Reform UK's Scottish election manifesto at-a-glance
PA MediaReform UK has unveiled its manifesto for the Scottish Parliament election on 7 May.
Below are some of the main policies featured in the document.
Top priorities
- Cut income tax
- Reform the NHS
- Reduce welfare spending
- Shut down quangos - public bodies operating at arms-length from the government, such as health boards
- Make Scotland the most successful part of the UK
Cost of living
- Align Scotland's income tax system with the UK's - meaning it would be reduced from six bands to three
- Cut rates by up to 3p below levels south of the border
- Immediately cancel planned increase in council tax
Economy
- Form a department of government efficiency to "cut waste and duplication"
- Re-allocate £1bn currently spent on net zero projects and £6.5bn spent on 132 quangos to fund tax cuts
- Phase out the land and buildings transaction tax - Scotland's equivalent of stamp duty, paid when buying property or land over a certain value - and non-domestic rates - known as business rates.
- Replace them with an annual property tax, the revenues of which are to be handed directly to local authorities
- Review statutory obligations placed on councils by Scottish government
- Review the number of civil servants and limit opportunities to work from home
- Cut social security spending and impose "rigorous face-to-face assessments of claimants"
NHS and care
- NHS to remain free at the point of need and fully funded by general taxation
- Establish a Scottish Healthcare Reform Commission
- Consider "creative" solutions to tackled delayed discharge from hospitals, social care reform, improved prevention strategies, expanded community healthcare and the adoption of the NHS England app in Scotland
Immigration
- Immigrants who adopt Scottish "values" - which the manifesto describes as being "generous, kind, amusing, hard-working, law-abiding and fair-minded" - are to be welcomed
- Restoring a housing rule that meant local authorities could refer homeless applicants to other council areas if they were deemed not to have a connection to the area
- Scrap Glasgow's status as Scotland's main dispersal city for successful asylum seekers
Democracy
- Reduce number of seats at Holyrood from 73 to 57
- Review devolved powers every 10 years
- Impose compulsory physical attendance and voting at Scottish Parliament
- Enact a recall bill allowing constituents to effectively sack their representatives
- End lengthy public inquiries "which transfer taxpayers' money to lawyers"
Housing
- Introduce a rent-to-buy model for young people, first-time buyers and working families
- Build 15,000 new homes per year over the next five years
- Allow local authorities to build affordable housing on town centre brownfield sites for local working families
- Build a sustained supply of social housing, owned by local authorities
- Repeal regulations for all new tenancies while keeping terms of existing tenancies unchanged
Justice
- Impose harsher jail sentences for repeat offenders, increase prison capacity and end early release programmes designed to cut the inmate population
- Tackle the "shoplifting epidemic"
- Scrap hate crime legislation introduced in 2024
- Immediately look to increase police pay
- Abolish Scottish Sentencing Council in favour of direct oversight of sentencing by ministers
Education
- Abolish Education Scotland and return responsibility for education to the Scottish government
- Reform Curriculum for Excellence
- Ban mobile phones in schools
- Use exclusion as an "essential tool" to maintain discipline in the classroom
- Allow secondary schools to apply for the self-governance model used by Jordanhill College in Glasgow
- Review university funding to "ensure degrees are meaningful, value-for-money and grounded in genuine academic merit"
Environment
- Scrap all net-zero subsidies - which can come in the form of grants and interest-free loans - to homeowners, businesses and communities for projects such as energy efficiency and decarbonisation
- Scrap targets to cut fossil fuel emissions and arms-length public bodies involved in net-zero policy
- "Rehabilitate" the North Sea oil and gas industry to make it Scotland's "primary energy system", as well as ending government opposition to new nuclear power stations in Scotland
- The manifesto claims "using our own natural resources again will reduce household bills immediately"
- Simplify the planning system to fast-track permissions for hydro, geothermal, open-cast coal mining and electrical network infrastructure on brownfield or industrial sites
Transport
- Fix potholes and abolish low-emission zones
- Create a 10-year rolling ferry renewal programme and harbour upgrades
- Ease congestion and improve efficiency of roadworks by adopting lane rental schemes to charge utility companies and contractors for road space during busy times
- Support the Clyde Metro and Glasgow Airport link
Defence
There were no defence policies outlined in the manifesto for the 2026 Scottish Parliament election

