Good morning! It's Lucy with you this Monday to bring you the latest from The National's news desk.

After a busy weekend of reporting on the impact of Storm Bert, we've got a lot of news to share with you.

Political parties in Scotland have slammed the Labour Government's plans to slash benefits spending, branding the move "vile and out of touch" and accusing Keir Starmer of political posturing.

You can read the exclusive story from my colleague Joe Scotting here.

We also spoke to a number of welfare charities, who said Labour's plans would leave disabled Scots "financially worse off".

In other news, I told how the LibDems confirmed they would vote against the upcoming Budget if it contained even a "penny" of spending on independence.

I spoke to the SNP's deputy leader Keith Brown, who called LibDem leader "anti-democratic" after he made the comments on Sunday morning - read my exclusive story here.

Tommy Sheppard has also written in today's National, arguing that the SNP must start to inspire if the party is to win back voters before the 2026 Holyrood election.

Meanwhile, you can also hear from George Kerevan and Ash Regan.

Plus, in case you missed our Sunday edition, Neal Ascherson wrote that Scotland needs to take an "as if" approach to independence. Read all about it here.

As always, you can find more breaking news, exclusive insight, and in-depth analysis on thenational.scot.

That's it from me for now - we hope you have a great week!