The front page of Saturday’s Echo mourns the loss of 200 bureaucrats, none of whom produce anything but reports and red tape. Yet one must wait until page four to discover 60 per cent job losses at one of the area’s largest construction firms, shedding employees who actually produce things and support countless other small firms across the region.

This bias is symptomatic of the mass delusion that government creates wealth. In reality, government can only consume, control and destroy wealth created by the private sector.

Why else would taxation require compulsion and force? No other organisation, other than the mafia, forces you to pay for them. When the private sector uses these tactics it is called fraud but when govern-ment grows, we call it progress.

We must wake up and reverse the trend towards ever high taxes unless we want all our industry permanently in China. The only solution is default on all unfunded government liabilities, including Iraq and Afghanistan, followed by massive tax cuts.

Kennedy and Reagan saw tax receipts soar when they slashed taxes during a recession because people start investing again and got back to work.

Philip Ridley, address supplied