THE disgraced finance secretary Derek Mackay and dozens of other former MSPs will tomorrow share golden goodbyes costing taxpayers more than £2.2million.

Nine MSPs who failed to get re-elected earlier this month and 34 who stood down of their own accord, will be paid controversial “resettlement grants” to help them adjust to life after Holyrood.

All will get at least £32,235, the equivalent of half a year’s salary, but those with more than six years' service get extra pro rata, up to a full year’s salary of £64,470.

The first £30,000 of the lump sum, which is paid automatically by the Scottish Parliament under a 2009 law, is tax free.

The grants include £53,725 payable to Mr Mackay despite him vanishing from the parliament in February 2020 after he resigned for pestering a 16-year-old schoolboy with sleazy texts.

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Mr Mackay, the former SNP MSP for Renfrewshire North and West, has already received a separate payment of £11,945 just for losing ministerial office, in spite of the circumstances.

Resettlement grants are meant to help "with the cost of adjusting to non-parliamentary life", and the only qualification is being an MSP immediately before a Holyrood election and not being one after it. 

No account is taken of personal wealth.

Former Scottish Tory leader Ruth Davidson, who is headed for a £323-a-day seat in the House of Lords and recently landed an £85,000-a-year job as a non-executive director of insurer Royal London, is due a grant of £53,375 after ten years as an MSP.

Former SNP children’s minister Mark McDonald, who quit over a sleaze scandal in 2017, is due to get £42,980 for eight years continuous service.

All of Holyrood’s parties have MSPs who will share in the pay-outs.

Sixteen former SNP MSPs will collect more than £920,000 between them, while 11 former Labour MSPs are together in line for £666,000, and ten former Tory MSPs will share £408,000.

Because he lost his seat in 2011, then returned to Holyrood in 2016, former Liberal Democrat MSP Mike Rumbles is entitled to a second grant of £32,235 after previously qualifying for £57,600.

Four former cabinet secretaries - Aileen Campbell, Roseanna Cunningham, Jeane Freeman and Mike Russell - will also get grants of £12,112 each later in the summer for loss of ministerial office.

All except Ms Freeman are due to receive maximum resettlement grants of £64,470.

Deputy presiding officer Linda Fabiani is also entitled to a special grant for losing that post of £7,588, which when added to her maximum MSP pay-off gives her a total of £72,058.

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The grants for loss of special offices are in addition to the £2.2m worth of golden goodbyes. 

After the 2016 election, the final bill for voluntary leavers and election losers was £2,106,691, and after 2011 it was £2,224,060.

The Taxpayers Alliance recently said voters would be “outraged" at MSPs getting such generous sums and urged the SNP to change the law to ease the burden on taxpayers.

The Scottish Parliament said: "Resettlement grants are paid in accordance with the Scottish Parliamentary Pensions Act (2009)," adding the final cost would be in its next annual accounts.