IN HIS speech to the Lib Dem conference, Vince Cable mentioned one of his favourite taxes which within the coalition he cannot impose, the mansion tax.

It seems he has a lot in common with Professor Greg Philo, who wants the top ten per cent richest members of society who have money in property to pay more tax.

If you have a computer and go to glasgowmediagroup.org, you can read the full article by Prof Philo about how a tax on the top ten per cent richest of the population could wipe out the national debt without bothering the other 90 per cent of us.

Is it not strange as we are the sixth- richest country in the world, we have to ask the poorest in the land to pay more taxes, while the bonus culture continues to add to the wealth of the already filthy rich?

Dennis Barton Woodthorpe, York.


• THE Lib Dem conference appeared bewildered as they listened to that great cuckoo in the nest, Nick Clegg.

They could have been rallied by a fearless leader standing his ground against the authoritarian New Labour rump and the nasty Tories.

Instead, the Lib Dem faithful are preached to by an appeaser of Tory policy. Well-paid public-sector worker Nick Clegg spoke of the virtue of work, but demonised the welfare system which he claims hinders prospects of the unemployed.

What codswallop!

Oh Nick, you are really revealing your true colours, tinged with the blue of the Tories berated by you before the General Election.

Echoes of Gordon Brown and his “end of boom and bust” as Nick boasted that by 2015 the UK will be a much better place. Better for who exactly? The super-rich or the poor who this coalition intend to stamp on?

Perhaps Lib Dem intelligentsia could explain where the jobs are to come from should public-sector spending be reduced by 25 per cent. By 2015 will there be plenty of affordable housing and full employment paying living wages?

I will wager that deficit and debt- reduction policies will cause great damage to the weak, leaving the powerful largely untouched.

T Scaife, Manor Drive, York.