ON the day that unemployment recorded one of the biggest falls in years, The Northern Echo led the news with a highly misleading and partisan headline: “160,000 families hit by tax change” (Echo, Dec 13).

The fact is that many more than 160,000 families are having their tax cut and some families are seeing benefits rises capped.

If you are in work and both pay tax and claim benefits, you will still be better off.

The benefits budget is the highest budget the Government has. In times of austerity it needs to be capped.

Those who both work and receive benefit will still have a substantial tax cut as the amount that all basic rate taxpayers can earn before paying income tax will increase to £9,200.

Labour is trying to muddy this argument with deliberate misdirection. Your headline plays right into Labour’s argument, while your editorial and report were balanced and fair.

At a time of wage restraint, benefits rates have at least matched inflation, but many workers, including low paid staff who administer benefits, have had wage freezes. Decisions like a benefits cap are not easy, but the bigger, more important, economic issue is the fall in unemployment and the reduction in the deficit needed to help the fall continue.

Graham Robb, Middleton St George.