Capital is 'odds on' to freeze council tax for second year

Published on Monday 20 October 2008 10:12

CITY council leader Jenny Dawe today said the odds were that Edinburgh will have another council tax freeze when the Capital's budget is set next year.

She said there were still "sums to be done" but her initial view was that council tax bills would be held steady for a second year.

Finance Secretary John Swinney announced at the SNP conference in Perth last week that the Scottish Government would be "making funds available" for all councils to freeze the tax again. A total of 70m is being set aside next year – the same amount as this year – although inflation is now higher.

Glasgow City Council has already warned it will be "nigh on impossible" to have another council tax freeze unless the government comes up with more money.

But Cllr Dawe was more optimistic about Edinburgh's chances. "My kneejerk reaction is not to rule it out," she said.

"Once we have a look at what we will get to recompense us, we will see whether that adds up."

The government's offer is that councils must freeze their tax levels to receive a share of the 70m provided nationally for the purpose – enough, it says, to make up for councils foregoing a 3.2 per cent tax rise.

If any council were to refuse a freeze, it would lose that funding. This year, Edinburgh got 6.9m and decided, along with every other council in Scotland, not to increase the council tax. Cllr Dawe, the city's Liberal Democrat leader, said the issue would have to be discussed with their SNP coalition colleagues.

She said: "We are doing the groundwork for next year's budget, as much as we can in the changing global circumstances, but the real, serious discussions will start taking place from next month onwards.

"I cannot give a definitive answer. But provided we can make our sums add up the weight is on the side of having that council tax freeze. If at all possible, that's what we will be doing."

She added: "It would mean a very unpalatable increase in the council tax if we rejected the government's offer. And it's not a good time to be asking people to pay more council tax."

Edinburgh Labour group leader Andrew Burns said he was "extremely sceptical" about another freeze.

He said: "It is wholly dependent on what level of finance the Scottish Government is going to give the council. A freeze does take a sizeable chunk out of the local authority budget and there needs to be adequate compensation.

"This year it has led to cuts in frontline services because the council has not had adequate compensation.

"I would absolutely reserve judgement until we see the detail of what is going to be given."