Eddie Barnes - Local Income Tax row...round 237.

The main Scottish political story of the day is the revelation in this morning's Times that the boss of HM Revenue and Customs, David Hartnett, is claiming there is "no legal basis" for the SNP's local income tax proposal and that his organisation would refuse to collect it. This rather scuppers things. The SNP was already on the offensive yesterday, accusing the Treasury of "bullying", etc. Cue Holyrood vs Westminster war Round 237.

Who gains from all this custard pie throwing? For the SNP, there are plenty of upsides. First off, the fact that the LIT is unlikely to be enacted will not trouble them too much seeing as a consultation revealed that a large majority of public Scotland is against it. And if it does collapse, they can (a) blame Westminster and the other parties for having blocked it and (b) stress how, as a back-stop, they've managed to freeze Council tax.

For Labour and the Tories, the hope will be that the constant stream of stories about the SNP's LIT plans will keep forcing the SNP to continually defend an unpopular policy, whilst giving them an opportunity to point out how bad it is.

However, as stated above, the SNP can always fall back on that highly popular Council tax freeze as the joker in their pack. There's an argument for saying that opposition leaders such as Iain Gray should respond with his own council tax reform package to blunt the SNP's counter-offensive, but opposition strategists say they want to keep the SNP where they want them - defending LIT. Nor would they want to give the SNP a sighter of their own council tax reforms so long before the next Scottish elections.

Expect a few more rounds in this one before a knockout blow is landed.