I NOTE with interest your report on the Prime Minister's position on the state pension ("Cameron's triple-lock pledge for pensioners",The Herald, January 6).

I am moved to wonder how much more arrogant drivel he can trot out. The tone of the article would have the public believe that pensioners should be grateful to the Government for guaranteeing a minimum annual retirement pension increment of 2.5% until 2020, conveniently glossing over the threat to winter fuel payments, free prescriptions, bus passes and TV licences.

I was fortunate that the date of my 65th birthday fell about two months before the date at which the payment of retirement pensions was delayed. My wife was 60 in January 2013, but will not receive her pension until September 2015, a delay of 33 months. A succession of governments had fully 60 years to plan for my wife qualifying for her pension, but failed to deliver as a result of poor manage­ment of our country's finances.

I can think of numerous instances of wasteful expenditure over the years, but for the moment, I will offer to help Chancellor George Osborne with two strokes of my red pen - one through Trident replacement, the other through Afghanistan.

Before I am told that Trident is a necessary nuclear deterrent, let me tell of the Glasgow man at a job interview. The HR manager said: "Tell me about your last job." "I was a lion exterminator in Sauchiehall Street," came the reply., "But you don't get lions in Sauchiehall Street." "See how good I was!" A whole succession of recent governments have chosen to retain Trident for the vanity of a seat at the top table of the United Nations. The Government tells us our forces will return from Afghanistan within the year, job done. I don't share its confidence. I am more inclined to the view that as soon as our troops are withdrawn, the place will revert to turmoil.

Rather than lecture us on the need for austerity, Messrs Cameron, Osborne et al should be looking at other aspects of our current financial mess. HMRC is focusing on the soft target of small businesses, while large multi-nationals are making huge profits while paying little or no tax. We still have banks and bankers playing the system still largely unchecked, and being paid huge bonuses. Perhaps Mr Cameron is too close to too many of them.

Kirk Gowans,

15 Kirkvale Drive, Newton Mearns.

George Osborne says we need further cuts to public spending to the tune of £25bn in order to clear our national debt. While this is a laudable aim, it should be remembered that cuts to public spending always affect the less well-off more than the well-off.

We could, of course, wipe the National Debt at a stroke, by one simple measure - the implementation of a progressive tax system that requires the well-off to make a higher contribution to the state. Taxes are the price we pay for civilisation, so who could reasonably complain? A little more honesty about what we all owe society collectively would be a political banner worth voting for.

Trevor Rigg,

15 Greenbank Gardens, Edinburgh.