A FEW weeks ago, I warned in this column that the Scottish Government were tweaking the council tax bands, so that higher bands would pay more.

I also said that their “cunning plan” was that the additional money raised in East Lothian would not be spent in the county, but clawed back to the Scottish Government to fund their “school attainment fund”.

Last week, the Courier confirmed this in a front page story. A senior council official warned that county council taxpayers would pay around £3 million more, but East Lothian schools would only see as little as £1 million of the proceeds.

That is just wrong. Local tax raised in East Lothian should be spent in East Lothian.

At this point, some readers might protest that the SNP opposition leader on East Lothian Council is quoted in the article saying that SNP ministers promise all the extra money raised will be spent here. So what is the problem?

Here’s the problem. East Lothian Council raises some of its funds from council tax, and receives some as a Scottish Government grant. The extra money in council tax will be £3 million. The council will keep that, but the government will then cut £3 million off their grant. Our schools will receive £1 million from the national fund. Bingo – the government will have £2 million of our money to spend elsewhere.

So, when SNP ministers and councillors say we keep the extra money they might be technically correct, but they are really trying to take us all for fools.

What they want is councils to get the blame for council tax going up, while ministers have £100 million to spend elsewhere, no doubt with great fanfare and lots of ministerial selfies all round.

I support the £100 million national fund for schools, but it should be funded by national taxes. I support redistribution too, but local tax should be redistributed locally. I have argued for years that our schools should benefit from the attainment fund, but not by cutting even more money from local services.

Frankly, this kind of government sleight of hand is what gives politics a bad name!