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It's not simply £70m each year, because the costs of delivering services keep going up.

You really need to explain your figures here. "The second year of a freeze requires £140m, the third year £210m, and we're now in the fourth year of the freeze, so St Andrew's House has to hand over £280m to sustain services at 2007 levels".

Are you claiming that council inflation will rise by 100% year on year? That would appear to be the only reason that if year one costs £70ml the next year will cost £140ml. Or maybe in the weird world of council finance the 2012 £70ml will have to be paid again in 2013 along with the £70ml from 2013.

Time to look again at the figures and explain how these totals were arrived at.

This comment has been referred for further consideration. Explain.

Look, the fact is that people want to pay less council tax not more. We're fed up with lining the pockets of overpaid council managers in particular and many of us believe councils are involved in things they shouldn't be.

Personally I'd like to see a complete reappraisal of what councils do because I think most people would agree many of them are out of control.

New Labour were promising cuts and more cuts - deeper than Thatcher dreamt about - according to Gordon Brown's Darling.
The reality is that Gordon Brown wrecked the economy whilst making himself a Millionaire. Not bad work for a guy who once claimed to be a socialist?
We need more direct and progressive taxation - unfortunately, a fairer system will not be possible whilst Westminster run and drain Scotland.
Slainte Mhor

Why were councils salting money away in Icelandic banks Who if anyone has been held responsible for the loss of that money? Has any one of them ever given an explanation or said sorry for the loss of this money?Why do councils need to carry a surplus they should only be funded to the level of their needs

I appreciate the council tax freeze if you fall between being well off where it is just another bill to be met or being on benefits where you do not pay it is a constant grind meeting this tax

Councils have now become overgrown administrative monstrosities ; no longer fit for purpose , obsessed with expansion of their role in society and becoming more and more draconian and self serving. They have now lost sight of their purpose, to serve the public , and see themselves as something akin to the old Russian local soviets, controlling every aspect of local life. They spend money provided by the taxpayer on schemes , focus groups and social initiatives that are more politically self gratifying than useful to the community. They employ myriads of people in obscurely named posts engaged in meaningless tasks, and when called on to make cuts, reduce the size of the essential services yet find the finance to maintain what are commonly referred to as the "non jobs " because in the eyes of some bureaucrats, such jobs take precedence to services. Meanwhile at the top of the administrative ladder salaries are paid that are far in excess of anything the incumbents , generally in post by default or political suitability , could ever hope to earn in the private sector, if indeed they could find employment. Sadly apathy on the part of the electorate and the power of the large political parties mean that changing the attitudes and practices of local government and councils is only possible if it has the backing of government. This however will never happen since government is so either enmeshed with the unions or incapable of engaging either in dialogue with unions or indeed going into battle with them. At the end of the day, nothing changes and the taxpayer foots the bill.

Holyrood is a law-making Parliament! aka GRC................glorified regional council the grown up equivilent of local whatever.............PS the last in first oot will apply, so you'll still have pretty much the core foundation in place........Personally want to know what happened to the captain of the south lanarkshire council that left this region short of £6.8m courtesy of iceland......Oh, I know! been moved to Director For Walking..............

@1
The £70m given to councils was to compensate them for the revenue they lost by increasing the council tax by inflation. In future years, you have to compensate them by the amount they would have raised if they had increased council tax in year 1 and in year 2. Hence £140m.

Now £70m may have been enough in 2007. There are arguments on both sides to that - but it is certainly not enough in 2011, and definitely wont be enough in 2012.

Regardless of who does it and for how long if the Council Tax can be frozen with no serious knock on effect the it's too high already.

This post reminds me of a political theorem I have - Universally supported policies are very often, universally idiotic.

This is a classic example of 'populism' leading into a political dead end that will benefit no-one. This whole debate is just bonkers. As you have cogently pointed out, property taxes are generally progressive and getting rid of them is just a completely silly idea if you wish to maintain a large public sector which requires a wide tax-base.

There is certainly plenty of scope of being more imaginative about local taxation but the current policies are all decidedly poor efforts and as you point out none address the key issue of the long-term balance between central and local taxation. The Tory policy of pensioner discounts seems the most logical and in keeping with the worthy (Lib Dem supported!) objective of a flat rate pension and eliminating the frankly dismal legacy of means tested benefits for pensioners.

At the risk of trying to stimulate a wider debate...

I think a good option would be for a combination of a 'housing charge' AND local income tax. The housing charge would be set at a lower level than the existing council tax (half?) and could be either fixed or banded (perhaps with fewer bands?) and could be subject to a national cap or controls. Then a substantial local income tax element would allow the re-balancing back towards the 50:50 split between local and national taxation.

Politically this should be a reasonably easy 'sell'. Qualitatively, the 'housing charge' bit covers the elements of local services provided to each household like refuge collection, street lighting, roads etc. and the local income tax bit is based on the ability to pay towards the wider local provision.

Probably the biggest advantage is that in the long-term it does not handicap future Scottish Parliaments. They would have ability to vary the ratios between hosing and income without needing to legislate again or waste time and effort changing the entire system. Supporters of local income tax can ramp that up or if another party/coalition comes into power they could ramp up the housing charge up again.

Thoughts appreciate...

PS In reply to 1 - some of us actually paid attention to our maths lessons and can understand the rather simple concept of inflation, so the figures make absolutely prefect sense to all of us.

So, 70 million extra each year is required by each council, but that extra must surely be collected in general taxation. Just as long as wages are increasing at the same rate. It gives a clue to the value held in our fiat currency - not a lot and less and less.

People like the council tax freeze because previously council tax rates were rising much faster than inflation year on year. There was no control. Were they expanding their own little empires or just paying themselves, particularly their CEOs et al, higher and higher salaries? I believe it was the latter. They learned it from the bankers.

8@

Absolute rubbish. The £70ml paid in year 2012 will cover fully the shortfall for that year. What they will need the following year will be the £70ml plus inflation, which even allowing for the way that Labour destroyed the UK finances that will not be 100% as this article seems to suggest.

"In future years, you have to compensate them by the amount they would have raised if they had increased council tax in year 1 and in year 2. Hence £140m". They have already been compensated for year one by the £70ml by these figures the financial year 2012 would be paid again every year until year five, with year two paid every year until year five and so on.

12. At 15:40pm 19th Apr 2011, dubbieside

Perhaps this will explain it.
Take year 0 to be the last year of Council Tax rises, all figures are in millions.

Year 0 – Total Council spending of 2550m pounds
Year 1 – Total is 2550m plus 70m (inflation at 2.75%) equals 2620m
Year 2 – Total is now 2620m plus 70m (inflation) equals 2690m
Year 3 – Total is now 2690m plus 70m (inflation) equals 2760m
And so on …

Now subtract Year 0 from Year 3 and you get the amount required for Year 3 which is 210m.