No time for a tax on jobs

Yesterday's letter of protest was signed by some of the top names in British industry. Yet it is a certainty that, for every one of those 23 signatures, there will be thousands of owners of hard-pressed small businesses nodding in agreement.

Anyone involved in running a business knows that even a small increase in the cost of employment can lead to closures and redundancies.

The fact that the Government is accusing the letter's signatories of being somehow bamboozled by the Tories on this issue is not only insulting to some of this country's finest business brains, but it also highlights how little practical knowledge Ministers

have of actually running a business.

But if the Conservatives are tempted to feel somewhat smug that their promise not to implement next year's National Insurance rise has won such high-profile backing, they should think again. For the fact

remains that both main parties are continuing to conceal the scale of cuts necessary to reduce the Government deficit and refusing to

say exactly how they will go about implementing them.

The parties are very good at producing detailed analyses of each others' tax and spending plans, but notably reticent at applying the same level of frankness to their own.

The public deserve better than this, particularly from David Cameron if they are to vote Tory with any confidence in the General Election.

After all, the likely response of Labour to the need to reduce the deficit is clear from its past record. In all his time as Chancellor and Prime Minister, Gordon Brown has financed his plans through extensive, but covert, tax rises – for example, by increasing National Insurance as a means of keeping his pledge not to raise income tax.

What is less clear to wavering voters is how the Conservatives,

supposedly committed to reducing the tax burden, will handle the

onerous responsibility of reducing a 167bn deficit. If Mr Cameron really wants to steal a march on Labour, he must stop running scared of what his opposite number will say and be clear and confident about his plans.

The promise not to raise National Insurance is just a start.