Joint Working Group on Sources of Local Government Funding and Council Tax Reform minutes: 24 October 2024

Attendees and apologies

Core membership attendees:

• Cabinet Secretary for Finance and Local Government (Chair)
• Minister for Public Finance
• Cllr Shona Morrison, Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA) President
• Cllr Steven Heddle, COSLA Vice-President
• Cllr Katie Hagmann, COSLA Resources Spokesperson
• Robert Emmott, Local Authority Director of Finance Group
• Les Robertson, Institute of Revenues, Rating and Valuation (IRRV) Representative

Also in attendance:

• James Messis - Scottish Government
• Jonathan Sharma – COSLA
• Gary Leadbetter – COSLA

Items and actions

9th meeting

The Chair welcomed members to the ninth meeting of the group, and noted the significant developments since the last meeting, including:

• a UK General Election
• the appointment of a new First Minister
• changes to the Scottish Cabinet, resulting in updated Ministerial membership of the group

The Chair confirmed that the group will continue to be co-chaired by Scottish Ministers and Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA), alternating chairing responsibilities. COSLA will chair the next meeting.

The Chair highlighted the success of enabling local authorities to introduce discretionary Council Tax premiums on second homes, noting that 30 of 32 authorities have adopted this measure, generating over £20 million in revenue this year.

The Chair clarified that this meeting’s primary aim was to take stock of progress on Council Tax reform and establish how to proceed meaningfully, given the elapsed time since the last meeting and changes in group membership.

The group engaged in a stocktake of the progress made and deliberated on the way forward. The following points were discussed and agreed that the previous engagement programme was not feasible to achieve within the timescales.

Members agreed that Scottish Government and COSLA would explore alternative approaches to engagement. Consensus was reached that the engagement and reform discussions should focus on property taxation. Some options discussed included:

• considerations and questions around the property market reference point, but with a soft landing
• updating the market reference point over a longer timeframe
• introducing transitional arrangements to ensure any changes to Council Tax bills are implemented incrementally

Members highlighted the technical and political complexities of the issue and agreed that broader political support is necessary for reform. It was agreed that as well as a programme of engagement, COSLA could use its role to engage in discussions across political parties to help establish consensus. The group agreed that the views of Scottish Assessors could inform the content of engagement. 

Members were thanked for their contributions and reminded that COSLA would chair the next meeting.