A FREE market think tank has expressed surprise after the Treasury appeared to back its campaign to cut the amount workers pay the Treasury.

Earlier this week UK government officials warned that the Adam Smith Institute's Tax Freedom Day may fall two weeks later in an independent Scotland and taxpayers could have to work an extra fortnigh to reach the milestone .

But the organisation behind the campaign has expressed its astonishment.

A spokesman said: "Normally the Treasury rubbish Tax Freedom Day."

The group defines the date as the day "when average Britons stop working for the Chancellor and start working for themselves".

Stewart Hosie, the SNP Treasury spokesman, denied the claim Tax Freedom Day would happen two weeks later under independence.