Higher paid receive the benefits

With regard to the tax threshold being raised, this mainly benefits the higher paid and not the low paid because most would not have paid tax at the lower threshold. Too many of the jobs being created now are zero hour contracts or up to 16 hour contracts at minimum wage.

I am sure they would like to earn enough to pay tax. The tax that causes problems for the low paid is VAT at 20 per cent which was put up to that figure by this government when they said in 2010 that they had no plans to do so. I am a pensioner who pays income tax and all the other taxes and am happy to do so because it helps to pay for services such as the NHS. This is very different to many wealthy individuals and companies who use accountants to create so called “legal” methods to avoid paying taxes on money earned in this country. If all taxes were collected all our country’s deficit would be dealt with. Don’t forget it was the financial services sectors all over world who because of their greed brought the world’s financial system to its knees. The banks are now being made to pay for their sins such as miss-selling PPI, libor rate fixing etc but by rights these things should never have been done.

Cameron stated before the last election that his government would be the greenest ever but this year he was talking about getting rid of the green crap; so much for that promise. With regard to climate change, the vast majority of climatologists agree that we humans are affecting the way the world’s climate is working. They may disagree by how much but they do agree it is happening. I would hate to think that my generation would do nothing about it and leave a mess for our children and grandchildren to live with once we have gone.

Colin Tawn states that a bedroom tax for the private rented sector was created in 1998. This is true but he forgot to mention that only new tenants would be affected. The iniquity of the coalition bedroom tax in the public housing sector is that all existing tenancies were included, making it virtually impossible for people to move to smaller properties because there too few of them of them. This has meant that the sick, disabled and the unemployed have had  to live on a  reduced income when many were already struggling to survive on the pittance they were receiving.

The irony of this tax is that it is not saving any money. The housing benefit bill is increasing because more working people are claiming because of their low income and the use of the private sector.

Paul Ridgway, Clifton