Austerity has been a disastrous failure

Sir, – The current UK Government is making claims to be relaxing its own misguided regime of austerity which has widened inequalities and slowed economic recovery.

While it claims public finances are squeezed, justifying its harsh policies around universal credit and cutbacks in public services, it still manages to find substantial subsidies for the more affluent segments of the population and geographic areas.

Around £40 billion, three to four times the amount spent on foreign aid, is spent on tax relief to contributions on approved pensions schemes where the Government actually pays into the pension pots of higher and additional rate earners.

Consider transport subsidies where infrastructure spend per head is £1,900 in London yet only £275 per head in the north of England.

Closer to home, the impact of welfare reform on the depressed mid-Fife economy is leading to the loss of £695 per working age adult, rising to almost £1,000 in the worst affected areas.

Numerous other examples are found where both fiscal and public spending in practice is regressive, benefitting the most advantaged which is the diametric opposite of fairness, and which – ironically – drags down the entire economy in the longer term.

Scotland must resist these overcentralising, regressive tendencies and actively rebalance our damaged economy and society.

Stuart McIntosh. 68 Kirkland Walk, Methil.

Getty Images. Picture: Austerity has ‘widened inequalities and slowed economic recovery’, a feat that one correspondent argues the Government is ‘misguided’ on.