DO YOU HAVE A GRUMBLE ABOUT ACCOUNTANCY?

We have just launched the most minimalist website in the accounting profession. Take a look at it on www.alexanderrosse.co.uk and by all means have a whinge.

THE DEBATE

Let us start off this rant by saying that we support any reduction in the state burden on our clients. By that, we mean the burden of red tape, tax and employer's National Insurance. Any reduction in these is welcome. We support the opposition pledge to cancel the Government's planned increase in NI contributions in 2011. Taxing jobs will either lower profits or less jobs - and some businesses will cease to exist as a result of this.

Which brings us onto our main rant: the election debate so far has been about slicing a small cake. We are all for growing the size of the cake. Along with reducing the national debt (without the necessary action on this, we will be paying more taxes for years just to pay the interest bill), we think the main political parties need to absolutely focus on the SME sector as the engine for growth that will generate the wealth to pay for our future prosperity. We want the focus not on taking more of a small cake, but making the cake bigger, so that marginal rates of tax do not need to rise, while we provide for the public services we all want.

No economy can tax its way out of a problem. Tax in itself is not a solution, but a temporary fix. We have a choice of either generating more successful businesses, which will create the jobs of the future, or hammer these businesses with more red tape and take more of their income away.

We know how we will vote. We are just waiting for the political parties to give us the clear options.