– in the Scottish Parliament at on 22 December 2016.
Alison Harris
Conservative
5. To ask the Scottish Government what action it is taking to attract more higher-rate taxpayers to Scotland. (S5O-00513)
Derek Mackay
Scottish National Party
Our income tax proposals for 2017-18 and beyond will ensure that Scotland continues to be an attractive place in which to live, work and do business. Tax is only one side of the balance sheet. As we are not passing on the Tory tax cut, those on higher incomes will benefit from the social contract, which includes free higher education, free personal care, free prescriptions and other vital public services in Scotland, and which maintains Scotland as an overall attractive place in which to live and invest.
Alison Harris
Conservative
Can the Cabinet secretary explain why Scotland has seen a decrease of 10,000 higher-rate taxpayers over the past year?
Derek Mackay
Scottish National Party
I do not know why the Conservatives are trying to pretend that our tax position going forward has affected the past. I am happy to look at the issue in further detail and share that information with Alison Harris, who I know is a former chartered accountant—perhaps she is currently practising; I do not know her position—and therefore takes the matter very seriously. I point out that all the predictions that she made in a previous debate on taxation have turned out not to be accurate.
The political party system in the English-speaking world evolved in the 17th century, during the fight over the ascension of James the Second to the Throne. James was a Catholic and a Stuart. Those who argued for Parliamentary supremacy were called Whigs, after a Scottish word whiggamore, meaning "horse-driver," applied to Protestant rebels. It was meant as an insult.
They were opposed by Tories, from the Irish word toraidhe (literally, "pursuer," but commonly applied to highwaymen and cow thieves). It was used — obviously derisively — to refer to those who supported the Crown.
By the mid 1700s, the words Tory and Whig were commonly used to describe two political groupings. Tories supported the Church of England, the Crown, and the country gentry, while Whigs supported the rights of religious dissent and the rising industrial bourgeoisie. In the 19th century, Whigs became Liberals; Tories became Conservatives.
The cabinet is the group of twenty or so (and no more than 22) senior government ministers who are responsible for running the departments of state and deciding government policy.
It is chaired by the prime minister.
The cabinet is bound by collective responsibility, which means that all its members must abide by and defend the decisions it takes, despite any private doubts that they might have.
Cabinet ministers are appointed by the prime minister and chosen from MPs or peers of the governing party.
However, during periods of national emergency, or when no single party gains a large enough majority to govern alone, coalition governments have been formed with cabinets containing members from more than one political party.
War cabinets have sometimes been formed with a much smaller membership than the full cabinet.
From time to time the prime minister will reorganise the cabinet in order to bring in new members, or to move existing members around. This reorganisation is known as a cabinet re-shuffle.
The cabinet normally meets once a week in the cabinet room at Downing Street.
The Conservatives are a centre-right political party in the UK, founded in the 1830s. They are also known as the Tory party.
With a lower-case ‘c’, ‘conservative’ is an adjective which implies a dislike of change, and a preference for traditional values.
