IT is disingenuous of David Walter (Letters, May 13) to accuse other political parties of being complacent about the council tax just because they will not support the Liberal Democrat proposals for change.
I have read in the national media that all the main political parties are searching for a system fair to all.
At the present time, the majority of the electorate do not pay council tax and any system which forces them into paying their share of local tax creates resentment and, as in the case of the poll tax, it led to riots.
The poll tax would have been a good local tax if it had been amended to exempt people like full-time housewives who had no income of their own. All other people who were in employment have no reason to expect others to carry them.
At the present time, all the parties think that the Lib Dem proposals would make matters worse. It would be better if would-be MPs like David Walter did not discombobulate, but got together with politicians of of all parties and tried to find a fair system, paid by all who were employed and could not be gerrymandered by the government of the day as is happening now.
What is the point of the Lib Dem councillors proposing that the council tax be scrapped, when it is not in their gift to change it? Only the government can change it.
J W Reid
Limehayes Road
Okehampton
l This correspondence is closed ? Editor