Letters: The solution for the Tories is clear: send for Michael Gove

Lavrov was right about Liz Truss

WHAT is the point in Liz Truss carefully selecting Government advisers costing thousands of pounds if they fail to provide her with the best way of “laying out the ground” for announcing her absurd policies to the world? Did she involve them and her closest allies regarding her brilliant ideas or perhaps she felt she knew best?

Perhaps the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergey Lavrov, got it in one when he ridiculed her ability not so long ago when she was Foreign Secretary. The SNP once thought its greatest ally in getting independence was Boris Johnson. Perhaps it has found another.
Jim Nolan, Strachur

Scrap her now before it's too late

IT was pretty obvious what was in the pipeline when on Sunday the Prime Minister threw her Chancellor under the bus declaring that the move to cut the top rate of income was a "decision that the Chancellor made" ("Truss admits mini-Budget mistakes", The Herald, October 3). One day later, and Kwasi Kwarteng U-turned on plans to scrap the 45p rate of income tax for high earners, saying that "the Prime Minister decided not to proceed with the abolition of the rate".

Last week you kindly published a letter from me in which I criticised Liz Truss for her U-turns and this latest one joins a long and lamentable list. Clearly, Ms Truss wants us to believe that it was Mr Kwarteng wot done it, and his jacket must be hanging on a shoogly peg, but the Prime Minister will soon run out of scapegoats to blame as she lurches from one wrong policy and bad decision to the next.

Perhaps the real culprits are the Conservative Party members who put her, and us, in this position – and to be fair to Ms Truss, she did make her plans clear during the leadership campaign, but they voted for her anyway; and goodness knows, they had the whole of a long hot summer to question her suitability for office. During those months, I recall that Scottish Tories, weary of the chaos unleashed by Boris Johnson, longed for "a drama-free Prime Minister" who would bring integrity and competence to Downing Street; after barely a month, those are qualities which this Prime Minister appears to have in very short supply. It would be better to scrap her now along with her 45p rate, before she can do any more damage.
Ruth Marr, Stirling

Will Starmer be the big winner?

IT'S almost 40 years since Sir David Steel made his rather naive and somewhat unrealistic speech telling his party members to "go back to your constituencies and prepare for government".

Following her recent mini-Budget and the ensuing furore Liz Truss seems, whether naively or unknowingly, to have handed this line to Sir Keir Starmer.

Time will soon tell if there will be more realism attached to his rallying calls to his party members at this politically delicate time for the Conservative Party.
Tina Oakes, Stonehaven

Will tax moaners do a U-turn?

I TAKE it that the convoy of removal vans heading for the Border will be making a U-turn, as has the Chancellor, now that the 45 per cent top rate of income tax has been reinstated?
Jim McSheffrey, Giffnock

• ONCE, a week was a long time in politics, now it’s down to 24 hours. Perhaps we could slim this down further with one of the BBC's better panel game shows – Just a Minute. “Ms Truss, Mr Kwarteng, could you give a Budget speech for just a minute, without deviation, repetition or repudiation”?
GR Weir, Ochiltree

• THE slogan at this week’s Conservative conference in Birmingham is “Getting Britain Moving”. That sounds more like the tag line for a brand of laxatives; which, in current circumstances, is eerily appropriate.
Doug Maughan, Dunblane

Where Kwarteng went wrong

AT least three things were ignored in the Government’s mishandled mini-Budget.

Largely in order to prevent the collapse of defined-benefit pension schemes, the Bank of England was forced to buy £65 billion of government bonds in its emergency intervention last week. It has been clear for around 30 years since the private sector began moving away from such schemes because they are unsustainable, that the public sector should have followed suit. There is no particular logic in basing one’s pension on final salaries rather than accumulated contributions, and those of the effectively-bankrupt RBS in 2008, whose CEO’s pension “entitlement” from age 50 was £700,000 per annum, are merely the most outrageous examples of a system no longer fit for purpose. They should be converted into defined-contribution schemes, with reasonable notice and respecting their accrued rights to date.

The lifetime cap on pensions’ deemed values also needs radical change or abolition, as one effect is to encourage senior NHS medics to retire earlier than otherwise just when their services are needed most.

Finally, it is SMEs, the small and medium enterprises, which will fuel our economic recovery. But it is their enterprising, risk-taking leaders who are penalised by the ludicrous reduction in tax-free personal allowance for earnings from £100,000-125,000 pa and its cancellation for those paid over £125,000. This results in a 60% marginal rate, yet the Chancellor managed to get himself into a mess with the 45% rate.

These all need urgent “action this day”, not merely fine words and lip-service.
John Birkett, St Andrews

SNP will be the biggest loser

THE bookies have made the next General Election a shoo-in for Labour, and one it seems at this stage it can only lose and the Conservatives cannot win.

For the million or so Tory voters in Scotland however, all is not despair. A moderate UK Labour government in London will not be the end of the world. The biggest loser of all will be the SNP. Its case for breaking up the UK and separation and its bogeyman will be destroyed at a single stroke, even if it hangs on at Holyrood. It may take some years, but a Labour victory could well be the beginning of the end for nationalism in Scotland.

So, whatever political pain there may be to come for the Tories, it is more than compensated for by the positive side. The SNP may well be joining the Quebec separatists as a blip on history.
Alexander McKay, Edinburgh

Time to follow Ireland's lead

AS the pound and the economy slide into a winter of discontent, just maybe, the men in suits have rescued the Tories.

In stark contrast to the UK’s disastrous mini-Budget, the Republic of Ireland’s budget package did not offer massive tax cuts. Instead it is tackling the cost of living crisis by increasing welfare and pensions along with increased subsidies on energy bills and childcare. This is being funded by a tax collection from thousands of foreign multinational companies based in Ireland.

In truth, while pensioners in Ireland get one of the best deals in Europe, Scottish and indeed UK pensioners get one of the worst. Ireland again demonstrates that independent European nations, the same size as richly endowed Scotland have more that a happy and successful future.
Grant Frazer, Newtonmore

Get out of this toxic Union

I EXPECT the "Rent to Buy" housing policy due to be announced by Douglas Ross will be greatly applauded by the Conservative Party, because at its heart is another way for the wealthy to gain more wealth at the expense of people who have less.

How much longer will our nation accept government in London by the rich for the rich? On the evidence so far I see no reason to place any hope in the prospect of Sir Keir Starmer's latest incarnation of New Labour doing much better than the main Conservative party. Our best prospect is for an independent government of Scotland to create a state where social justice is the essence of everything it does. Get Scotland out of this toxic Union.
Ni Holmes, St Andrews

Read more letters: Truss's low-tax obsession will put Starmer into No 10

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