Easingwold marketgoers 'not comfortable' with tax affairs of Sunak family - Yorkshire Post Letters

On the BBC Radio 4 Today programme on Saturday morning (April 9) Kevin Hollinrake defended the tax affairs of the Chancellor Rishi Sunak and his wife Akshata Murty.

During the interview the presenter Nick Robinson asked Mr Hollinrake what the people in Thirsk market would say about the Sunak family tax arrangements if he was to go there and ask them.

Mr Hollinrake said that he thought that Labour activists would object but the general public would not.

As it happened, I was preparing to join a Labour campaign stall in Easingwold artisan market that very morning, a similar market town to Thirsk, both in Mr Hollinrake’s constituency.

We took the opportunity to ask the people in the market whether or not they did mind.

It turns out that they did. Forty people said that they were not comfortable, six said that they were, two were neutral on the matter. That is 83 per cent of random passers-by objecting.

I suggest that it is unwise for Kevin Hollinrake to invent his constituents’ opinions on this matter.

And I am disturbed that he uses ‘Labour activists’ as a pejorative term for people who may be critical of Mr Sunak’s actions, especially so as Mr Hollinrake is by definition a ‘Conservative activist’.

It appears that the current Conservative approach to the public is to ‘brook no dissent’.

There are elections in North Yorkshire on May 5. Perhaps that is the opportunity for people to express their opinions.

From: Christopher Clapham, Shipley.

Once again the Conservatives have hit the headlines. This time it is the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s wife and her tax affairs.

The problem is that creating wealth is a dirty business and always gets a loud outcry from the Labour Party, who are clueless when it comes to financial matters.

However, if you want to read the truth on the matter you only have to read the good old The Yorkshire Post, April 9.

This tells us that the Chancellor’s wife has done nothing wrong. Labour do not seem capable of getting anything right.

They really should try and be a constructive opposition. After all they have had plenty of practice.