Hansard

Having been on the previous Finance Committee when we spent many happy hours considering and then legislating on the land and buildings transaction tax, I continue to have a fair degree of affection for LBTT, so I appreciate the opportunity to take part today and renew its acquaintance.

LBTT was the first devolved tax that we legislated on in the Parliament so, just like the eldest child in a family has a special place in its parents’ affections, I think that, for some of us, LBTT has a special place in our affections.

LBTT may not be the best-known tax that we have, and it may not produce the most money—it tends to be outshone by its bigger sibling, income tax—but it is a fully devolved tax that we were able to fashion in more of a Scottish way of doing things, and John Swinney deserves many congratulations for his role in leading on it.

No legislation is perfect, as has been said, and, in any case, circumstances change. I fully support the principle that we should revisit and review legislation and seek to improve on it when that is required, so I am more than happy to support this amending bill. It seeks to correct what is widely agreed to have been an unfairness that was not spotted at the earlier stages of our consideration of the tax.

I do not think that, as a Parliament, we need to be worried about that. We debate and legislate based on what we know at the time, and we then build on that as we move forward. That raises the question, however, of how we amend tax legislation on a regular and on-going basis. I am attracted to the suggestion made by the Law Society of Scotland—and, I think others—that we should consider a regular finance bill for, as the Law Society describes it,

“necessary changes ... at the administrative end of policy”.

That might not need to be annual, but it could perhaps be every two or three years. Something like that appears to happen with the Treasury and HM Revenue and Customs in the UK, and that is something that we could perhaps adapt for our purposes. I understand that the Government and the Finance and Constitution Committee will look into that, and it certainly sounds like a possibility to me.

I take the point that the forthcoming change to legislation needs to be publicised, so that those who could benefit from it are aware of it. However, we clearly need to be aware that we are probably looking at only between 76 and 189 cases, so I do not think that a widespread advertising campaign on television is needed.

In whatever way we look at it, LBTT has been an improvement on SDLT. It has been more progressive and fair from the beginning. The first-time buyers relief of £175,000 is very generous in my opinion. I accept that house prices vary a lot around Scotland, but people can certainly buy a reasonable flat in my constituency for less than half of that amount.

I hope that we can all support the bill at stage 3. It appears to be one of the less contentious bills that we have dealt with in this place, and I look forward to voting for it at decision time.