The First Minister has clashed with opposition leaders over a leaked document examining the financial impact of Scottish independence.
Labour, Tories and the Liberal Democrats all sought to pile pressure on Alex Salmond after a private Scottish Cabinet discussion paper was made public.
Labour leader Johann Lamont claimed the leaked paper shows that SNP ministers "say one thing in private" but that they "deny in public the truth we all know". There is "something very serious at the heart of this Government", she said.
The paper, made public by the Better Together cross-party campaign to keep Scotland in the UK, warns of "inherent real-terms cost pressures with public sector budgets" and that "these pressures could reduce the resources available to provide additional public services".
By 2016-17, public finances are "expected to have returned to a sustainable position" and spending is expected to rise from 2017-18 onwards.
Ms Lamont said it shows that Finance Secretary John Swinney is "talking to the cabinet about cutting" services.
But the First Minister said the document highlights "real-terms growth in public spending" in the future and that this has been "translated by the Better Together campaign, Labour and their Tory allies as being cuts in public spending".
He then criticised the "misrepresentation" of the Better Together campaign. "A document projecting real-terms growth in public spending was described by Johann Lamont and her Tory allies as cuts in public spending. That is clearly not true," he said.
But Ms Lamont said the paper reveals the "real deficit" between what the First Minister says in private and what he says in public. "What in public the SNP claim is scaremongering, in private they agree is the truth," the Labour leader said.
The leaked paper highlights the volatility of oil revenues which, in an independent Scotland, "would have important implications for budget setting". On defence a "much lower budget must be assumed", the paper claims. It also says that "meeting interest payments on inherited debt will be a significant feature of Scotland's budget after independence".
