Readers' Letters: Governments must stop taking so much from us in taxes

The latest UK Government Spending Review gives away more of your money, implying yet more tax rises.

I would like to point out to the Scottish and UK governments that their taxation policies are not at all fair. Just because someone’s gross income seems high does not mean that they necessarily have spare money to give to the taxman. Rents of over £2,000 a month is not uncommon in cities. That is £12-24 thousand pounds taken yearly from their net income.

Conversely, some on low income live in much cheaper accommodation and may supplement their income by doing odd jobs.

Self-checkouts can be handy but they're denying someone a job and governments the taxes that would come with same (Picture: Getty)

My late wife and I had three children who now each live with their three children in Glasgow and Newton Mearns. My wife and I were able to afford to bring up those three children. We both worked, I as an engineer and my wife as a teacher. Our children and their partners have better jobs; my daughter is a GP, but are all struggling financially with high tax and high mortgages.

Governments take money from everywhere, including companies. Why do supermarkets now have so many self-checkouts? They can’t afford to employ people. Machines don’t draw wages, also they don’t pay tax. Companies, unlike governments, cannot run at a loss.

Stop bleeding dry companies and families. Restrain expenditure, stop overtaxing everyone – you will kill the economy and harm everyone but the hyper rich.

Ken Carew, Dumfries

What change?

I am sure her criticism of John Swinney during Prime Minister's questions on Wednesday will have gained Joani Reid, Labour MP for East Kilbride and Strathaven, some brownie points from Sir Keir. Last week's by-election defeat was undoubtedly a bad result for the SNP and I have no problem with her highlighting that. I was intrigued, though, by her comment, “My constituents are sick of SNP failure and they voted for change.”

Could Ms Reid explain where that promised "change” is because I have seen evidence of very little? Disability benefits are to be slashed by Labour and hundreds of thousands of people who are already struggling will be left much worse off. The Tories' two-child benefit cap is keeping hundreds of thousands of children in relative poverty but Ms Reid's “party of change” supports it. Austerity is still with us, WASPI women have been betrayed and Labour are supplying weapons to a state accused of genocide and ethnic cleansing!

To most people, the only real change evident since Sir Keir came to power is a determination to spend vastly greater sums of money on nuclear weapons and other sophisticated military equipment – war not welfare, in other words! Joani Reid's grandad, the great Jimmy Reid, titled one of his books in reference to the Labour government led by Tony Blair. The present administration is even more right wing than Blair's (which for all its faults did not target disabled people for benefit cuts) and the title of that particular book, Power Without Principles, surely applies even more to Sir Keir Starmer and his government!

Alan Woodcock, Dundee

Keep caring

This week, the Scottish Parliament approved the Care Reform (Scotland) Bill, which, for the first time in the UK, will give all unpaid carers a legal right to breaks from caring. It’s a landmark decision that has gone largely unnoticed, yet it has the potential to be truly life changing.

Every day across Scotland, hundreds of thousands of unpaid adult and young carers quietly provide essential care and support to family, friends, and neighbours. Far too many do so without any meaningful time off, often at great cost to their own health and quality of life. Recent research from Shared Care Scotland reveals that even when carers do get a rare break, it’s often spent catching up on housework and essential errands, not on rest, recovery, or simply having a life beyond caring.

The right to a break could be transformative but only if it’s properly funded and backed by flexible, accessible respite care support in every local area. Without that, it risks becoming just another well-meaning promise that fails to deliver.

Carers are the backbone of Scotland’s health and care system. They’ve waited long enough for more than warm words of gratitude. This new legal right is a huge step forward, but it will only make a difference if we now see urgent, committed action to make it real.

Don Williamson, Aberdour, Fife

Make it methane

So Ed Miliband is going to fund the Acorn carbon-capture project (your report, 13 June). What a waste of money; anyone would think CO2 was a poison gas!

Methane has a warming potential 23 times that of CO2; there are huge quantities of it locked in permafrost, some of which is released naturally. Carbon capture and storage is just another money-spinner for Big Energy.

George Morton, Rosyth, Fife

Power grab

The Los Angeles immigration riots continue apace, without any sign of abating. To put it in some kind of context, Los Angeles County has a population of 11 million, Los Angeles City 4 million and the riots themselves involve only 400,000 people in downtown LA. Surely Governor Gavin Newsom is correct in saying that the riots could have been dealt with by the police. President Donald Trump's controversial recruitment of 4,000 National Guardsmen and 700 Marines over the head of Governor is simply exacerbating the situation, not least because the troops are reluctant to be used as fodder in what is fast becoming a political crisis.

What, then, is Trump's agenda? Governor Newsom, in his war of words with the President, alleges that Trump's advancing senility is the core of the problem. Whatever the truth of this, it does look like he is preparing a power grab by his federal government to rein in pesky California.

Greenland, California, who will be next?

Ian Petrie, Edinburgh

Lunar lore

Sandy Macpherson (Letters, 13 June) was amazed at the red colour of the moon last Tuesday. He requests enlightenment. As light passes through the atmosphere, it is scattered by air molecules. Shorter-wavelength blue light is scattered more than longer wavelengths such as yellow, orange and red. As the sun sets on a low horizon, sunlight travels through more air due to the angle, so blue light is scattered even more, leaving only light from the red end of the visible spectrum. Hence, “Red sky at night, etc”. The same is true with moonlight, which is nothing more than sunlight reflected from the surface of the moon: thus a low moon, less blue and proportionally more red.

As for Sandy’s suggestion this phenomenon may be a portent of coming doom: the moon does have a dark side.

David Muir, Edinburgh

Let it lie

I fail to understand why the families of those who died in the Mull of Kintyre helicopter crash consider the MoD's description of it as an “accident” as “dishonest, deceitful and disingenuous” (your report, 11 June). What do they know that everyone else doesn't know?

Pilots do not fly their aircraft into the ground willingly but may do so when they are disorientated and have little visibility, as in this case. It was before the introduction of GPS.

They call for a public inquiry, yet such an inquiry was held in Paisley Sheriff Court over 18 days in January and February 1996. Is this a case of continually asking a question until one gets the answer one wants?

Steuart Campbell, Edinburgh

Wasn’t it nice?

Certain people stand head and shoulders above their contemporaries and Brian Wilson certainly fitted that category. From the first big Beach Boys hit in the year of the Cuban Missile Crisis, “Surfin' Safari”, all the way to “Pier Pressure” in 2015, he demonstrated the ability to create music which will stand the test of time.

For many Baby Boomers growing up in the Sixties, having experienced the austerity of the Fifties, I was blown away by the sheer joy and exuberant melodies he created, along with friends and competitors the Beatles and many others who defined that era. However miserable life was, however, hard the lessons learned were, the music of that decade made it all much more bearable.

We all knew the wonderful hits like “God Only Knows” and “Good Vibrations”, which is surely one of the best pop songs ever written. There were also the slightly less well-known songs like “In My Room” and “Don't Worry Baby”, which, like the harmonies of the Beach Boys’ contemporaries the Mamas and the Papas, lifted us above the rough times we all encountered in growing up and facing the realities of existence.

Even relatively late in life, Brian was able to produce quite a melody which was, to my mind, the last Beach Boys' song. It came out in his album, “No Pier Pressure” and featured the familiar voices of fellow Beach Boys Al Jardine and David Marks. The song was called “The Right Time”. Close your eyes and you could easily be back in the Sixties.

Brian Wilson did indeed come to us at the right time. His music is his lasting legacy to all of us.

Andrew HN Gray, Edinburgh

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