Charles III William, Duke of Rothesay Swinney government The Rt Hon John Swinney MSP The Rt Hon John Swinney MSP Kate Forbes MSP Sixth session Alison Johnstone MSP Angela Constance MSP Dorothy Bain KC The Rt Hon Lord Carloway KC PC United Kingdom Parliament elections European Parliament elections Local elections Referendums Starmer ministry The Rt Hon Keir Starmer MP The Rt Hon Ian Murray MP The Scottish variable rate (SVR) was a mechanism which would have enabled the Scottish Government to vary (down or up) the basic rate of UK income tax by up to 3p in the pound.
One such reserved matter was taxation; however, this had been a key point in Scottish negotiations relating to parliamentary control.
As a means of compromise, Westminster afforded the Scottish Parliament the ability to vary income tax, which was subsequently given the consent of the Scottish electorate in the second question of the 1997 devolution referendum.
Therefore, the Scotland Act 1998 granted the Scottish Parliament the power to vary income tax by ±3p in every pound.
This power was often referred to as the tartan tax, a phrase first used by Conservative financier and politician Michael Forsyth as a way of attacking the power, using the idea of 'tartan' to get across the idea that it would be an extra tax on Scots alone.