As Ministers consult – again – on reforming the council tax, Brian Taylor explains why the exercise may be doomed

Perhaps Ministers felt emboldened by Hallowe’en – but this week the Scottish Government dipped a decidedly tentative toe into the Stygian depths of council tax reform. Not that you would notice. The Finance Secretary, Shona Robison, stressed that the entire exercise would be “revenue neutral.” That is, no change to the overall amount of cash raised from householders. Maybe, possibly a redistribution of the burden. But even that was played down.

Ministers were not advocating any specific reform. Anything that did emerge would need full consensus, “a long delivery period” - and, thus, would not be completed “in this decade”. Way to kill a story, Shona. Still, one can understand. After all, it was reform of local government finance which ousted Margaret Thatcher from Downing Street. Remember the poll tax? Course you do.

SNP Ministers have spent much of their prolonged period in office uttering sundry promises to shake up the council tax, which replaced the poll tax. When he was Finance Secretary, John Swinney looked at Local Income Tax – which had occupied SNP (and Liberal Democrat) thinking for aeons. He looked, he pondered – and concluded it was an even bigger stinker than the council tax. Not that he quite put it that way, of course.........

© Herald Scotland