HELENSBURGH households could pay up to £600-a-year more in council tax if proposals to ramp up bills are rubber stamped next week.

Councillors in Argyll and Bute will vote on a three per cent increase in council tax across the region – the maximum allowed – when the local authority agrees its spending plans for the coming year.

But vital local services could be spared any further cuts as a result.

The move would see lowest band houses asked to pay just over £800, an extra £23-a-year, while the bill for the highest bands could rise to almost £3,000.

The recommendation to consider increasing council tax by the maximum amount – in line with several other Scottish councils – is part of a package of measures which, if adopted in full, would result in the council not just balancing its budget but ending up with a surplus of £2.58 million.

Last year the Scottish Government announced an end to the council tax freeze which has been in place across Scotland since 2007, but told councils any increases would have to be limited to three per cent.

Helensburgh and Lomond’s MSP, Jackie Baillie, said the blame for the likely increase lay with the Scottish Government and not the council.

Ms Baillie said: “The SNP came to power ten years ago with a promise to scrap the council tax. Now the only thing they have scrapped is the council tax freeze.“The 3 per cent increase proposed by Argyll and Bute Council will be applied across the board to shore up funding for local services after the block grant from Edinburgh was cut by the SNP. “However this comes on top of tax increases of up to 22.5 per cent on higher band households already imposed directly by SNP ministers.“People in Helensburgh and Lomond will end up paying more in tax without seeing any improvement in local services. Every penny raised in tax will have to go towards filling the huge gap between what we need and what we actually get from the SNP in Edinburgh.”

Kirsty Flanagan, the council’s head of strategic finance, estimates the increase in Argyll and Bute would raise an extra £1.239 million.

A spokesperson for finance minister Derek Mackay said: “This is not the first time that Jackie Baillie has indulged in naked political opportunism – saying one thing to her constituents while saying the opposite in the Scottish Parliament.“For ten years, Ms Baillie has attacked the council tax freeze – now she attacks her local council for ending the council tax freeze.“And of course, Ms Baillie voted in the Scottish Parliament for the very council tax reforms which she is now criticising – indeed, the only issue she appeared to have with them was that the increases in higher band homes would not be large enough.

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“Argyll and Bute Council will keep every penny it raises from these reforms to spend on local services.

“Despite years of austerity imposed on our budget by the Tories at Westminster, local government has been treated very fairly by the SNP government, and the overall increase in spending power to support local authority services for next year amounts to over £400m.”

The council has already agreed to end the council tax discount on second homes in the area, raising an additional £380,000, while the increase to council tax in bands E, F, G and H – already directed by the Scottish Government – is expected to raise £2.306m.

Helensburgh Conservative councillor Gary Mulvaney, who chairs the authority’s Helensburgh and Lomond area committee, said: “With the SNP government contining to cut council funding, with another £6m cut this year alone for Argyll & Bute, a small increase will be needed to retain as many of the vital services as possible.

“Of course, those in Band E-H homes will see a further increase as result of the surcharge imposed centrally by the SNP.

“With income tax hikes for middle earners, and a rates revalution next month, the SNP goal to make Scotland a high tax, low growth economy appears to be working.”

But Helensburgh SNP councillor James Robb said the predicted surplus in the council’s budget would make it hard to justify a tax rise to the public.

Councillor Robb said: “For the last nine years the SNP Government has provided extra funding to councils to allow them to freeze council tax.

“In the next financial year councils have the power to raise council tax by up to 3 per cent.

“With the Argyll and Bute Council budget in surplus next year and holding large reserves it may be difficult to explain a rise.”

Local Liberal Democrat councillor Ellen Morton, Argyll and Bute’s depute leader, said: “Our budget is still in the making.

“The Scottish Government has now given us more money – they’ve just reducing the cuts they were going to make. We’re still facing a £6 million funding cut on top of the money cut last year and the years before that.

“A 3 per cent increase on top of the rise for homes in higher bands would represent a very significant increase in council tax for some households.”

Argyll and Bute councillors will also be asked at next week’s budget meeting to approve a 3 per cent increase in most charges to the public for using council services.

Local authorities in Edinburgh, East Renfrewshire, the Borders, Midlothian and the Western Isles have already decided to raise council tax by 3 per cent, while Aberdeenshire Council has approved a 2.5 per cent increase.

A council spokesperson said: “Due to significant cuts made by the Scottish Government this year, the head of strategic finance has made several recommendations, including that the council may wish to end the council tax freeze and replace with a 3 per cent increase, which could raise an additional £1.239m.

“The council will make the final decision at its meeting on Thursday, February 23.”

The Scottish Government says Argyll and Bute’s overall increase in spending power to support local services in 2017-18 amounts to £5.6 million, or 2.7 per cent of the authority’s budget.

If the increase is approved at next Thursday’s meeting the new council tax rates in Argyll and Bute will be as follows:

Band A - £808.89 (up from £785.33)

Band B - £943.71 (up from £916.22)

Band C - £1,078.52 (up from £1,078.52)

Band D - £1,213.34 (up from £1,178)

Band E - £1,591.12 (up from £1,439.78)

Band F - £1,965.82 (up from 1,701.56)

Band G - £2,367.28 (up from £1,963.33)

Band H - £2,959.19 (up from £2,356)

The Band E-H figures are estimates based on the average increase resulting from the Scottish Government’s decision to increase council tax on higher band homes.

The council tax figures do not take into account Scottish Water’s water and sewerage charges, which are included in each household’s overall bill.