Costing benefits

Bob Taylor (Letters, 10 November) asks which of the universal services Scottish Labour would charge for? It’s a fair question.

I wonder if, conversely, Mr Taylor or the SNP would clarify the cuts which are being made elsewhere in the budget in order to fund these universal services?

But we already have one answer as your front-page headline makes clear: “Teacher numbers set to fall as cuts take toll”.

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Your recent report (5 November) highlighted the fact that education is “no longer free as parents buy basics for schools”. The SNP’s promises to maintain teacher numbers, reduce class sizes and cut the numbers of 
pupils in poor schools by half have proved to be hot air. What is the use, I wonder, of, for example, free university tuition to pupils whose prospects of ever being able to take advantage of it are being put at risk in the first place?

The Scottish Government’s response is barely credible. If councils cut teacher numbers because of a lack of funding, then they will “face a financial penalty”. That should help!

Moreover, Cosla and the 
government are developing a “more useful measure of educational outcomes which will shift the focus away from measures such as teacher numbers”. How convenient! Let’s move the goal posts. Will it be a real shock to us if schools are deemed to be 
successful under the new 
criteria?

Whether money is spent on universal benefits or on our crumbling schools is, of course, a matter of choice. Universal benefits are obviously by their very nature vote catchers. I therefore see little prospect of the SNP making any hard choices rather than continuing to concentrate on courting popularity.

Colin Hamilton

Braid Hills Avenue

Edinburgh