Charity scandal

No doubt many readers were tut-tutting over their porridge while reading about how it may have cost the Sick Kids Friends Foundation £500,000 to raise just £60,000 (your report, 3 February). It is now up to the proper authorities to investigate this case to find out what went wrong.

The real scandal this highlights is just how much our health service relies on charity to make it work.

As well as charities raising funds to buy equipment or pay for specialist hospital staff, it is now commonplace for care in the community projects to be fully staffed and managed by charities which compete with each other and submit competitive tenders to secure multi-million pound contracts from local councils and regional health boards.

At the same time we see other charities and commercial concerns raising money to pay for books, computers and other basic equipment for schools. Why should charities have to support and subsidise health and educational provision in Scotland?

The National Health Service and our education system were introduced to use funds raised through taxes and national insurance to provide healthcare and education for all.

Well-meaning individuals raising money to pay for vital hospital equipment and basic educational tools should ask what the government is doing with the money saved. If taxes were used to provide the health and educational services we need, then perhaps our politicians would realise we cannot afford to spend billions on new weapons of mass destruction and tens of millions on a huge raft of overpaid political mandarins who are superfluous to requirements and would still be poor value for money even if they were paid sensible salaries.

JOHN F ROBINS

Bainfield Road

Cardross, Dumbarton