SCOTLAND’S hospitality trade has a message for the Scottish Government: enough is enough. First, there was the smoking ban. Then there was the cut in the drink-drive limit. Now the owners of pubs, clubs and hotels are facing large increases in their rates which some in the sector believe could push more businesses over the edge. Pubs and clubs will close, they say. Jobs will go too. And one club owner has gone even further. The rates rise, he says, is an iron bar that will break the trade in Scotland.

There will be some observers who think this is just the hospitality trade squealing because it is being forced to pay more tax, and businesses certainly need to pay their fair share of taxes to support public services, especially when those services are coming under intense pressure.

However, there are two undeniable facts about Scotland’s pub and hotel sector. The first is that it is vital for the country’s economic prosperity, particularly in cities and towns. The second is that the sector has been under great pressure in recent years, with pubs in particular feeling the strain – the rate of closure is now three pubs every single week. It is in that context that the extra burden of big rate rises should be judged.

An immediate problem is that the new rates, which are due to come into force this April, are partly based on rental values calculated in 2015, when the economy was arguably in better shape and had better prospects than it does now. But the more profound problem is that the rates applied to hotels and pubs are not calculated in the same way as they are to businesses in other sectors. The rates in the hospitality trade are based partly on turnover, whereas the rates for other types of commercial property are calculated largely on square footage with turnover excluded.

This has been the way the system has worked for some time, but it is hard to see how such a discrepancy can be fair, particularly when it leads to small pubs facing rises while some supermarkets enjoy a cut. Not only would it be fairer to calculate rates on the profit that a pub or club makes rather than turnover, the system also risks creating a disincentive for small businesses to expand.

The hope for the longer term is that, when it reports this summer, the Barclay Commission on the business rates system will suggest a fairer model that will rate pubs and hotels in the same way as other businesses.

Which begs an important question: why force the rate rises through now before the commission has reported back? It would have been fairer to wait for the results of the commission so a sober assessment could be made of the current state of the rates system. Indeed, there is still time for the Scottish Government to do the right thing, put the rises on hold and prevent that iron bar of big rate rises coming down on a trade that is vital to the Scottish economy.

The Government then needs to seriously tackle the question of reform and support a fairer, more sustainable model for calculating non-domestic rates. In all their complaints about the rate rises, no one in the hospitality trade has denied that every business must pay their fair share in tax. All they asking for is that all businesses are treated fairly.