SCOTLAND's police chief has urged the SNP to use its general election landslide to bring an end VAT payments crippling his force.
In an unusual political call, Sir Stephen House said he hoped the party could use its new Westminster influence to stop tax payments that this year will amount to double a predicted funding gap.
Police Scotland is this financial year due to pay around £24m in value-added tax on goods and services it buys, despite the fact that no other UK force has to do so.
Sir Stephen has long railed against the VAT payments, which Police Scotland pays because the UK Treasury has not seen fit to add the force - or is sister fire and rescue service - to a list of exempted public bodies.
The bill, after all, comes as he has admitted he will need to adopt as yet unspecified "extreme measures" to meet an expected budget shortfall of £11m. Such measures are expected to have frontline impact.
But his new and highly political tone was designed to send a message to both Holyrood and Westminster.
Citing other national bodies given VAT exemptions, he said: "I know there are people from the Treasury who will come up with explanations as to why we're slightly different, but looking at the simple fairness of it, it does not add up.
"We look to the Government to make use of the mandate they've been given by the Scottish public, and it's a mandate that's hard to deny with 56 MPs out of 59.
"I'm not suggesting this is the first thing they should be asking, but I'd like it to be on their list.
Sir Stephen was speaking at the annual conference of the Association of Scottish Police Superintendents (Asps).
That body's president, Chief Superintendent Niven Rennie, told Justice Secretary Michael Matheson: "This is a ludicrous and unjustifiable VAT bill from the Palace of Westminster and I hope the 56 MPs from your party embedded in its walls will have clout."
Sir Stephen - in front of more than 100 delegates at the conference - quizzed Mr Matheson on how likely the SNP was to secure concessions on VAT.
Mr Matheson was unable to make a prediction. He said: "This is not something that requires a change in legislation. It can be changed by a stroke of the pen by the chancellor. We are not going to let up on this issue."
He added that that the UK Government had previously added other new bodies, such as controversial "Academy" schools, to the list of exempted bodies.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.Â
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.Â
That is invaluable.Â
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article