Hundreds have taken part in a demonstration outside the Scottish Parliament in protest at cuts to council budgets.

Unite and GMB Scotland organised the demonstration to coincide with the first stage of debate on finance secretary John Swinney's budget at the Scottish Parliament on Wednesday.

Union officials claimed a £350m council budget cut for 2016/17 would result in 10,000 redundancies across Scotland.

The demonstration came as Mr Swinney has warned local authorities any attempt to raise council tax will be seen as an act of "bad faith" and lead to the withdrawal of their entire share of a £408m support package.

Unite's Scottish secretary Pat Rafferty said: “Make no mistake our councils are being force fed an austerity agenda that’s been manufactured by the Tories in Westminster but delivered by the Scottish Government.

“Invidious choices are being made across the country but the blame will ultimately come back to the Scottish Government unless it is prepared to co-operate with councils and trade unions now to explore alternatives.

“From that end Unite members have been making the case for an amnesty on pre-devolution debt owed to the Treasury by our local authorities, who are currently repaying as much as 44 pence in every pound of council tax collected to service debt.

“There is no quick-fix but we’ve lost 60,000 jobs across local government since 2009 and we cannot afford to lose tens of thousands more."

Mr Swinney told Holyrood's Local Government Committee he was prepared to claw back some of a £408m funding package if councils did not meet agreed targets.

He said: "So, for example, a local authority signs up to protect teacher numbers but in fact doesn't do so, I would reserve my right to claw back a proportion of the £88m involved in the settlement in relation to teacher numbers.

"I have subsequently had correspondence from the leader of Moray Council. "It has asked me the scenario: if a local authority was to sign up to all three elements of the package and then subsequently, at budget-setting date which would be in the next few weeks, decided not to freeze the council tax, would I just penalise them in relation to the council tax?

"Or would I withdraw the support - their share of the £408m, the total package of support available?

"I have taken the opportunity of that scenario to clarify to all local authorities that if an authority told me on February 9 that they were going to sign up to all three elements, but then a couple of weeks later decided to increase the council tax, I would consider that to be an act of bad faith.

"I would withdraw the funding in relation to the whole £408m."