Income tax issues

I am not a part of Labour politics but I do not see why their leaders should rush to adopt separate income tax as a policy.

The statistics are showing that by far the highest tax contributions are from the south-east of Britain. Wales is lower and will not wish to adopt separate income tax. Scotland would not gain or lose much by separate taxation, but in the long term (post-oil) would lose. Do Scots have, as you write, an appetite for separate taxation?

It is only when people have the facts that they will form a view. For now they believe the SNP enough to think it may suit them. The hard information now becoming available contradicts this. The Barnett formula has suited Scotland very well. Given this, do we really want to collect our own taxes?

Hugh Mackay

Edinburgh

It seems that however modest and pessimistic are the coalition’s updated targets for economic growth in the UK, those in the real world such as the IMF and the ratings agencies inevitably react by expressing scepticism and predicting a worse outcome.

Are we now reaching a point where the positions of the Yes and No campaigns will be reversed – those against independence for Scotland will now be accused of having a reckless disregard for economic realities and baseless optimism in the future of the UK, while the Yes camp will be labelled as lacking in adventure in favouring the too obviously safe option of getting Scotland out of the drifting vessel that is the UK?

Alan Oliver

Brightons

Andrew HN Gray (Letters, 20 April) equates the rise of the SNP with oil and gas discoveries. Winnie Ewing’s by-election victory in 1967 was a major part of that rise and was before we knew about the oil.

We cannot know what would have happened if the oil had not been found, but in my view the SNP would have continued to argue effectively for Scottish independence.

David Stevenson

Edinburgh