Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson has been accused of committing a Mitt Romney- style gaffe ahead of her appearance at the Tory Party annual conference.
The SNP seized on extracts released ahead of her speech today in which she said just one in eight Scots, 12%, was a "net contributor".
She called Scotland a "gangmaster" state due to the high proportion of the population who work for the public sector.
The SNP accused her of a gaffe on the scale of US presidential candidate Mr Romney.
He was secretly taped telling donors he did not concern himself with 47% of voters whom he said paid no income tax.
The Conservatives said they stood by the figures – which they said came from the 2010/11 Government Expenditure and Revenue Scotland report.
But SNP MSP Kenneth Gibson called on Miss Davidson to apologise.
He said the comments were her "Mitt Romney moment", adding: "At least Mitt Romney only insulted around half of Americans though, while Ruth Davidson believes almost 90% of Scots do not contribute to society.
"It is an outrageous slur, and [she] should apologise to the people of Scotland."
Miss Davidson is expected to tell a fringe event at the conference, in Birmingham: "It is staggering that public sector expenditure makes up a full 50% of Scotland's GDP and only 12% of people are net contributors, where the taxes they pay outweigh the benefits they receive through public spending."
She is also due to add: "Only 12% are responsible for generating Scotland's wealth. I wonder how many of them work on public-sector contracts?"
The extract went on: "If the gangmaster state is the only provider people can see for their housing, education and employment, it's no surprise those who seek to break the stranglehold find barriers in their way."
Her team later made clear Miss Davidson would refer to 12% of households.
A Tory source said the Scottish Conservative leader was not giving a message to voters, but was pointing out "economic reality".
She will also accuse Labour and the SNP of still blaming the Conservative Party "for the problems they have created – and are continuing to create".
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article