Don't let Scotland's cool summer fool you as planet is getting warmer

Wildfires raged across Europe
-Credit: (Image: Spyros Bakaliss/AFP via Getty Images)


We must sort out council tax mess

The SNP first won power at Holyrood in 2007 on a bold manifesto which included some eye-catching offers to voters.

High up on the list was a pledge to reform and replace the outdated council tax system that had been introduced by John Major’s Tory government in the early 1990s.

Fast forward 17 years and Scots are still waiting.

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Local taxation might sound the most exciting of subjects but at a time when our public services are crumbling, it could not be more important.

When community centres are closing and swimming pools shuttered, something has gone very wrong with the way we fund local authorities.

There is a long list of complaints against council tax. For a start, the majority of Scots pay their bills based on property prices last calculated in 1991.

It’s also a regressive system which takes little account of a person’s ability to pay.

The STUC is just one of multiple organisations which recognises council tax has had its day and a replacement system should be found.

The need for change is made all the more pressing given the £500m of cuts announced by the Scottish Government last week.

Council tax reform will be a slow and laborious process. It’s not a quick or easy fix.

But allowing the system to just carry on regardless will simply store up even more problems for the future. We can’t keep ignoring the issue.

Scots deserve decent public services. And that means finding better ways of funding them.

Act now on climate

It might have been a dreary and disappointing summer for us here in Scotland - the current nice weather in parts of the country notwithstanding.

But we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that in much of the rest of the world, the mercury continues to rise alarmingly.

For the second straight year, the planet has had its hottest summer since records began, with swathes of Europe, the US and Asia dealing with sweltering conditions.

In Delhi, India, for weeks on end, millions of residents boiled in temperatures hovering around 50C early this summer.

More and more, this kind of unthinkable heat is becoming the norm for nations around the world. It’s frightening.

Climate change is only to keep getting worse until serious action is taken on curbing greenhouse gas emissions.

Scotland may have had a cool summer this year - but be in no doubt, the planet is heating up.

And future generations won’t thank us for failing to act.