Kenny MacAskill MSP's argument that license fees should be based on volume of alcohol sold, or at least not on the rateable value of the business premises, is an excellent idea whose time has come ("We need action to deal with the shift in alcohol consumption to off-sales", Agenda, September 21 & Letters, September 23). The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) would suggest that HMRC and local licensing authorities could share information to ensure that this change would put no additional administrative burden on smaller licensed businesses.
We understand that similar proposals have been rejected in the past at least in part because old-fashioned systems meant that information couldn’t be shared between layers of government. In our view, with sufficient levels of co-operation and effort, there’s no reason why a more modern, and less unfair, system couldn’t be developed.
Andy Willox,
Scottish policy convenor,
Federation of Small Businesses, Berkeley Street, Glasgow.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here