By Andy Wightman, Local Government spokesman for the Scottish Greens

It is not surprising that local government featured prominently in this year’s budget negotiations once again. I’m pleased that the Scottish Greens managed to extract more money for local services in the budget this week, delivering the £95m identified by Cosla as this year’s cash shortfall for councils.

In Edinburgh, that means £7.43m more than was offered by the SNP’s original draft budget, and Green councillors in the city have already identified that this could accelerate the delivery of two new schools in Wester Hailes and Liberton, as well as reverse the cut to Edinburgh Leisure and pay for much needed tree planting expansion in the capital.

But it has been clear for a long time that our local government finance system is broken. This is not just about the money itself, it is about political and fiscal powers. While Greens have secured new powers to introduce levies on tourism and employers’ parking spaces, local government in Scotland remains among the weakest and least autonomous anywhere in Europe.

It is depressing that over 20 years of devolution we have not yet abolished the regressive and out-of-date council tax. And it is a source of immense frustration that my proposal to hand control of the non-domestic rates back to local councils to whom the tax belongs was defeated by Labour, Conservatives and the SNP, backed by powerful vested interests who prefer centralised decision-making in Edinburgh to genuine local autonomy.

Repatriation of rates would have represented the biggest devolution of fiscal powers to local authorities since the Scottish Parliament was established. It should have been a no-brainer, but it was another example of where the Scottish Government seems unwilling to decentralise and devolve power.

Scotland remains one of the most centralised countries in Europe. In countries such as Finland with the same population as Scotland, they have over 300 municipalities – 10 times the number of councils as in Scotland – and this is the European norm. It has not always been thus. Until 1930 there were 1109 parishes and town councils in Scotland. Now there are just 32 local authorities.

Scottish politicians of all persuasions have with varying degrees of enthusiasm argued that the Scottish Parliament should have more powers and be responsible for raising a greater proportion of its own revenue. But the logic has stopped at Holyrood. Councils in most European countries control around 50% of their own revenue. In Scotland it is 15-20%.

As we face the big challenges of the climate crisis, demographics and affordable housing, it is local communities and councils who need the powers, the finance, the flexibility and the accountability to address them. In short, local government should be local and it should have the powers to govern.

We have the power to deliver this now. It is long past time we did so.