No-one who has been reading this blog for a while will be surprised that I voted with the Government on the Benefit Cap last Monday night and also for the Changes to the Child Support Agency on Wednesday. There is however a good case for compromise on the benefit cap in one respect. The cap is the same for the whole of England and Wales, and yet we know that of the 67,000 families or so who are receiving take-home benefits of above £26,000, 54% are in London. Private rents in London are exceptionally high compared with those in most other areas and private landlords can at present sting the State for more or less what they can get. There is an argument for exerting some downward pressure on these landlords. So I hope Ministers will consider “regionalisation” of the welfare cap, at least incorporating a London weighting into the measure. The principle that work should be seen to pay is a good one but there is a case for being a little fairer to these London families, even if it is in the main to provide some transitional relief for landlords.
The vote on the Child Support Agency charges was fascinating. I was one of the very few Crossbenchers who supported the Government but it was clear before the debate that the Government would lose. Why? Well it was fascinating to watch the way the Lords works. Peers had received briefings funded by Barnardo’s the children’s charity and other children’s charities. Lord Mackay of Clashfern, a former Lord Chancellor who moved the amendment on behalf of Barnardo’s, is a respected and well-loved figure and was convinced that charging for those who could not reach an amicable agreement, mostly women trying to get child maintenance money out of a former partner, would be treated unfairly. The lawyers in the House piled in behind him. Peers had worked themselves up into an emotional righteousness against the new disincentives in the Bill to use the Child Support Agency as a matter of course where parents are separating. I confess that before I looked into the detail of the matter I was going to vote with Lord Mackay too. But then I read the independent reports that have consistently said that over 90% of the 300,000 couples with children who separate every year could make their own arrangements if encouraged to do so but are using the agency unnecessarily, adding to the severe pressure on the Agency, and the huge cost. A small charge would be a disincentive to using the agency for all except those who need it and help the agency tackle the support needs where one party, usually the man, is reluctant to pay. The Government had obviously had discussions with Lord Mackay and recognised his concerns. The Government therefore tabled its own amendments for discretionary waving of charges. But these amendments came up BEFORE Lord Mackay’s and no-one was really listening, so keen were they to get on with the vote.
Lord de Mauley, the assistant minister/ junior whip, was taking this section rather than Lord Freud; this was unfortunate since the ineffably elegant Eton educated Rupert Ponsonby, 7th Baron de Mauley gives the impression that 1000 years of good breeding may not have prepared him to deal with the issue of welfare benefits. This is actually deeply unfair since he has taken a serious interest in this business and is far more clued up and on the ball about the detail than he may be given credit for. And then three former Social Security ministers weighed in against the changes. But there we are…and the one backbenchTory who spoke for the Government, a recently appointed member, barrister Baroness Berridge, said the right things (http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld201212/ldhansrd/text/120125-0002.htm#12012551000542
) but somehow struck an unfortunate tone which does not emerge from reading Hansard. Like a pack of fox hounds peers had scented the quarry…and there was no stopping them.
The Government will think carefully I am sure about its response but I am pretty sure the Commons will reject these amendments.
One and all still have to face up to the constitutionally-entrenched Mind-Delusion
that one-human-being is in fact,
and is in goods-and-monies income-entitlement,
MORE than one human being
whereas most other human-beings are either only entitled to less than that one-multiple-income,
or not entitled even to one-human-living.
—————————
The paradigm-shift Resolution to this Issue, along with all the other Issues being posted by Noble Peers,
could be at hand;
but it will involve much longer and more deliberately generated all-round alternatives, than are possible under the already dominant and Standard-Diagnoses-Manualled traditional quickest-and-best-practice solutions and ‘fixes’;
and this longer methodology will require even one of its foremost leaders, Dr Edward de Bono, to ‘knuckle-down’ and lead (or willingly follow) into an ultimate Neccessity & Sufficiency Sustainworthiness;
for instance in his leading book “Edward de Bono’s Thinking Course” describes
‘a first-doctor, traditional expert at quick-diagnosis,
delivered with great confidence, even when wrong’;
(whereas the second doctor would make all the holistic-assessments and have all the lab-tests done before offering what s/he would still only call the ‘probable’ diagnosis);
Our minds tend to ‘jump in, with what we already know to be Right or most-relevant’
(page 25 )“The mind tends to work like the first doctor because we have to get on with life, and a flurry of alternatives too often means a dither of indecision.”
