Readers discuss the farmers protesting against the Budget, if Keir Starmer would be brave enough to call a General Election and if the UK should re-join the EU (Picture: Bloomberg via Getty Images)
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'It's easier to sell a tax wen you frame it as fairness', says reader
Chancellor Rachel Reeves says EV drivers will pay a new 3p-per-mile tax to make things fair (Metro, Thu), saying ‘all cars contribute to wear and tear on our roads, so it is only right that our motoring taxes cover EVs via a modest per-mile levy’.
She says petrol and diesel drivers pay fuel duty, which pays for roads, so all EV drivers should chip in, too. Sounds reasonable. On average those paying for petrol and diesel at the pumps pay 7p per mile, according to the AA.
But fuel duty doesn’t pay for the roads – it goes into the general tax pot.
This is about tax revenue. Fuel duty brings in £25billion to £30billion a year. As more people switch to EVs, that number will drop and the Treasury can’t afford the gap.
But ‘fairness’ makes a better headline. It’s easier to sell a tax when you frame it as fairness. But the truth is simpler. The government is protecting its income and that’s fine – just say it.
If the goal is to replace lost fuel duty, say so. If the money is going into the general pot, say that as well. People can handle the truth. What they don’t like is being told a convenient story to try to spin something. Ant Hodges, via email
Is ‘public sympathy’ with the farmers?
This reader says, ‘All the farmers are requesting is a meeting with the government to outline their worries around inheritance tax’ (Picture: Jordan Pettitt/PA Wire)
I really think the public sympathy will be with the farmers arrested as they protested in Whitehall on Budget Day over inheritance tax reforms (Metro, Thu).
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Only late on were they notified by the police that they would be unable to bring tractors to Whitehall.
Many farmers who were coming from the north were already on their way to London.
All the farmers are requesting is a meeting with the government to outline their worries around inheritance tax. Molly Neville, Sheffield
Is Reeves severe?
It surely cannot be mere serendipity that the chancellor’s surname is an anagram of ‘severe’? Bob Readman, Sevenoaks
Is Budget history repeating itself?
Regardless of Rachel Reeves’ Budget, Labour is likely to remain upbraided for the UK’s ongoing economic woes. It bears interesting similarities to the Conservative Party’s position after chancellor Norman Lamont’s ‘Budget for the recovery’ in 1992.
The UK was in recession and a fed-up electorate were enduring high inflation, punitive interest rates and tumbling house prices.
Legislation to replace the hated poll tax had been passed but Conservativism was still tainted by its legacy.
Nevertheless, prime minister John Major proved his mettle by calling a general election the day after Lamont’s Budget, defeated Neil Kinnock and returned to power to serve the country for another five years. I somehow doubt Sir Keir Starmer would now have the courage to show his teeth and do the same. Robert Hughes, London
This treader says Starmer would not be brave enough to hold a General Election (Picture: Richard Baker/Getty Images)
Would food or clothing vouchers be better than money for lifting the two-child benefit cap?
As expected, the two-child benefit cap was lifted in the Budget (Metro, Thu), which politicians say will take 450,000 children out of poverty at a cost of £3billion a year.
However, handing parents more cash won’t necessarily give those third, fourth or fifth children a better start in life. It could instead be spent on drink, cigarettes and vapes. Food or clothing vouchers would be better. Clark Cross, Linlithgow
‘Re-engagement with Europe would enable us to have an welfare state and more certain economic growth’, says reader
No one watching Rachel Reeves at the despatch box on Budget day could have doubted the lady’s ‘chutzpah’.
Extemporising where necessary, she gave as good as she got in relation to the cat calls coming from the ‘Gentleman’s Party’ opposite.
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The chancellor is clearly someone who is eminently capable of being both ‘bold’ and ‘brave’.
Perhaps at some time in the (not too distant) future, we can hope to hear this same lady announce the UK’s return to the EU customs union and single market?
A re-engagement with Europe would enable us to have both an adequate welfare state and more certain economic growth. Andrew McLuskey, Middlesex
Punny reader makes a return…
This reader does a funny (Picture: Getty Images)
Seriously, apple farmers who are too scared to diversify should just grow a pear. Dave Hughes, Chigwell
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