Labour will confiscate shares from workers’ pensions, not from fat cats

SIR – Labour says it intends to give shares to workers. When will the party and its leaders realise that shareholders are not a few fat cats with plenty of money?

Most are banks, building societies and insurance companies that invest money on behalf of millions of small savers and workers’ pension schemes.

Gordon Brown reduced my personal pension payout with his tax on dividends, and I lost more in the financial crash of 2008. Millions of others were affected in the same way.

With a reduced pension my living standards are lower and I spend less. My taxable income is reduced. This reduces the income for the Exchequer and makes me more likely to require government support in my declining years. R E Hawthorn

Thatcham, Berkshire

SIR – Labour’s proposal is theft. It may be dressed up as some sort of Robin Hood process, but, rather than stealing from the rich and giving to the poor, it is stealing from a very wide spectrum of society to prop up a Labour Party economic policy which is just borrow, spend, borrow, spend – now substituting theft for borrowing

Labour governments have a rich history of plundering the country’s wealth to create an ever more dependent group in society.

The plundering of shares will mean a reduction in the investment value held by individual shareholders (who may well rely on the dividend income in retirement) and by pension funds, which support those pensioners who took responsibility for their later years by taking out private pensions.

That is to say nothing of the flight of capital from Britain that such a proposal would bring. Indeed the very suggestion now may well influence future capital investment in British enterprises. John Orr

Hampton, Middlesex

SIR – I am amazed at how out of date the Labour Party is with its plan to use other people’s money to finance its workers’ share scheme.

It has not learnt the lessons from France, where there is a whole industry of avoidance to prevent a company’s employment numbers reaching critical levels.

Nor does Labour recognise the future influence of AI on employment. There will soon be perhaps five people running a factory that previously employed 50. Helping companies and employees manage such change would seem to be a more useful initiative.

Or is it merely an electioneering device, a bit like the students’ grants suggestions before the last election? Nigel Thomas

Elham, Kent

SIR – Presumably employees who work for banks and other big companies (such as department stores) that may make annual losses will have to contribute up to 10 per cent to the company. Rob Dixon

Aberlady, East Lothian