(“Because of this natural tendency of mind we need to develop a conscious tool …”
and the first two in such a ‘tool-bag’ are taught, by the Cognitive Research Trust and by Lateral-thinkers and Dr de Bono-ites, as PMI (Pluses, Minuses, Intestings/Influentials; and then
APC (Alternatives, Possibilities, Choices) )…
————
All of the above needs to be scrutinised ‘holisticly’, as overall or under-pinning essential “Lifesupports”
viz this topic’s “The Benefit Cap and Child Support”
I think it’s obvious that living costs are higher if you have children. Benefits should be about giving people the minimum they need to survive as a temporary measure, so it follows that those with children should receive more.
The real issue is that the proposed cap of £26,000 net pa is too high. A single person doesn’t need that much money. A PhD student for example is expected to live on a stipend of half that amount, and I can tell you it’s quite possible. You can’t afford to rent a three bed semi, but why should people living off the state expect to? Many hard-working people have to rent a room in a shared house, so why shouldn’t benefit claimants? If someone loses their job, their choice should be more somewhere cheap, or if they want to maintain their lifestyle, supplement their income by using their savings. If they don’t have any, don’t expect the state to foot the bill.
With a lower basic cap, the maximum with child benefit could be closer to £26,000. Surely that should satisfy everyone (by which I mean politicians and taxpayers, not claimants)?
While I’m sympathetic to you argument experience suggests flat rates are easy and cheap to administer and relatively harder to defraud than multiple rates or where means testing or multiple cross cutting rates apply.
I’m not suggesting multiple capping levels. I’m suggesting a single, lower cap, then the existing child benefit to boost income for those with children. No additional means testing is required, just the existing measures to ensure only those with children receive child benefit.
Surely including child benefit in the cap means extra administration, as some people might be entitled to receive just part of it if they other benefits took them over the threshold?
I was under the impression that the proposal was to use those already means tested and adjusted benefits to adjust to the 26k figure leaving the cheap to administer, because it is fixed, Cb untouched.
As I say I have no issue with you idea if it can be achieved at de minimus cost
Put a cap on the amount of rent private landlords can charge to those families on benefits and then ensure that they can’t discriminate against people who are on benefits and deny them a home and the cap won’t hit so hard, perhaps. The last thing you want is families out on the street with nowhere to go. I don’t understand why this hasn’t been done already when all the warnings point into the direction of ripoff Britain! It’s not rocket science.
The problem is that they may well choose supply the rented accommodation to others.
If you look at what happened in NY with rent controls you will see that it has pretty dire effects.
£26,000 net pa is too high. A single person
Rural area? £10,000 is sufficient.
They seem to include the need to own a car in such calculations, which pushes it up by £3000 a year, to £13,000
The utter delusion in this instance is that benefit and ‘child benefit’ above all is a gift from ‘government’ and therefore the tax payer, that people don’t deserve or have a right to.
They took away the tax benefits given to those who work and replaced it with child benefit for all.
Now they are trying to pretend that it doesn’t cost more to keep a family of dependents than it does to have a single working household? Kids cost money and a lot of it. The tax allowance didn’t ever cover those costs and neither does child benefit. So they are robbing working families with children by removing it. It is a right to have child allowance. And that is that. You cannot keep a family on the same amount of income as a single person.
And the joke in all of this is, the amount we must give a family on benefit has to be capped at £26K. Have you seen the wages offered now in adverts for jobs, across the board. I was shocked when I saw an offer for a full time job the other day at £10k pa. Are they serious? Who in this day can live on that, single or otherwise?
Wages have been deliberately held down over the last thirty years. I remember in the eighties a general salary offered a London secretary was £24 to £26K, until the Thatcherites decided this was way beyond what business could afford. Then when the brown stuff hits the fan and that low an income becomes too ludicrous for even a down and out to live on, it is still thrown around as if it is a fortune. Whilst those at the top cream it off at a laughable figure. Of course they could not afford to pay a person a living wage, but the profligate on the hill top get away with it because they will give it to charity, on our behalf. We all know ‘it trickles down dear’ doesn’t it?….. Raise the wage level in line with thirty years of massive inflation and the hand outs will not be so impressive. Will they?
