OTHER SUPPLY SIDE OF THE POND:

Big guns roll up to bombard Brown (BILL JAMIESON AND WILLIAM LYONS, 11/29/04, The Scotsman)

A HUNDRED senior business figures, academics and economists have called on Chancellor Gordon Brown to cut taxes.

The appeal, carried in a letter to the Financial Times today, comes as the Chancellor puts the finishing touches to Thursday’s Pre-Budget Report.

A combination of lower-than-forecast tax receipts and higher public spending may force higher taxes next year.

But today’s letter - signed by, among others, Sir Ronald Halstead, president of the Engineering Industries Association, Sir John Craven, chairman of Lonmin, hotelier Sir Rocco Forte and Tim Ingram, chairman of Caledonia Investments - says reducing the tax burden should now be a priority for the UK.

"Recent large rises in public spending and taxation have not delivered commensurate improvements in public services," they write.

"Instead, the priority should now shift to reducing taxes on wealth-creating businesses and on the millions of families for whom the ever-increasing tax take is a damaging imposition on their ability to support themselves in raising children and saving for retirement.

"We simply do not accept that the government can get better value for each extra pound it spends than those who have to pay the extra pound in tax."

Karl Rove will feel welcome.

Posted by Orrin Judd at November 29, 2004 8:38 AM