Two things have become abundantly clear this week. One is that the UK’s public finances are a mess; the other, that this UK Government has neither the guts nor the gumption to take the steps required to sort out the legacy of decades of buck-passing and kicking problems down the road by both Labour and the Tories.

The child poverty rate in Scotland is 22% (“Concern as data shows Scotland missed targets on child poverty”, The Herald, March 28). That’s much better than the 31% in England and Wales but still a disgrace. About 16% of the Scottish population live in absolute poverty, which is almost 900,000 people. And this in a wealthy country.

A significant part of the problem is our national debt. As Mark McGeoghegan points out (“This Labour government is devoid of the courage or ingenuity to meet today’s crises”, The Herald, March 28), it’s almost 100% of GDP, four times what it was in 1990. Interest payments on that debt will be over £100 billion this year, 8% of government spending; five years ago, when interest rates were low, the figure was £25 billion. We’ve maxed out the national credit card and are now at the mercy of the money markets.

It's not going to be easy to escape this dilemma. Austerity, as imposed by Rachel Reeves, won’t help; nor will borrowing more. A partial solution is offered in a report by the Wealth Tax Commission, which suggests a time-limited wealth tax would raise £260 billion if set at the rate of 1% for five years on those individuals with net assets of £500,000 or more (ie £1 million for a couple). That doesn’t sound over arduous when you consider the situation we’re in.

Beyond that, as a country we’re going to have to learn to live within our means. With an ageing population, spending on the NHS and social care is only going to increase at rates above inflation, and most other government departments are already cut to the bone. We’re going to have to accept that, if we want good public services, we’ll have to pay a bit more tax. Tax is often referred to as a burden, but it’s really the fee we pay to live in a decent society.

We’re also going to have to consider whether we can afford some of the freebies and subsidies currently offered universally, and that may include university tuition.

Doug Maughan, Dunblane.

Why not leave the Labour Party?

A few days before Polling Day at the 1983 UK General Election Neil Kinnock, then Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, made his famous "I warn you" speech in which he cautioned voters about the consequences of another Tory victory and the return of Margaret Thatcher. Kinnock's closing words in that speech were: "I warn you not to fall ill. I warn you not to grow old." After witnessing the actions of Rachel Reeves since the Labour Party came to power only eight months ago, those warning words of Neil Kinnock from 1983 now ring very hollow. Like many older Scottish voters I never thought we would see the day when a Labour Party Chancellor of the Exchequer would take actions to jeopardise the welfare of vulnerable people to the extent that even Margaret Thatcher herself might have thought was unacceptable.

More interesting however have been the reactions of Labour politicians to what has been taking place. In Scotland we have their leader at Holyrood, Anas Sarwar, staying silent on the matters concerned, as if trying to pretend that they weren't happening. Then we have a group of their Scottish MPs, apparently led by former Better Together campaign leader Blair McDougall, actually voting in favour of Ms Reeves' actions at Westminster. For their benefit I would advise them that proposals to withdraw the winter fuel payment from pensioners and then to cut payments to the sick and disabled did not appear on their party's manifesto prior to last July's election.

Finally, we have the other extreme in Scotland where the criticism of Labour's actions from two of their worthies, former MSP Neil Findlay and Brian Leishman MP, has been quite virulent. Mr Findlay, who supported the Better Together campaign in 2014, has at least had the decency to resign from the Labour Party, if for no other reason than to salve his conscience. Mr Leishman, on the other hand, has done plenty of well-publicised moaning from the sidelines, but little else. My question to Mr Leishman would be that if he is so opposed to the harm that his party is doing, why does he continue to remain a part of it?

Jim Finlayson, Banchory.

• Ian Murray ("With the SNP unfit to handle money wisely, Labour will deliver renewal", The Herald, March 27) says “but we are doing it [sound financial management] in a fair way, asking those with the broadest shoulders to pay their fair share, while protecting the most vulnerable”.

Surely such a cap-doffing hack as Ian Murray doesn’t really believe this? Has he been accepting too many tickets to fortune teller events? Sheer fantasy.

Barry Docherty, Glasgow.

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We should not subsidise rail

I agree with Mark Smith ("The £200m that’s being wasted on the wrong train line. Time for a rethink on rail policy", The Herald, March 24) that money should not be spent on reducing train times between Glasgow and Aberdeen but disagree that it should be used to build new railways. There are excellent bus services between Aberdeen, Peterhead and Fraserburgh and no need for a train service.

