took on tax.
"And so the investment in our national health service can be higher than it ordinarily would have been because the SNP govt has made the hard choice on tax."