Now the issue of financial and emotional responsibility. Men and women should be taught to accept that having children is not a game of ‘house.’ It cannot be stopped after an hour or two of fun. It is for life. Women who have children to men who won’t commit to their parental obligations are selling themselves short. And more than that, are selling their children short of the necessity of a father. A father is a gift no one should reject. Girls must be taught to only accept the worthy as a lover.
This should be taught in school from a very early age, to both sexes. Rather than the mechanics of sexual activity, responsibility should be emphasized. And the mutual respect between the sexes promoted rather than downgraded as it is now.
Nature is always best. It knows what is good for us. Turning our back on it is not only dumb it is self destructive. And to do that for some idiotic political idea is a farce. And the big issue here is, why do we want to? Can anyone explain that in simple words for us all to understand?
If we continue to promote resentment in the sexes we are going to exacerbate the problem we have become accustomed to and the damage will get more hideous over the years.
In the broader sense, Lennon and McCartney had it right when they used the lyrics of ‘love’ being the answer.
I repeat in the broader term this has to be the answer. Rather than batter the other sex because they are a different species, accept the differences and enjoy it, instead of being entwined in a scenario of control. Which can never have a winner.
at £10k pa. Are they serious? Who in this day can live on that, single or otherwise</i
Serious. Some people are frugal, and enjoy frugality.
Croft, yes, I accept your point about the difficulties of regionalising rates of benefit but the differences are very stark.
Maude, I can’t agree that any benefit is a ‘right’, it’s a variable support system decided by elected governments designed to promote various social policies as well as support those who cannot support themselves. Child allowance can indeed be varied and I cannot see in what way it is a ‘right’. But you are right about teaching girls to choose the right men as fathers for their children. I fear fecklessness and simple naivety will never be changed but the more knowing women who are all too expert at playing the system will change their habits if the incentives change.
@Baroness Murphy:
I did know this word ‘right’ would be an issue. It is indeed a ‘right’ until you tell tax payers that their taxes are no longer to be addressed fairly.
As I wrote, to take taxes from those who have families and treat them as if they have no children is obscene. They have every ‘right’ to keep what they lawfully earn to support their families at a living wage level.
Either return the tax allowance in full for people with children or leave the ‘family allowance’ as it is. Government removed tax allowance for dependents and gave ‘family allowance.’ If you are going to remove that, then you must return the tax allowance for dependents.
If you refuse to do this, then you will be taxing us all to death. Except the rich that is, and all the immigrant dependents you have encouraged into the country without first getting the public mandate to do so.
Where you are mistaken is in believing ‘government’ has the unfettered right to taxation without representation. And you are not representative as a government, for their is no majority and the election was run on a dishonest premise.
It is time you began taxing those who are very rich at the same level as you do the rest of us. Why is it so extraordinary to have this as a matter of course?
That way you won’t have to be paying out ‘our money’ in so many benefits to those you feel have more right to it than the British people who pay for it.
What you are really doing is robbing Peter to pay Paul. And the Paul is the group who have no right to it. And I am not referring to so called ‘benefit claimants.’
It’s not a right. There is no right for anyone to take other people’s money by force.
Either return the tax allowance in full for people with children or leave the ‘family allowance’ as it is.
They won’t. They have run up massive debts. Caused by things like the cost of the Lords. 2,700 pounds a day per peer. They want their expenses and you’re one of the little people.
Where you are mistaken is in believing ‘government’ has the unfettered right to taxation without representation. And you are not representative as a government, for their is no majority and the election was run on a dishonest premise.
If you have no direct say, then you have no responsibility.
Just as ‘all bankers are guilty for the sins of the few’, all politicians as fraudsters and all public servants are guilty too. So no bailout when their pensions can’t be paid. The price of failure isn’t it.
That’s Labour’s logic.
@LB:
British taxed poor are being forced to pay taxes to give as charity to the world. Charity they need to support themselves in the expensive UK we have today.
Government give tax breaks to the rich on nebulous grounds, but, worse than that they give breaks to multi national at a rate that would take your head off.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZH24RXBJyWI
And as a last little teaser on this thread. The real all inclusive total for the banker Heston was £39 million not the paltry £1.5m claimed by this government. They certainly are all in it together. Nice work if you can fiddle it.
