Wild exaggeration on council tax increase

In last week`s Observer we witnessed the last throes of a Tory and Labour administration that has nowhere to go and is going there fast.

The claims of £7 million being taken out of Stirling to tackle the education attainment gap elsewhere in Scotland were so hysterical and wild that they beggars belief.

The Scottish Government`s proposals for the council tax for next year have been published and are widely available.

In these proposals council tax bands E and above will be increased by published percentages. We know the detail and, in fact, in a separate article elsewhere in the paper the actual predicted figure to be raised was supplied: £3.9m.

When safeguards for those on low incomes are taken into account, the actual figure anticipated to be raised in Stirling by this adjustment to the council tax is £3.5m.That money stays in Stirling.

What does happen is that when the Scottish Government comes to allocating the funding to local government there will be an adjustment in the money that is given to Stirling. It is anticipated that the allocation to Stirling will be reduced by £2m as a contribution to the funding to be used to close the education attainment gap elsewhere in Scotland, a reallocation policy that has gathered cross- party support, with Labour in Holyrood supporting the SNP plan.

So the Scottish Government will use its powers to judge where money can be best allocated for the greater good of the country.

We should be grateful for that power because just at the time this shambles of a Tory/Labour administration is complaining about reallocation of money away from Stirling it is asking the same Scottish Government to reallocate over £200m to Stirling as part of the City Deal. You couldn’t make it up.

Gerry McLaughlan, SNP finance and economy spokesperson, Stirling Council