THE most disturbing forecasts in the Scottish Budget were the almost non-existent economic growth predicted for the remainder of the decade (“One million middle-class Scots are to pay more tax”, The Herald, December 15).

I have been struggling to find any country within the OECD or without with a weaker prognosis. Even the growth forecast for the rest of the UK looks positively stellar in comparison. One might have expected a greater focus from the Scottish Government on addressing this lamentable performance.

But no; instead we have a puerile stunt cutting the tax burden by a derisory £20 a year for low earners in an attempt to camouflage the large rise in the tax burden for those earning above £26,000, a salary close to what a top-flight graduate can command and exceed.

Entrepreneurs and innovative job creation are what the Scottish economy desperately needs to address its economic performance but the evidence from the Budget is that this is not a priority. Regrettably the SNP Government seems to know a great deal about destroying wealth but nothing about creating it.

So, in the course of a year, the additional tax burden in Scotland, compared to the rest of the UK, for an income of £60,000, has doubled from £400 to almost £800. The direction of travel is disturbingly clear. It is far from obvious that these tax increases will deliver any sustainable increase in tax revenues; indeed, the impact may well be incrementally negative.

The inevitable damage to the Scottish economy and the flight of middle and high earners south of the Border will rapidly erode the yield estimates. For every middle or high earner who rearranges his affairs to be tax resident outside Scotland, Scotland loses not only the additional tax the Government was expecting to collect but also the totality of his tax contribution.

After a few more years of Scottish Government budgets taxing the populace into submission we can expect a movement to repatriate the tax powers back to Westminster until such time that Scottish finance ministers demonstrate greater maturity and responsibility in managing the economy.

Raymond Hall, The Firs, Gartness Road, Killearn.

THE Scottish Fiscal Commission forecasts subdued growth of less than one per cent in Scotland until 2022, citing a number of factors including demographic challenges. Scotland has a higher proportion of older people than elsewhere in the UK. Many are economically inactive and some require greater state support than most of the working population.

Prior to Thursday’s Budget, Scotland already had the highest income tax levels in the UK. Now 45 per cent of the population (middle and higher income earners) will pay more tax simply because they live in, for instance, Dundee rather than Leeds or Swansea.

Workers in England, Wales and Northern Ireland will probably not consider moving to a part of the UK where they’ll pay more tax. that is serious, given Scotland’s demographic problems.

What incentive is there for highly skilled workers, business leaders and professionals to move here, particularly those with families when our education system has been badly managed by the SNP? Scotland’s population is growing more slowly than in the rest of the UK, with low birth rates and immigrants from overseas proportionally preferring England to Scotland. Nicola Sturgeon’s latest tax increases will serve to discourage the kind of highly qualified workers we need to boost our economy and help sustain our hard-pressed public services.

Martin Redfern, Woodcroft Road, Edinburgh.

A GREAT deal is being made of Scotland’s economy under-performing that of the UK in terms of growth over the last decade or so and that disparity is forecast to continue.

But isn’t it a fact that Scotland’s (onshore) economy has had lower growth than the UK throughout the 20th century, when Scotland was controlled directly from Westminster? Our low growth is historic and will not be fixed by altering income tax by a penny, this way or that.

Economics, if it’s a science at all, plays out over the long term and I would be more impressed by the hordes of economists pontificating on this budget if they had a solution to this long, deep seated-problem of low growth. Does Scotland need a bigger basket of tax powers? Do Scottish politicians, business leaders and unions need to have an agreed industrial programme (as in Germany ) to drive out economy forward?

If that were the case, does Holyrood have the fiscal power it needs to do this? Should local government have a set percentage of spending year in, year out?

If so, would it “carry the can” for education outcomes, care in the community and so on? Serious problems need serious solutions but I see nothing but political games being played out; talking heads nodding sagely but saying nothing of consequence.

GR Weir, 17 Mill Street, Ochiltree.

AT last there seem to be many quite happy to be paying a little more for improving services in Scotland and helping the most disadvantaged in our society.

While Murdo Fraser, Scottish Conservative party spokesman for finance, howls in outrage about a broken promise to retain the 20 per cent rate, he forgets that everyone will benefit from the new starter rate of 19 per cent on the first taxable part of their income, and the poorest most of all by being taken out of tax altogether.

Only a small proportion of those on 20 per cent, whose income is approaching the higher rate, will actually pay a little more.

Would these folk taking a small hit not be prepared to accept this slight variation from the promised 20 per cent freeze to allow a tiny improvement for the very poorest? Even as a pensioner who has not been affected, I would, like many others, have accepted a small increase to help them and protect our valuable services. Is this really the “Me, me, me” society Murdo Fraser’s response indicates, or does scoring points over the SNP weigh more heavily than thinking of others and putting the poorest first?

L McGregor, Gartcows Road, Falkirk.

SURELY your front-page headline (December 15) should have been “1.4 million low paid Scots are to pay less tax than the rest of the UK”.

Sandy Riddell, Machar, Arbeadie Road, Banchory.