And if the Baroness feels that the US is the cause these bankers should be paid so much because theyw ill only go there and get a position on Wall Street, I suggest she lets them try as English men to get a job as CEO at a US bank. They would fall on the floor laughing.
This is the reason these individuals believe the British parliament is full of fools, because they simply don’t know what they are talking about. And, Singapore, well, they have to live there and that is an untenable thought to the City of London spoiled babies.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2093630/Cameron-refuses-micromanage-bonuses-RBS-bosses-says-turning-payout-matter-individual.html
If government doesn’t feel the tax payer has the ‘right’ to allowance for dependents, or, the ‘right’ to expect support when the country fails in its duty to run the economy in the black, in order for the ordinary man to survive, well they have no ‘right’ to the tax payers cash, now do they?
Now here is a guy, Roger Hayes, who has it partially ‘right.’
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H9HivlOAMqs
He has fell for the ‘Europe’ is the trouble con floated by those who want to make money out of the global connection to the USA. He doesn’t see it that ‘Europe’ is caught up in the con just as we are.
Are they being taxed (forced charity)?
yes.
Government give tax breaks to the rich on nebulous grounds,
Depends what you mean by tax breaks. If its paying 2,500 in tax (min wage), or paying a million in tax (Hestor) then I don’t see much of a tax break. Where is the break?
The real all inclusive total for the banker Heston was £39 million not the paltry £1.5m claimed by this government
You will have to explain that one.
So let me point out the real crooks. The UK government debt is 7,000,000,000,000 (7 Trillion). They are running a ponzi scam on an epic scale. Worrying about 1 banker is falling for the scam’s excuses. 1 banker is irelevant. Banking losses and bailouts are irrelevant. It’s 1% of the problem.
If government doesn’t feel the tax payer has the ‘right’ to allowance for dependents, or, the ‘right’ to expect support when the country fails in its duty to run the economy in the black, in order for the ordinary man to survive, well they have no ‘right’ to the tax payers cash, now do they?
The government has no intention of running the economy in the black. They intend running the ponzi for as long as they can extract cash.
I’ve repeatedly posted and challenged the Peers on how much the government owes. Not one will respond. Why?
1. They were guilty of running the debt up.
2. They are incompetent (not mutually exclusive with 1)
3. They know what is going on and kept shut.
Take your pick of any one or any combination.
So you’ve got it wrong. You want tax breaks for your personal reasons (right reasons I add) You won’t get them because they want your money for their scams.
On the video link.
The flip side, you have no responsibility if you haven’t consented to being robbed. In fact, you have a moral right to prevent people from robbing you.
You haven’t been asked about taxation. When did you get a vote on taxation? With no direct say, comes no responsibility for bailing government out.
Wall Street, I suggest she lets them try as English men to get a job as CEO at a US bank. They would fall on the floor laughing
The number of plain spoken Brits in the theatre in NY is surprising,but you would have to change your accent, to become president of the USA, or Arnie, State Governor, of the wealthiest state.
Laughing all the way to dead losses.
And here it is in easy terms, LB.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPKg-3KxJ00
And as a little reminder, in case we all forget.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axlnhjbOQac&feature=related
@LB:
If you read what I wrote again you will see I say his ‘all round total hits ‘£39m’ which was the big headline yesterday, January 30, in the Daily Mail, page four.
That has been taken off the net, however, this one spells it out.
http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/news/article-2093697/RBS-Stephen-Hester-turns-1m-bonus-payment-head-clash-MPs.html
Additionally my post does not centre on this ‘one man’ as an overall distaste for the UK practice on taxation for the rich. It is meant to cover all those who make unbelievable emoluments and end up paying very little as a percentage of their tax liability in proportion to the rest of us.
Somehow, I cannot see that you, of all people, would have missed that sentiment.
And how fierce it becomes when the suggestion is those who take more than their fair share of the economic pie, from the top of the tree, are the pariahs, not those on benefits.
They are able to fight like the US against the British in the Revolutionary war. Aren’t they? Couldn’t be because, unlike the disabled, sick and poor, they can buy themselves out of it.
I’ve no qualms with people earning millions, or even billions.
