22 AUGUST 1941, Page 14

TAX-FREE INCOMES FOR INVALIDS

Sm,—No one up to now appears to have considered the plight of chronic invalids, or physically disabled persons, with small fixed incomes under the present heavy scale of war-time taxation. Unable to work themselves, and often obliged to employ someone to look after them and do the work of the house, they are faced with grave difficulties in the present and penury in the future should the next Budget be even more severe. Where the total income does not exceed £250 per annum and the recipient is an invalid, dependent upon a fixed income and unable to earn, then the whole or greater part of that income should be freed of liability to tax. With the high cost of living now ruling this is not only an urgent necessity, but mere humanity. The matter should be put before the Chancellor of the Exchequer and adjusted without delay, so that many weak and suffer- ing people shall not have the additional burden of privation placed upon them in the grim winter ahead.—Yours faithfully, A SYMPATHISER.