Under a tax

A majority of Scots back Nicola Sturgeon’s plans to raise income tax to help fund public services, according to a new poll. Well, who doesn’t love taxes? Has anyone worked out exactly how many millions of pounds have been squandered on failed SNP policies/incentives/it systems/vanity projects/futile jollies abroad? Money that could have gone to protect the very services they now say need the extra cash from tax rises?

Elizabeth Campbell Most people will always support a rise in Income Tax. Provided it’s someone else who’s paying for it.

634TDJ I am happy to pay more if it leads to clear improvements. What I wouldn’t be up for is if the overall tax take goes down because of wealthy individuals changing behaviours legally (and rightly in my opinion – after all, who doesn’t like to pay less if they can, legally?) to reduce their tax payments.

DGS If you ask anyone, if they would pay more for better public services, then they’ll almost always say yes. Everyone is willing to pay more for a service that’s better, public or private. It’s more appropriate to ask, if people are willing to pay more for the same level of service, most will say no.

Francis Ferguson This tax change was a clear manifesto breach from all the things they were saying at the election just in 2016, that they would not raise the taxes on basic rate taxpayers, and this announcement was 2017, one year later.

Common Sensei