The idea for a National Care Service should not be sacrificed over an obsession to lower taxes - Yorkshire Post Letters

From: Bryn Glover, Kirkby Malzeard, Ripon.

It took only the smallest hint from the Prime Minister that his next manifesto (presumably in about three years from now) would refer to the creation of a National Care Service (NCS) operating along the lines of the NHS, for the hyenas of the press to pounce on the possibility of rises in taxation.

This was echoed by those current politicians who actually oppose the Health Service, believing instead that everyone should pay for themselves, with the best quality going to those with deepest pockets - irrespective of how those pockets came to be filled - just as is the case with education and justice in this country.

There seems to be an obsession about lowering taxes, like some unchallengeable mantra; and any suggestion that we may need to pay more is seen as an act of heresy.

However, others such as myself, believe that it is a mark of an advanced civilised society that it should care equally for those in genuine need, and that the NHS, now approaching its ninth decade, has always represented that guiding principle.

As one who is just a few years older than the NHS, and who lives off his state and work pensions, I would actually welcome the establishing of an NCS, and following the principle of only getting what we are willing to pay for, I would seek to make my own contribution in the form of more personal taxation, fairly applied according to my ability to pay.

This country pays in tax towards the bottom of the European league, and if we look admiringly at the welfare provisions offered to our Scandinavian cousins, then we must also reflect that they pay amongst the highest taxes in the continent, and are overwhelmingly happy to do so.