Dear Editor,

After a delightful Christmas meal at Mediterranean Flavours, my wife Sally and I walked home through the Basins.

Dusk was in place and consequently I wrote the attached poem "Dusk at the Basins":

The veil of dusk is sliding over

above the tree surrounded waters,

old sun touched gloss the coming smothers,

means day light to its finish falters:

Dark silhouettes the dress of mallards

slow gently gliding on the surface,

still lie the swans, night holds no hazards,

though duck laughs loudly, feeling nervous?

Few people linger, air stings frosty,

sits man on bench a lonely shadow,

while branches bend to pressure costly

in wind that bites the grassy meadow:

The sharp carved blade of moonlight hastens

through twisting tree tops, weaving, hiding,

as remnant sun departs the Basins

which disappear to dark abiding.

Kind regards,

Martin Perry

Wellington

Dear Editor,

We have reached a dangerous new low in British politics. Politicians taking money from foreign fossil fuel interests to fund their political ambitions.

Like Trump in the US, Reform has openly sought donations from oil and gas executives, taking £2.3-million from oil and gas interests up to 2024. Seventy-five per cent of all donations to Reform over six years came from just three rich men, two of whom have links to oil and gas. This year it took £9-million from a billionaire donor in Thailand with business interests in fossil fuels.

The Conservatives have taken nearly £5-million from Michael Hintze who holds significant American oil and gas stocks including a US fracking firm, and Kemi Badenoch funded her leadership campaign with money from a director of US oil company Chevron.

To keep the money flowing from their generous benefactors, Badenoch and Farage champion policies that keep us dependent on imported fossil fuels, and pursue the lie that moving to clean renewable energy generated in the UK “will bankrupt our economy”. They ignore British business leaders and the CBI who report that the clean energy transition is not a cost but a major economic opportunity, with renewables already supporting nearly once million well-paid jobs with wages 15 per cent higher than the national average.

The same politicians try to disguise their allegiance to their foreign financial backers by telling us that “it is futile for the UK to act alone”. A quick reality check shows us we actually risk falling behind: Ireland, Denmark and Portugal all produce more of their electricity from wind than the UK. Germany produces twice the amount of wind and five times more solar than us, and the Netherlands on a similar latitude generates more solar energy.

These politicians choose to ignore the very real costs of delaying the move away from fossil fuels. Taking oil and gas money from foreign donors is a clear choice to serve foreign financial interests at the direct expense of the British people and the future of our economy.

Caroline Snow, via email

Dear Editor,

Most people now accept taxing wealth is necessary. Campaigners like Gary Stevenson, Richard Murphy, and recently Zack Polanski have spent years pushing the issue into the mainstream. Meanwhile, rising inequality leaves millions struggling to stay housed, fed and warm. In the UK, the wealthiest one per cent of families own more than the bottom 50 per cent. That’s plain wrong!

Anyone who searches “tax avoidance” online can see how the wealthy legally avoid tax. Paying little or none is considered normal - by shifting profits to low-tax places, taking income as shares rather than salary, and the “buy, borrow, die” model, where rising asset values are never taxed and are passed on at death without capital gains liability. This behaviour is widespread and amounts to legalised fraud.

The problem has been identified for years, yet little has been done. Is that because wealthy people resist what doesn’t benefit them? The Green Party proposes a modest wealth tax: one per cent on wealth above £10-million and two per cent above £1-billion, raising an estimated £15-billion a year. Patriotic Millionaires argue for two per cent above £10-million, raising around £22-billion. To the very wealthy this is small change, yet they fight it fiercely.

Richard Murphy argues that faster, simpler measures could raise far more. His Taxing Wealth Report 2024 sets out reforms raising up to £90-billion annually, including an investment income surcharge similar to National Insurance, which alone could vastly outperform a wealth tax - while also preparing for such a wealth tax if still needed.

2026 could be the year this blatant injustice is tackled, so Christmas 2026 is better for those who create wealth through work rather than those who use tricks to avoid tax on assets and hoard wealth. Murphy’s report is a clear roadmap, and I hope campaigners and political leaders align around it.