Should British politicians publish their tax returns?

Either everyone’s tax returns should be public, as in Norway, or no one’s – otherwise that really would be one law for politicians and a different law for everybody else

Legitimate questions should be answered, but demanding the publication of tax returns would put people off going into public service (Getty)

Donald Trump’s tax returns have finally been published, confirming what had been suspected: that he has paid little in federal taxes in recent years. He appears to have used legitimate tax deductions to set depreciation and losses against his gains.

The publication was the product of a long legal and political struggle, as Trump held out against the convention that presidential candidates should publish their tax returns.

The outcome, though, is something of an anticlimax, in that there seems, on the first pass through the mass of material, to be nothing very damning about the former president’s tax affairs. The consensus is that the returns themselves would not prevent Trump from running for president again. If anything is going to obstruct his path to the primaries, it is more likely to be one of the various lawsuits that have been brought over the running of his businesses.