John Swinney has finally abandoned all pretence that he can produce a Local Income Tax as promised in the SNP manifesto. This is a surprise to no-one: there never was a detailed, thought-through, workable Local Income Tax Policy in the first place. The LIT was a line in the SNP manifesto designed, not as real policy in itself, but as slogan to replace the Council Tax. The reasoning being that “the Council Tax is unpopular, let’s get a few votes by opposing it”. Which is all very well, but if you oppose the current tax, and you are in power, you need a working alternative. And LIT has so many faults and contradictions that it just exploded in the face of John Swinney and Alex Salmond.
To date the SNP dropped the abolition of student debt, starter packs for first-time-buyers, 1000 extra police, matching Labour’s school building programme “brick-for-brick” and the Local Income Tax. Next in line is the Scottish Futures Trust, another empty slogan masquerading as a policy. That will make almost the full house of abandoned SNP policies.
What price the referendum as the next candidate for the “oot the windae” treatment?
