Today our correspondents discuss the proposed footbridge at Perth, statistics, land taxes and the meaning of life.
Perth footbridge is ‘obscene’ waste of money Sir, I note that Perth and Kinross Councillor Ian Miller is intending to consult residents as to what the new pedestrian bridge should be called.
I, and the majority of residents in Perth, know perfectly well what it should be called – a complete and utter waste of public money.
Here we are, a country floundering in the depths of recession, where we are all being asked to tighten our belts and batten down the hatches, yet Perth and Kinross Council has the audacity to spend £1.4 million of our money to go towards funding a bridge for a few cyclists and walkers.
This is the same council which could only afford to cut the greens of the North Inch Golf Course twice a week – a course which was once the best municipal course in the country and whose greens were once the envy of many private courses in Scotland.
This is the same council whose salary costs have spiralled through the roof in recent years. This is the same council which is now even asking us to pay for extra wheelie bins.
What the council should be asking is what is the best way to spend £1.4m. I can tell you they will be deluged with responses but building a pedestrian bridge will certainly not be one of them.
The very thought of building such a bridge in the present economic climate which we will need to partly finance and pay maintenance costs for evermore, is not only ridiculous but it is an obscene and immoral use of public money.
It is time that the people of Perth put an abrupt stop to this.
Ian McPherson.182 Glasgow Road,Perth.
Criminal use of statistics
Sir, Being a retired police officer, I must say that I find press articles regarding the apparent reduction of crime, amusing to say the least.
Politicians both national and local appear to get excited whenever such reports are published.
If they would take a deep breath they would realise that the figures refer to recorded crime and not the true total of the crimes committed.
In many cases, the police do not attend to reports of crime and, therefore, they are not recorded.
April Fool comes to mind when I read such articles.
Allan Murray.44 Napier Road,Glenrothes.
Land tax is more equitable
Sir, Graeme Brown (September 8) is right to celebrate the drop in house prices.
How absurd that rampant inflation in the price of such a fundamental necessity as a place to live should be seen as a good economic indicator. That was the fallacy that led us to the present crisis.
Mr Brown makes the connection between house prices and land prices. It is of course, the land, not the bricks and mortar, that is the volatile element in the property market and unless politicians recognise this, they will never succeed in stabilising prices.
The solution lies in a radical revision of our tax system, shifting the source of public revenue away from active production and on to land values.
The system of land value taxation was considered by the Scottish Office as an option for local government finance in 1998, when its Land Reform Policy Group produced a report in readiness for action by the new Scottish Parliament.
It noted that the result would be a “fall in value of property for current owners” but, ironically, it listed this as the prime disadvantage.
Perhaps, in 1998, no politician wanted to spoil the illusion of prosperity that rising house prices created but the Scottish Parliament has continued to ignore the link between land reform and fiscal reform and has so far wasted the opportunity that even its limited tax powers offer.
Land has no production cost and its value is publicly generated. Land values are a measure of the comparative public demand for different sites and are further enhanced by the provision of public services and infrastructure.
Rather than being allowed to haemorrhage into private or corporate pockets, these values should be recycled back into the public purse.
At UK level, the huge stream of revenue would enable the government to reduce the current burden of deadweight taxation on industry and enterprise, while avoiding the threatened draconian cuts to public services.
Crucially, it would strike at the root cause of the boom-bust cycle and prevent the otherwise inevitable repetition.
John Digney.Creagmhor Lodge,Lochard Road,Aberfoyle.
We make our own meaning
Sir, Harrison Hudson (September 9) says, somewhat predictably, that “the notion that existence comes from nothing is just not credible” and “every effect must have an adequate cause”. He then does a complete about-face to claim this god he worships is the exception to those rules.
The notion that God was necessary to manufacture the universe and everything in it is just not credible, for it would logically necessitate the search for who or what had created God, reductio ad absurdum. Such a notion would be nonsense.
Mr Hudson argues that if the universe has no purpose, it is difficult to explain our search for meaning. It is not difficult at all. Simply, it is up to us to create meaning. Meaning has been best explained by Robert Ingersoll, the great US humanist, who said,
“The time to be happy is now, the place to be happy is here, the way to be happy is to make other people so.”
As author Douglas Adams said, “Is it not enough to see that the garden is beautiful, without having to imagine fairies at the bottom of it?”
Alistair McBay.Lawmuirview,Methven.
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