I do have qualms with people taking money of other people using force or the threat of force.
Now can I ask you, given that the rich are going to be paying hundreds, thousands of time more tax than other people. At the same time people are making lots of noise about how the rich don’t deserve anything for their tax.
ie. They can be milked for their money, but a thank you? Feck off being the reply.
That’s a very dangerous state of affairs in my opinion. You need the rich to earn money, otherwise the poor will get nothing.
Then the middle class will be milked for their tax, to pay for the elite in government. 2,700 a day per peer is what they cost us.
They elite will cut the poor before they cut their wages.
That’s what you are seeing now.
The rich will do what the rich always do. Move and hide their money. They know what governments do when desperate. See Greece.
Now is the UK in the same position as Greece? The answer is yes. It’s just that the maturity profile of its debt is a little longer.
So they are going to cut your pension to pay for their lifestyle.
And how fierce it becomes when the suggestion is those who take more than their fair share of the economic pie, from the top of the tree, are the pariahs, not those on benefits.
==============
There are quite a few on benefits who are not pariahs. I’d put the figure around the 1 million mark. The number of truly disabled. [1m rising to 2.5 at the end of Labour isn’t explainable)
The rest are in lots of cases taking something for nothing.
On the rich, I would partially agree with you. Some are talking something for nothing.
The rest who have accumulated wealth, I disagree strongly with you.
For example, why don’t you suggest confiscating Richard Branson’s wealth, all of it?
The rest are in lots of cases taking something for nothing.
Not that many, and there are certain rights.
If it means that those who have always lived here obtain a tacit negative taxation because of it, whilst those who have immigrated in the last 20 years do not, then it can only be a sensible thing. (I don’t think that remark is discriminatory, but if it is apologies).
There are things about Open Door policies that would be impossible to manage/administer without such subtle ploys.
If, like the Russians in the early 90s they turn up and sign on at 20 different offices in 25 different names, and make big money for a while, then it has got to be stopped, but generally it is not like that.
If you do not have permsssion to be in the country at all, you are not going to go round, swanking for Benefit payments are you?????????
Keep your eyes to the ground and WORK! Immigrant philosophy for 150 years or more, firstly to the Land of the Free (NY docks) and now to the lands of the… Free-er(?)!Heathrow/Gatwick/wherever in EU27
Oh, but, LB, it is easily explained.
The massive influx into the country of immigrants from throughout the world is the proportional exact figure for the increase.
They massage the figures and lie about the numbers of entry. It’s big business and a lot of people make a lot of money out of it. Lawyers, quangos, social workers, et al. And how they have done this is, they quickly, in a turn around, gave millions nationality. Made them all British citizens. So they now play the ‘they are not migrants game.’
The high birthrate and the figures of disability levels from migrant inter family marriage has created a great deal of dependents child disability. Rather than teach those who enter, that incestuous relationships create deformities, as that may offend those who have a history of this kind of experience.
If you were to check out the figures in hospitals, of all kinds including psychiatric, you would be staggered by the level of immigrant population we are taking care of out of taxation.
Tony Blair should donate his entire income to cover his irresponsibility in policy making on this matter. As should his cohorts who assisted in this duplicity. Those people should be footing the bill for all of this personally.
The lawyers who benefit from this practice were advised and carried out these applications at a level that was inconceivable to the ordinary people. And all without the public consent or knowledge of what was going on. Ask those who went to these nationalization ceremonies and were given a little teaspoon to commemorate it, how they couldn’t believe their luck and how easy it was/is.
If you want to ask a FOI question, ask how many people over the years from 1997 to present, have been made British Nationals.
Along with that, you could also ask how many were sick or disabled on entering the UK or were elderly when they entered the UK, to be with family who had settled here.
When you have got that information, go back and ask how many of those migrants came from outside the EU. That way you will get a much clearer picture on how and why the disability level rocketed the way it has.
Those figures put out last week are a joke. And the annoyance shown at us having the gall to ask how many, we, the tax payers of this country, are now having to support for life, as a result of these policiesy, is ominous. The audacity of it, being, you have no right to know how thin we are going to spread your welfare pot. Nor, have you any right to know where the money we take from you is going to make it impossible for you to expect a pension. We, the government have decided to give it to other nations peoples who want to live here, so that we can create a multicultural environment for you to live in.
