One of the most common issues I speak to local Borders residents about is the higher bills they have been facing in recent years.
In Scotland, workers and businesses have suffered from the highest taxes in the whole of the United Kingdom for several years now.
Parties like the SNP and Labour seem to think ever-higher taxes are not a problem. They appear to believe that people can continue to pay more, no matter how much of their own hard-earned money they are already contributing.
Taxpayers are made to keep picking up the bill, even when services are not improving. The SNP's recent budget in Scotland has not helped the situation and, in Labour's first budget as a UK government, they broke promises to not raise tax on workers, businesses and farmers.
The dire consequence of those two budgets will be felt in the Borders over the coming years. As a result of decisions made in those SNP and Labour budgets, there is less to spend on essential local services.
The SNP have squeezed council budgets for more than a decade, reducing the amount of the Scottish Budget that goes towards local authorities, yet at the same time increasing the number of things that they are expected to deliver.
Meanwhile Labour's budget dealt an unexpected blow to Scottish Borders Council and local authorities up and down the country. The decision to raise National Insurance has left councils with higher bills to pay for each employee.
A recent Freedom of Information request revealed the cost to our council. It said: "Based on the Council’s permanently established workforce, the impact of the national insurance increase in 2025/26 is estimated to be £4.328 million."
This means that our council has £4 million less to spend than expected on essential services and, disappointingly, the SNP have refused to help them by increasing funding to cover it.
So, councils are now in the impossible position of either cutting services or raising taxes. Local authorities across Scotland, including locally, will be forced to raise council tax, even though they don't want to do so.
Councils have been forced into this position through no fault of their own by budget decisions made in Edinburgh and London, not here in the Borders.
It's a sorry state of affairs and we can only hope the damage of SNP and Labour decisions is kept to a minimum.
