Today's vote on local taxation is a true landmark. Holyrood did three things. First, MSPs rejected Council Tax as "discredited, bureaucratic and unpopular".
Second, they noted the wide range of options being put forward, including our own Land Value Tax, the SNP's national tax on salary, the Liberals' local tax on salary, and a reformed Council Tax, which is what we presume Labour and the Tories would be pushing if they knew what reforms they wanted.
Finally, and most importantly, though, Parliament backed a set of Green principles for a future system of taxation: fairness, local accountability, the need to reduce tax avoidance and the wider social, economic and environmental impact of any proposed system of local tax reform on communities across Scotland.
It's almost impossible to see either the salary tax or the council tax meeting those criteria. It may be that the end result won't be land value tax, but I can't see anything else on the table that meets those criteria. A good day for the future of local taxation.
(image of a project by Micahel Tavel Architects and David Kahn Studio)
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