And, if you don’t like the idea of a poverty stricken old age, or, an NHS that can no longer treat you, then you are a bigot and a racist for daring to question the sanity of our ideas on this matter.
Lastly, this figure is not reducing, even though this government talks of changing the situation via various means. Additionally, the new policy they tell us they are putting into practice are unlikely to make a difference, in real terms. Because no one will address the issue in Europe.
Money should come directly from Europe in the billions to support their immigrant and asylum policies. If this circumstance was felt to be a necessity by those in Brussels, and embraced so ardently by our leaders, who have little or no knowledge of life for the average man outside parliament, then the European Union should have to foot the ongoing bill out of their coffers, without any increase from the states within that union.
Perhaps their largesse will be met with a more realistic attitude if they are made to ‘personally’ pay out of their annual stipend, for the application.
http://www.migrationwatchuk.org/briefingPapers
This website may give some idea, but, it is based on massaged government figures. And of course, apart from that, doesn’t include illegals. Which they are finding by the day, is way higher than the given figure we presently have.
There may be 1.5 million migrants, but 100% of them won’t be on welfare. I’m surrounded by them, and I’ll classify them as follows.
1. The poor and low skilled. The advantage too them is that these are the dynamic ones who have got up off their arses to move to where they can get work. I can’t complain about their motivation one bit.
However, since they consume in the same way as brits, they are a cost to society because they don’t generate the tax revenues.
2. The ones on benefits/criminals etc.
These should be made to leave.
3. The high skilled high tax paying.
These should remain for so long as they pay more tax than the average government spend per person, per migrant.
2 and 3 are pretty clear. Far better than quotas and prescribed jobs. That is just civil service make work.
1 is more difficult. It has a detrimental effect on the numbers on benefits. One option is a very long qualifying period for benefits. Would work for brits too.
The other good thing about it is that the criteria is completely non racist. Deals with a lot of the complaints.
If you knew that migrants earned more than 40K per person, and was paying more tax than they consumed, I suspect you would take a different approach. Such people also are educated, and so any children would be better educated, and the number of problems such as crime reduced. The BNP would have more of a problem recruiting from the people currently adversely affected
And, if you don’t like the idea of a poverty stricken old age, or, an NHS that can no longer treat you
It’s going to happen. Not because of migration. That’s a minor contributory effect in the total problem.
The real problem is government debts and the fraud in hiding those debts.
Gilts – borrowing – 1.05 trillion.
State pensions – not on the books – fraud.
State second pensions – not on the books – fraud.
Civil service pensions – not on the books – fraud.
PFI (capital part) – not on the books – fraud.
Guarantees for ex state enterprise pensions schemes – not on the books – fraud.
Bank losses (Gordon’s share trading) – not on the books – fraud.
Nuclear decommissioning – not on the books – fraud.
7,000 bn in total.
Deficit this year – 150 bn
Increase in total debt – 350 bn
Total 500 bn
Government taxation – 550 bn
Doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see what is going to happen.
That 7,000 does not include welfare. 50% of the population has less than 5K in savings. Are they going to be bailed out? Well, they will want to be bailed out, but the money won’t be there.
That’s the real problem.
Even Fred the Pleb (he’s lost his knighthood), is just politicians trying to divert attention from the mess of their making.
70 bn bank losses (most caused by Gordon Brown) versus 7,000 bn of government debt with no assets. Also caused by Gordon Brown and others.
@LB:
I have a great deal of qualms around ‘International Corporations’ who earn billions of pounds from us being able to get away with paying ludicrous tax levels, like 16%.
Try Zug for example. See how many of these top pay receivers are fiddling you out of your pension, and worse, your child’s right to a health service for life.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NxezUBlBE-w
Mull over some of these revelations for awhile, and see how you feel about those who want to reduce their tax liability to the detriment of us all.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jGTcjbHJ8XE
And
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=iv&src_vid=jGTcjbHJ8XE&annotation_id=annotation_785718&v=aYe1Hdc5MfY
I have a great deal of qualms around ‘International Corporations’ who earn billions of pounds from us being able to get away with paying ludicrous tax levels, like 16%.
=======
International means they don’t do all their business here. What makes you think that its correct to tax a business that is operating in Germany on its German profits?
