SCOTTISH Labour MP Michael Shanks has contradicted his nominal leader on the council tax freeze.
Shanks, who has previously claimed that he would follow the Scottish Labour line despite being in Keir Starmer’s Westminster group, told the BBC on Thursday that council tax “should not be frozen” by the government in Edinburgh.
However, Anas Sarwar, the Scottish Labour leader, has previously supported the policy. He told the Daily Record last year: “I back the freeze. I do back the freeze, but it has to be fully funded.”
The Scottish Government made £147 million available to councils in order to fund the freeze, with a further £45m expected in after consequentials from the UK Government’s Spring Budget.
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Scottish local authorities were given the option of accepting a share of that funding, or of raising council tax on their constituents.
Labour-run Inverclyde Council was among the authorities to opt to raise council tax, with leader Stephen McCabe telling a full meeting that he had gone against his party bosses wishes in doing so.
McCabe’s snubbing of Sarwar’s position has now been followed up by Shanks, who was asked if the Labour council leader was right to ask Michael Gove to circumvent Holyrood with additional funding.
The Scottish Labour MP told the BBC: “I think it's for individual council leaders to do what they think is best for their council. I think they've been put in a horrible situation where they're having to make decisions about cuts in the local communities.
“But they don't have the ability, they've lost their democratic ability to raise the council tax.”
Shanks (above) said he thought most people would be “in favour of paying a little bit more council tax to ensure the local facilities were paid”.
He added: “It should be in the hands of local councils to make these decisions. It shouldn't be frozen in Edinburgh.”
Shanks’s comments are embarrassing for Sarwar, who is nominally in charge of Scottish Labour policy.
Asked about the split, Scottish Labour issued a statement which did not address it.
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A spokesperson said: “Across Scotland councils run by every political party face making impossible decisions.
“No councillor – SNP, Labour or Liberal Democrat – came into politics to make these decisions to decimate their communities.
“The SNP and the Greens have taken Tory austerity and compounded it, siphoning money away from essential services and treating local government with contempt.
“Now libraries are closing, roads are crumbling, bins are overflowing, and the failure of the SNP to fully fund a freeze in council tax means local authorities are facing even more impossible choices.
“Scottish Labour remains committed to a fair funding deal for our local communities.
“It should be the case that when the Scottish Government’s budget goes up, the budget for local communities goes up too.”
Analysis from the House of Commons library published earlier in the week suggested that Scotland’s block grant will consist of just 3.5% of UK Government spending in 2023/24 and 2024/25, according to the Autumn Statement plans.
This is the lowest share of UK Government spending since devolution.
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