ONE of the sharpest political quotes exposing class inequality, the distribution of wealth and political hypocrisy is attributed to an anonymous “unemployed wife” living on Clydeside in Scotland during the Depression of the 1930s.

The story goes that a well-meaning upper-class woman held a talk to teach a group of wives of unemployed men how to manage their households, including; how to make a nourishing broth from inexpensive fish-heads and fish-bones. After the talk there was an opportunity for questions, whereupon one of the wives asked the pointed question: “Aye, very interesting but who gets the rest of the fish?”

In our current age of austerity, we could do with more of this sort of political insight. The current Scottish “fish” includes the damning facts that Scotland’s two richest families (£14.1 billion) are wealthier than almost a quarter of the population with the least wealth combined (£13.5bn). The combined wealth of Scotland’s five richest families (£19.3bn) is more than the total Scottish income tax revenue for the 2024-25 financial year (£18.99bn) and between 2024 and 2025, the combined wealth of Scotland’s 10 richest families grew at a faster rate (7.9 per cent) than average earnings (5.9 per cent) in Scotland.

That’s why today — Tuesday January 13 2026 — as Scottish Finance Secretary Shona Robison delivers the Budget at the Parliament in Holyrood, members of Unite Community Scotland have joined together to make a similar demand as to our Clydeside heroine.

Unite the union’s Community branches operate across the UK and Ireland for people not in traditional employment. Our membership is varied and includes for example; unemployed people, students, the retired and carers. Most of our campaigning is over issues that affect our local communities but we also come together to support each other on national issues such as; the cuts to winter fuel payments, ending the cruel sanctions regime applied to disability benefits, scrapping the two-child benefit cap and calling for a wealth tax.

A wealth tax is our first and foremost demand — that the Scottish government make full use of the powers it currently has to raise taxes to fund public services and deliver for working-class people.

Local government budgets across Scotland are in crisis and without significant funding the services provided, such as health and social care, education, transport and, most significantly of all, housing, will continue to deteriorate and we are managing decline. These are services our members, their families and their communities rely on.

Much has been written about the delivery of such local services, new ways of working and the role of the private and third-sector but the reality is that unless local government is properly funded, joined up and delivered by the public sector it will continue to be dysfunctional, inefficient and will fail our communities.

The Scottish Trade Union Congress (STUC) has done some important work on the practicalities of raising tax revenues in Scotland, which set out where the increases should be levied to avoid further tax burdens on the working class. STUC research showed that the Scottish government could raise an extra £3.7bn a year, with at least £1.4bn of that figure coming from a Scottish wealth tax.

Despite protestations to the contrary the Scottish government has the power to introduce several taxes within the framework of the existing local tax system including a specific wealth tax. The potential transformative benefit of a wealth tax is the standout demand among a range of sensible and achievable tax measures to raise funds for vital public services that even includes a “quick win” of an extra £25 million from a tax on VIP private jets.

We have demanded a Budget that delivers for our communities, our families and for working-class people and it can be achieved by taxing the wealthiest. Anything less than this or any half-hearted “gimmicks” aimed at getting sympathetic media coverage, or even claiming to address the daily struggle most people endure to get by, will be another version of the lecture on the nutritional value of fish-head broth.