Would you accept a German government taxing British telecom on its profits in the UK?
At the end of the day, its not corporations who pay tax. It’s people. Corporation tax is just tax paid on behalf of the shareholders.
Zug is booming. Ask yourself why? Are they fiddling me out of a pension. Well they might be, I still have a Swiss pension from when I worked there. However, if they are they are fiddling every Swiss national too, and there are strong reasons to believe that isn’t the case.
We need the UK to become more like Zug and less like North Korea or Greece.
your child’s right to a health service for life.
There is no such right.
So, do you think your tax money should go on services, or on paying fat cat pensions?
Mull over some of these revelations for awhile, and see how you feel about those who want to reduce their tax liability to the detriment of us all.
I’m all in favour of it. Tax avoidance is legal and moral. It’s moral because if the government takes it, it wastes it. It is committing fraud. If you think its moral to give money to a fraudster, I’m sure Lord Taylor or Lord Hanningfield will be please to make your acquaintance and take your money off you.
In the mean time, those who minimise their taxes, protect themselves, and their families from the disasterous effects of government policy. With debts of 7,000 bn in taxation of 550 bn (there is still very little evasion), its going to go wrong. The government would need tax revenues of well over GDP to be safe, and you can’t tax more than 100% of all incomes. So its inevitable that they will default.
@LB:
Then the answer is, to make it ‘illegal’ to have a company here, or, in Europe, without paying the full tax requirement.
And you are going to say, well they will all leave. Which is what they have done, according to 60 minutes, from the US. Yet, the people who run it remain in the country. And there is the way to get them.
They must live in the country where they have their company. To do otherwise, must be illegal. And like the US government does with taxes on ordinary people, they must pay on various different levels. State tax, European tax. Land taxes, and so on and so on. And if they don’t like it, feck off.
Make them live full time in Guernsey, Jersey, Isle of Man, Caymen Islands, Zug, Ireland, etc., out of this country.
Look, I am not a master at this, but we must have those who would know how to stop this bloody lark, somewhere in our midst. And we should do it with Europe, across the board. Otherwise, the entire world should levy the same tax in every country. No matter where they pretend their set up is. And that should be levied at a minimum of 50%. Claw back some of what they have stolen.
And this lark of not paying full paye income tax like the rest of us. That thick red Andrew Neil trying to tell us they pay 52%, what a crock, does he think we are all idiots? They have every kind of get out via accountancy to avoid those taxes and it is set up that way by government, who has too many of the gangsters in there with them.
These are the pariahs on the state. They fiddle billions more than any people claiming benefit, or, any families receiving an allowance for support of their children.
This word game and pretense in politics must stop. Otherwise, they too must be got rid of.
They are multinationals. They have businesses everywhere.
Do you expect the UK to be able to tax them on their world wide income?
What if other countries decide likewise?
If you buy a share in Amazon, are you going to refuse to receive any dividends because its an American company?
Why can’t I buy shares in Amazon? I don’t live in the US.
And if they don’t like it, feck off.
They have feck’ed off. Now you are complaining that they have feck’ed off to Zug.
Make your mind up, do you want them or don’t you want the companies in the UK?
If you don’t want them, don’t complain when they don’t pay taxes here because they are resident in Zug.
Then the middle class will be milked for their tax, to pay for the elite in government. 2,700 a day per peer is what they cost us
The only way of keeping tabs on the middle class is by making them employees, whose employers pay the taxes en bloc. Unfortunately this means that government always wants to deal with bigger and bigger business to make them do the work of tax raising amongst their employees. One big payment of tax is far easier to deal with than half a million small ones.
qualms with people taking money of other people using force or the threat of force.
Unfortunately that is how the European empires started, with the crusades and the East India and TVL companies which followed.
At the moment we have an inward looking Planter and plantation philosophy, which enriches the Earls and Dukes, and some Gentlemen too, by importing not only their goods, but THE people as well!
The vast incrase in population of GB ltd over the last 15 years of 10million people is inward plantation, a tax charge on every one of them when they buy a home,payable to those Earls/Dukes/Gents ,of one third to one quarter of the value of each property.
That is a cool, cool profit. 10million people 2m Households? £100,000 on each house to lord this or lord that! That has been the real taxation of the last 20 years!
