CHANCELLOR Alistair Darling has announced that from tomorrow that the inheritance tax threshold for couples will rise to 600,000 and then to 700,000 by 2010.

This will also affect by widows and widowers facing existing death duty bills and all married couple and civil partners.

He also promised an attack on super-rich private equity bosses and non-domiciled businessmen who make their money in the UK and live abroad.

The aim of this two-pronged strategy was to undermine the Tory bounce based on Shadow Chancellor George Osborne’s promise to take all but millionaires out of the inheritance tax bracket.

Edinburgh South-West MP Mr Darling said this showed the Tory figures did not add up and their plans would help the richest families while his allowed another 2 billion to boost public services.

He said that his plans would provide a budget for the Scottish Government that would rise by 3.7 billion over the next three years.

Mr Darling also said that:

UK economic growth is expected to be between 2 per cent and 2.5 per cent next year, the Chancellor said. And for 2009/2010 it is 2.5 per cent to 3 per cent.

Net borrowing is forecast to fall from 38bn this year to 23bn in 2012.

That there would be an extra 400m for military operations abroad this year and an extra 7.7bn for defence spending

Mr Darling announced a new single budget for the police, security services and other agencies to deal with terrorism, to rise by 1bn a year to 3.5bn in three years’ time

He promised to reform the capital gains tax system, ensuring those working in private equity pay a “fairer share”. There will be a single rate of 18 per cent for all.

A number of “loopholes” for non-domiciled taxpayers will be examined. Mr Darling said Tory plans to charge a flat rate of 25,000 to such people, would mean only 15,000 paying. This would mean revenue of 650m a year, rather than the 3.5bn that the Tories had estimated, he added.

Investment in science and technology to rise to 6bn in three years’ time.

The main rate of corporation tax will be cut by 2p in the pound to 28 per cent by next year, the lowest in the G7 group of wealthy industrialised nations.

Aviation duty would be paid on flights, rather than individual passengers.

The overseas aid budget will rise to 9bn by 2010.

The amount of child maintenance a family can receive without it affecting their benefits will double from 20 a week to 40 a week by 2010.

Pension credits will rise by 5 a week from next April for single people and 7.65 for couples.

However Mr Osborne accused the Chancellor of “fake figures” and a pre-election statement without an election.

A BEAUTY salon in Leith is at the centre of an investigation into money laundering after its Vietnamese owner was convicted of running a cannabis factory.

Detectives are probing Sunset Nails on Leith Walk after Manh Tuan Nguyen admitted growing tens of thousands of pounds worth of the strongest type of the drug, known as skunk.

Nguyen, 26, is said to be a senior figure in London’s drug trade and is believed to have funnelled cash generated from his criminal activities through the business in a bid to hide its source.

He is facing prison after pleading guilty at Woolwich Crown Court last week to conspiracy to produce skunk on a large scale.

Officers from the Metropolitan Police had been investigating Nguyen for almost two years and raided Sunset Nails on several occasions.

The police team believe Nguyen used the small Edinburgh shop to launder profits from his drug growing by pretending it came from legitimate customers. Although they came away empty-handed during the raids, the force’s inquires remain ongoing.

Officers discovered hundreds of cannabis plants, which could produce 70,000 worth of the drug, during a raid on a property in Kent owned by Nguyen.

His conviction followed an 18-month UK-wide investigation into Vietnamese gangs who, according to police sources in London, control almost the whole supply of skunk in the country.

Vietnamese-run nail bars in London are used to hide the multi-million pound profits reaped by the gangs, leading to suspicions that the salon in the Capital was being used for the same purpose.

Today, an Asian receptionist at the business confirmed Nguyen was still its owner but she had not seen him for “a few years”.

A Metropolitan Police source close to the investigation said officers were delighted to secure a conviction against Nguyen, who it is thought has extensive family links in Edinburgh.

The source said: “He is certainly quite high up in that scene and we spent some time trying to track him down and get the conviction. The judge told him at court when he next came back he would be looking at significant jail time.

“When the police did raid [Sunset Nails] we found nothing, but it is still being investigated.

“The vast majority of nail bars in London are a front for laundering proceeds from all the cannabis factories like the one in Kent.”

Nguyen’s address was given as Ryan Close, London, though he was also linked to two flat addresses in Albert Street, Leith, only a few minutes away from his nail bar.

The receptionist at Sunset Nails said that Mr Nguyen had not visited the salon for a few years. She said: “He’s not been here in Edinburgh. I think he is still in London.”

A spokeswoman for Woolwich Crown Court said: “Manh Tuan Nguyen pled guilty to charges of cultivating cannabis and is due for sentencing on October 31.”

THE doctor who sparked the MMR controversy paid children 5 to take their blood samples at his son’s birthday party, a disciplinary panel heard yesterday.

Dr Andrew Wakefield is accused of showing “callous disregard for the distress and pain” he knew or ought to have known the children might suffer as a result of his actions. He is also accused of abusing his position of trust and bringing the medical profession into disrepute.

Dr Wakefield and Professors John Walker-Smith and Simon Murch are appearing before the General Medical Council (GMC) Fitness to Practise Panel in London to hear disciplinary charges against them. They are accused of serious professional misconduct and face being struck off.

