The Labour and Tory sums don’t add up - Christine Grahame

Christine Grahame MSP

​Well the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has given us the answer. You can’t.

So it’s obvious, some public services are to be cut, certain taxes increased (or your tax-free personal allowance before tax is reduced or other taxes such as capital gains tax, inheritance tax are increased) or a bit of both.

This is against the background of humungous borrowing by the UK government.

It is eight years since the Brexit vote

Continuing with this wee lesson in arithmetic, the National Debt (what the UK borrows to stay afloat) is currently £2,654.3 billion, according to the most recent figure I could find.

To put it another way, if we say 100 per cent represents what we as a nation earn, then the debt is 101 per cent. Meaning the books simply don’t balance.

Add to that we have to pay interest on the borrowing which is £4 billion. So my question to Rishi Sunak or Sir Keir Starmer is this: where are the money trees? If no trees where is the money coming from for those promises?

Add to the equation the fact that neither mentions the B word - Brexit to you and me.

Brexit, according to research by the Centre for European Reform, suggests the UK economy is 2.5 per cent smaller than it would have been if Remain had won the referendum.

Public finances fell by £26 billion a year. This amounts to £500 million a week and is growing. By now you are probably thinking “stop I have a headache” and “she would say that wouldn’t she”.

But it’s not me saying it. These are independent sources which you can check for yourself. Please do. Because at the final count on Thursday July 4, we should hold whoever wins to account, either in government or at constituency but preferably, before you cast your vote.

Christine Grahame MSP for Midlothian South, Tweeddale and Lauderdale