Dissenting opinions: caravans and VAT

‘I disapprove of what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it’: so the historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall summed up Voltaire’s philosophy. Free speech is an important right but these days it is controversial: when is something so wrong or so damaging that it should not be allowed to be said at all? On balance I am in favour of people being allowed to put forward a view; if that view is wrong or capable of causing harm it needs to be published and answered rather than de-platformed and driven underground.

I don’t suppose David Pedley’s ‘lay view of HMRC’ (Taxation 21 March and 5 September 2024) is capable of causing great harm or lead to anyone being ‘cancelled’ but I would regret other readers of this magazine investing time in a goose-chase or ...