Scots paid record £2.7bn in council tax last year, new figures show

Scots paid out more than £2.7 billion in council tax last year, the highest amount ever recorded.

Local authorities billed households £2.837 billion in council tax, which goes towards paying for services such as street cleaning and schools.

With payments made totalling £2.728 billion, councils collected 96.2% of money owed to them.

Scottish Government figures also showed that from the year 1999-2000 to 2022-23 council tax charges totalling £47.975 billion were levied – with households paying out £46.632 billion over this period.

A total of 21 of Scotland’s 32 councils increased council tax rates by 3% in 2022-23 – with eight authorities putting rates up by a smaller amount while Shetland froze bills for its residents at 2021-22 levels.

East Renfrewshire and Falkirk increased their rates by the largest amounts, with rises of 3.50% and 4.00% respectively

Back in 1999-2000 council tax payers were billed for £1.244 billion but a Government report detailed how this “rose sharply” to £1.93 billion by 2007-08, with this “principally due to increases in council tax levels”.

With council tax charges in Scotland frozen between 2007-08 and 2016-17, there was a smaller increase in the total amount charged over this period, with this due to growth in the tax base only.

Collection rates have also “increased steadily”, the report said, with these going from 87.2% in 1998-99 to 95.1% in 2011-12.

Councils, however, collected less of the cash due to them in 2020-21, with the rate falling to 94.8% during the coronavirus pandemic as authorities suspended debt recovery processes to avoid putting more financial pressure on families.

The collection rate is now slightly higher than pre-pandemic levels, with the report stating: “This may be due, in part at least, to the £150 cost-of-living payments made by local authorities on behalf of the Scottish Government.”

Most eligible households received this help as a credit towards council tax accounts.