Welcome debate on top tax rate

William Hague's suggestion that the top-rate tax threshold could be raised (40p tax not sacrosanct, August 16) should be an opportunity for a proper debate on taxation. Over two decades, the progressive tax system has been eroded, with the burden shifted from high earners to ordinary consumers, and cuts in income tax paid for by rises in VAT and excise duty.

Between 1983 and 1995, tax as a proportion of gross household income fell from 41% to 36% for the richest fifth, but rose for the poorest fifth from 27% to 39%. The combination of tax and benefits means that the lowest earners face the highest tax rates on extra earnings.

The growth in the number of top-rate payers is the result of the Conservative government's failure to raise the threshold in line with earnings. A higher top rate, starting further up the income scale, could improve the fairness of the system.

Bharti Patel Nick Burkitt
Low Pay Unit

• The Tories' proposal to reduce the higher rate of income tax not only exposes them as being concerned mainly with the rich, but also forces open the real questions about tax, for both major parties. It is encouraging that Labour's reaction has not been to match the Tories' tax-cutting promises, but to ask which public services the Conservatives would underfund. As Gordon Brown has shown, the tax system can be reformed in innovative ways. And there is much to be done to persuade the public that its taxes will be spent efficiently. But the essential political truth - that taxes pay for public services, and we can not have the services we want without paying for them - must remain the starting point for debate.

Michael Jacobs

General secretary, Fabian Society

• You write about the increasing numbers of middle-income earners paying higher-rate tax (Treats and tricks, August 17). The impact is particularly harsh on families with a single earner. A single-earner family with income around twice the national average will pay around £2,000 per year more in tax than it would if each of the couple earned the national average.

Bruce Nelson
Edinburgh