He refers to the many new homes built near the Borders Railway but these are within the Edinburgh journey-to-work area. This means that many trains are heavily used for under four hours daily. That is a loss-making situation requiring public subsidies.

Already UK residents, only 30% of whom often use trains, pay £200 billion a year to subsidise them without being consulted. That is entirely undemocratic.Why should people in say, Newton Stewart, Kelso and Stornoway pay to build and run railways in Aberdeenshire or elsewhere any more than they should pay to provide parks there? In many countries there has long been a policy of requiring users to pay the costs of train services. That should be the case here.

There are far better ways of creating wealth and reducing inequality by using public money. Max Wiszniewski ("Scotland’s Land Reform Bill is broken, but there is a foolproof way to fix it", The Herald, March 24) describes one of them: through land reform. It does not require spending huge amounts of taxpayers' money on infrastructure to benefit a tiny minority.

There are many other opportunities. Many more people who are rarely heard from should be better informed of possibilities and encouraged to make a case for providing these through cost-benefit analysis. It would be far better to have a large number of small projects which can be soon implemented than a few very costly showy ones which could take ages to implement and may become disasters like HS2.

Policies should not be mainly under the control of narrow self-serving interest groups who want others to fund their pet projects.

Alan Mathieson, Perth.

This fuel is a green smokescreen

The fire at one of the substations that provides power to Heathrow provided a reminder of the many hundreds of flights that the airport handles every day. Chancellor Reeves justified the recent Government announcement supporting a series of airport expansions by stating that "sustainable aviation fuel" (SAF) was a "game changer" that will reduce carbon dioxide emissions by 70 per cent. Currently the UK is committed to a 2% SAF content in aviation kerosene and is providing £63 million to boost production. To date this is predominantly derived from used cooking oil, 80% of which is imported from China and Malaysia.

It is planned that the SAF content will increase to 22% by 2040 by which time it is forecast that passenger numbers will have doubled, equating globally to 200,000 flights day consuming over 18 million barrels of aviation fuel. This will necessitate the use of multiple sources of feedstock such as municipal waste, sewage and a vast area of land dedicated to growing bioenergy crops. These are already grown on a massive scale to provide the E10 element in the petrol, thus further reducing the area of land available for growing food.

Alternatively SAF could be produced in the form of green hydrogen but this would require up to 3.4 times more wind and solar capacity than at present. Clearly the Chancellor has not taken the trouble to read the report from the Royal Society which concludes that this course of action could be up to 69% more carbon-intensive than using standard kerosene jet fuel and could result in "unacceptable collateral ecological damage". Airline operators may be keen to be seen as environmentally responsible but in reality they and the Chancellor are hiding behind another green smokescreen that fails to stand up to robust scrutiny.

Neil J Bryce, Kelso.

• Rather than worry about sustainable aviation fuel, why not do a proper problem-solving exercise and find out why there has been such an increase in air travel, despite the advent of instant electronic global communication?

Such an exercise might reveal the true situation, and the correct answer, rather than a knee-jerk response that could be wrong.

Malcolm Parkin, Kinross.

Is it wrong to ask all UK residents to subsidise the railways?Is it wrong to ask all UK residents to subsidise the railways? (Image: Newsquest)

Education should be secular

The philosopher AC Grayling said that the major reason for the continuance of religious belief in a world which might otherwise have long moved beyond it is indoctrination of children before they reach the age of reason. Norwood Primary School in Eastleigh, Hants, has sent a letter to parents and carers informing them that the Easter Service would not be held this year "in the spirit of inclusivity and respect for the diverse religious beliefs represented within our school community".

We live in a multi-racial, multi-cultural, principally secular society. By educating children from all backgrounds together, without emphasis on any particular religion, there is a far greater chance of mutual understanding and personal friendships. Enthusiasts of all faiths oppose secular education because exposure to other traditions has the effect of loosening the grip of their own. The steady move away from Christianity in this country may be traced to a number of factors: education, apathy, immigration and the well-documented incidence of paedophilia and child molestation among some Christian clerics. Christianity should have its privileged position in our schools removed. Religion-free morals – which predate by centuries their Christian counterparts – are freely available.

Doug Clark, Currie.

A moving  proposition?

Estate agents often get a bad press. No wonder, when in the report of a forest for sale near Plockton ("Forest near picturesque Highland village goes on market for over £300,000", The Herald, March 28) they suggest planning permission might be available from Argyll & Bute Council.

David Hay, Minard.