The trio published a paper in the Lancet medical journal in February 1998 suggesting there could be a link between the triple jab of mumps, measles and rubella, and bowel disease and autism. It led to falling numbers of parents immunising their children and a row over whether Tony Blair, the then-prime minister, had vaccinated his son, Leo.

It is alleged that Dr Wakefield approached children at the birthday party offering 5 to give blood for research.

While making a presentation to the MIND Institute in California on 20 March, 1999, he apparently told delegates about the incident “in humorous terms” and said he intended to take blood samples in the same way in future, the hearing heard.

The charges, which were read to the five-man panel, continued: “Your conduct was unethical in that you took blood from children in an inappropriate social setting, offered financial inducement to children to obtain blood samples, and showed a callous disregard for the distress and pain that you knew or ought to have known the children involved might suffer.”

Dr Wakefield was accused of being “dishonest” and “irresponsible” when putting his views about MMR across for publication. It was claimed he should have realised his linking of MMR with autism would have “major public health implications” and would attract intense public and media interest.

But supporters of Dr Wakefield have collected more than 7,000 signatures in an online petition. Before the hearing yesterday, parents gathered to show their support for Dr Wakefield - who now works in the US - by holding placards, clapping and cheering as he walked in.

Some signs read: “We’re with Wakefield”, while others read: “Wakefield Cares”.

He and his wife, Carmel, posed for pictures while a few parents chanted: “There’s only one Andrew Wakefield” and one shouted: “It’s a witch hunt.”

One supporter was Sue Gilbert, from Bath, whose 16-year-old son, Adam, has Asperger’s syndrome.

She said: “My son had the MMR jab at 14 months and had a terrible reaction. About ten or 11 days later he came out in a measles rash, he was very poorly. Prior to the MMR, he was a totally normal child.”

The allegations against the doctors relate to investigations for their study on 12 youngsters with bowel disorders carried out between 1996 and 1998. At the time, all three doctors were employed at the Royal Free Hospital’s medical school in London, with honorary clinical contracts at the Royal Free Hospital.

They are accused of performing lumbar punctures on children without proper approval and “contrary” to the children’s clinical interests.

Dr Wakefield and Prof Walker-Smith are also accused of acting “dishonestly and irresponsibly” in failing to disclose in the Lancet paper the method by which they recruited patients for the study. It is also alleged a drug was administered to one child for experimental reasons.

One of the key allegations against Dr Wakefield is that he was being paid at the time for advising solicitors on legal action by parents who believed their children had been harmed by MMR.

It was alleged that he accepted 50,000 from the Legal Aid Board for research to support litigation by parents.

Another charge is that he ordered investigations “without the requisite paediatric qualifications”.

All three doctors are accused of conducting the study on a basis which was not approved by the hospital’s ethics committee.

Last night, Jackie Fletcher, founder of the campaign group JABS, stood by the doctors and said the families were adamant that MMR had damaged their children.

She said: “My son is severely handicapped. We’re living with the evidence. The Department of Health should be investigating. We’ve given them the names of 1,200 children who we believe have been damaged by MMR. They have done nothing.”

Several Royal Colleges and faculties signed a statement ahead of the hearing, saying there was no evidence of a link between MMR and autism.

The statement read: “The undersigned believe that the MMR triple vaccine protects the health of children.

“A large body of scientific evidence shows no link between the vaccine and autism.”

The three men deny the charge of serious misconduct and the hearing is expected to last for three months. SUPPORTERS GATHER OUTSIDE HEARING TO ACCUSE GMC OF ‘WITCH HUNT’

THE doctor who prompted a public-health alert over the MMR vaccine was given a hero’s welcome outside the General Medical Council yesterday, despite facing allegations of serious professional misconduct.

Dr Andrew Wakefield, who controversially linked the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine with autism, was greeted by a crowd of about 50 protesters who believe he has been victimised by the Department of Health.

Yesterday, outside the GMC’s central London offices in Euston Road, emotions were running high, with parents chanting support for the doctor.

The campaigners, from grandmothers to young children, waved placards reading “Witch hunt” and “MMR a jab too far”. Emotive messages from the parents of children suffering from autism were also displayed on noticeboards outside the hearing and security into the building was tight.

One of the mothers showing support for the doctor was Isabella Thomas, whose online petition has so far attracted more than 7,000 signatures. Mrs Thomas, 50, from Somerset, believes the MMR led to severe reactions in two of her sons, leaving them with bowel disease and autism.

“These doctors are put on trial because they tried to say parents were concerned about the vaccine,” she said.

“This is medical negligence by the Department of Health.”

She and her husband, Ian, 49, began to worry about MMR after their son Michael, was given the vaccine aged 14 months.

“Michael immediately began to react to it. He had high-pitched screaming and a high temperature which I could not get down.

“He changed from being one baby into another. During that period of time, it was like having a wild animal.”

When her youngest son, Terry, was a few months old, one consultant said that if he did not have MMR, he could die from measles because he was prone to convulsions. He also suffered a serious reaction with a high temperature.

Mrs Thomas repeatedly visited doctors and questioned the safety of the MMR jab.

“They basically threatened that if I carried on causing a fuss then my children would be put on the at-risk register.”

Mrs Thomas says it is important to stand by Dr Wakefield as he was the only doctor who listened to her.

Last year, Mrs Thomas and other parents took drug companies to court but the refusal to grant legal aid meant the case was stopped because they could not afford to continue.

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