Meeting of the Parliament 29 January 2015
Mr Swinney claims to know, but he did not carry out a consultation. He said that he consulted COSLA, but the Scottish Government did not formally do so. We were told by COSLA in committee that the conversation lasted a matter of minutes and that it was simply a conversation about quantum and how much each council was going to get in recompense. There was no discussion of the principles or what impact the legislation could have on payment of council tax in the future.
I can demonstrate to members how far apart the Scottish Government and the councils are. When I asked COSLA whether councils would be compensated if their council tax collection rates faltered as a consequence of the legislation, they seemed to be under the impression that they would be. In evidence to the committee, the COSLA representative suggested that councils would be compensated if that were to happen. When I put the same question to Mr Swinney, he said that there was absolutely no way in which COSLA would be compensated if that were to happen.
We do not know whether council tax collection rates will fall. COSLA has suggested that they might, but the Scottish Government has said that there is no way that COSLA would be compensated. The cost of failure, if that were to happen, would fall on the councils and not on the Scottish Government, which has centrally forced the policy on COSLA, the councils and the rest of the country.
If the policy has an impact, we could be talking about significant sums. There are more than £1 billion of council tax arrears going back over the past two decades or so. It might sound great when Mr Swinney says that 97.5 per cent of council tax is collected, but when one tots up the unpaid council tax it amounts to more than £1 billion.
Even if the policy has a small impact on council tax collection, it will have a big impact on councils and public services. The Scottish Government ought to be on the hook for that, because it is the Government’s policy. The Government has forced it through: it refused to consult or to try to thrash out and see through some of the issues, instead of just pushing the bill through as it is going to do today.
As I said at the start, we are not fighting the policy out of any love or affection for the community charge. We have listened to councils and we think that there are pragmatic reasons for being against the policy, but we are against it too in principle, because—as Mr Swinney said—those who can pay their taxes should properly pay those for which they are liable.
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