According to the national press and the words of Gordon Brown, taxes are set to rise - above inflation no doubt - for the next 50 years. What's new, I say. It's a wonder the government doesn't want us all to work a 48-hour week, collect all of our earnings from us and, issue us with a bit of spending money. Of course, those 649 clowns in parliament would be exempt, no doubt. They would go on creaming off huge expenses, just as they do now.

B Thomas, Redruth