Council tax 'must end', commission finds

Council tax “must end”, the Commission on Local Tax Reform’s report on local taxation states unequivocally.

While clear about the need for change, the report, published today, is less definite about what the change should look like.

The commission outlines three alternatives that could be used at a local level: a tax on property, a tax on land and a tax on income, and suggests a combination tax might be best.

“A replacement system, therefore, would benefit from including multiple forms of tax which would allow local taxation as a whole to be fairer” the report states.

The report rules out specific taxes for specific services, and recommends continuing with a general tax that contributes to “general funding of local services”.

It recommends that any alternative system be designed to minimise the need for “complex relief schemes”, and that any such tax schemes should be easy to understand.

It also advocates setting rates at a local level “wherever possible” to offer greater flexibility and local democracy.

However, the report does not recommend one particular option, leaving it up to individual political parties to use the research to inform their own proposals for an alternative in their manifestos next year, along with the implications of their chosen option.

There are no easy answers, it suggests. “We are not persuaded that a single tax instrument can simultaneously deliver greater equity for taxpayers and autonomy for local government whilst also being efficient and readily implementable.”

Speaking at the launch of the report Marco Biagi MSP, local government minister and co-chair of the commission, said it was “the most detailed work that has ever been done on most of the options” and had “gone beyond what the commission has been asked to do”.

He promised that the SNP would set out in detail their proposal in the new year, “in good time” for people to cast their vote next May.

Co-chair of the commission, Councillor David O’Neill, president of COSLA, said council tax is “not fit for purpose” and although the freeze “hadn’t helped”, even without it “the present system is not forever”.

O’Neill said the work done by the commission means that parties “know where the challenges lie, where the strengths and weaknesses are”, so they “have that at their fingertips” the information they need to come up with an alternative.

Commenting on today’s report, the STUC said: “Given the range and quality of evidence contained in the report, it will be extremely disappointing if any of Scotland’s political parties enter the 2016 elections on manifestos committing to retaining the council tax and the freeze which currently applies”.