Patrick Harvie MSP

With inflation starting to drive up the cost of living again, and continual pressure on public services because of the UK Government’s cuts agenda, there’s an urgent responsibility for the Scottish Government to act.

Blaming the Tories for their economic policies and for the reckless Brexit agenda is justified – but words are not enough.

We need to take real action if we want to protect people in Scotland.

Now, finally, there seems to be an opportunity as the SNP has signalled that it is open to new ideas on tax.

Too often, this comes down to a simplistic argument about whether tax should go up or not.

But it is clear to me that people on low and average incomes cannot bear that extra cost.

We must use the tax system not just to raise revenue from everyone, but to fund our public services while closing the inequality gap.

It is only a lack of imagination that’s been stopping us so far.

The Greens have shown how we could actually achieve a tax cut for everyone on a low or average income, so that they keep more of what they earn while raising more from those who can afford it.

And that is just income tax; following through on the longstanding promise to replace council tax with something fairer could also help cut inequality, raising revenue and helping create a more stable housing market where young people actually have a chance of getting a decent home at a fair price.

Next month the UK Government will publish its budget. With it, for the first time, will come a new system for calculating the share of funding Scotland gets back from the taxes we have paid to the Treasury.

It is a messy system and it leaves Scotland with a tight window of just a few weeks to create, scrutinise and agree on its own budget.

But in that time we will have a chance to start replacing the resources that have been taken away from our public services.

We will be able to give the people who deliver those services a fair pay rise too; they have seen their wages fall in value relentlessly over the last decade, and it cannot go on. We will be able to invest in the future, helping to create the stronger, fairer and greener economy that the next generation will depend on.

But we will only be able to do these things if we also start making the tax system fairer, ensuring that we cut the inequality of wealth and income that scars our society, instead of cutting the budgets for the public services we all depend on.