THERE are rumours that Chancellor Gordon Brown's summer Comprehensive Spending Review will cut the planned start of 13 of the Highways Agency's new road building schemes to just eight.

How can it be that here in Britain, the fourth largest economy in the world, we cannot seem to be able to afford to build ourselves a few roads to be able to deliver goods and move people without endless wasted hours and money caused by congestion? How is it that the Chancellor can take more than £41 billion each year in taxes from road users and yet spend only £6 billion in return on road buildings and maintenance?

Malcolm Bingham,

Low Lane,

Horsforth, Leeds.

...UNHAPPY with the amount of tax we already pay to our money-grabbing Government, Gordon Brown wants us to start paying tax on ISAs and PEPs.

At least Dick Turpin wore a mask!

We soon shall have to pay tax on the amount of oxygen we use.

So, next time one of Tony and Gordon's "highwaymen" comes trotting my way, they can call in and help themselves to the shirt off my back.

Karl Bateman,

Meadow Lane,

Haxby, York.

Updated: 10:39 Friday, March 12, 2004