Blagger harps on about the real cost of pensions, but what the feck does it matter,
if inward plantation, covers our pesnion life insurance, by factors of hundreds?
Feckless? NO!CANNY! UK canny!
Blagger harps on about the real cost of pensions, but what the feck does it matter,
if inward plantation, covers our pesnion life insurance, by factors of hundreds?
=============
Well, put some numbers to it.
Migrant comes in on min wage. 2.5K a year in taxes, receives 11K a year in government spending, on average.
Doesn’t work does it.
Those migrants, also want their state pension at the end of it as well, remember.
Those migrants, also want their state pension at the end of it as well, remember.
And also be less of a burden by returning to the land of their fathers to retire, but not to Wales.
It is a small world seen from the cosmopolitan eye, no part of the world being independent of any other, though for my money I would rather be in Patagonia, Welsh as I am.
They are multinationals. They have businesses everywhere.
It would be surprising if multi-national businesses can be taxed anywhere, in view of their quasi nation state status. That is the whole point about their power, that they are unassailable taxwise,and have the lobbying power to influence mere constitutional democracies, prime minsters and presidents ,to do their bidding.
Rifkind has been informed.
Limiting shareholder status is an old Swiss trick, being emulated.
Amazon will soon be superseded by iRiverCoverStory the new korean gizmo offered by Waterstone/WHS/HMV for their online book/disc selection with a great deal more freedom of choice.
They can’t. No more so than Germany can tax UK companies.
All the UK can do is insist that UK subsiduaries are taxed in the UK, and/or that profits generated in the UK remitted overseas are taxed.
It can’t even discriminate and put a different tax rate on such items, because that’s against EU law. Both on freedom of movement of capital (the right to feck off, is now an EU right), and illegal state aid.
@Lord Blagger:
The so called ‘benefits’ paid for by the working tax payer of this country are not the cause of the financial downfall here or in Europe. Financial chaos is politically induced. What is happening is at a high political level and they want slave labour and this country has followed the US all the way on this. Which is why they cling to them so fiercely. They want us in this country and throughout Europe to work and be paid the same way those in the third world and China are forced to exist. So that those on the very top band can have complete control.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=Gi1R4iDx3Lg
Why is it, LB, you simply will not take on board what is happening, even though you must see it is as plain as the nose on your face?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=Gi1R4iDx3Lg
Here is the truth on what is going on in the UK and internationally. This government of ours is either stupid or duplicitous in the extreme and the people that surround them want their idiocy or duplicity to remain covert.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFXyQrE-dHc
AS a start this is the way to deal with it. Because, if we do not deal with it from the source, all the impoverishment you place on the head of the ordinary citizen will not save us from devastation. This is what happened to Greece, and now Portugal, as well as the rest of those on shaky ground, including us. Non tax paying big business is the real culprit in all of this austerity, for they are the ‘cheats’ not the poor and disabled people who have no other way to survive.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DpM1g9zqoqk
Government has had to nobble the Lords to get their policies through quickly before the majority of the people realise just what they are doing and how they are going to suffer because of it.
Forbes list:
1 HSBC Holdings
2 General Electric
3 Bank of America
4 JPMorgan Chase
5 ExxonMobil
6 Royal Dutch Shell
7 BP
8 Toyota Motor
9 ING Group
10 Berkshire Hathaway
Fairly obvious what people have got to do. Give up cars and spend less.
The so called ‘benefits’ paid for by the working tax payer of this country are not the cause of the financial downfall here or in Europe.
===========
Partly agreed.
The cause is debt. It’s bugger all to do with banks. A fraction of 1% is down to them, and on net balance, they have been positive for the UK.
Look at the numbers.
1. Losses on the bank bailout – 70 bn. Most down to Gordon (I’m in hiding) Brown. He bought shares paying well over the odds. He sold fire insurance after the building had burned down.
Contrast that against the 50 bn a year that the banks were paying in total taxation, and they are still paying a huge chunk now.
The state debt, on and off the books, its 7,000 bn. That doesn’t include welfare. It does include pensions. There are no realizable assets to sell to pay that debt.
What is happening is at a high political level and they want slave labour and this country has followed the US all the way on this.
Consequence of the debt. Not because of any planning. They are too stupid for that.
They want us in this country and throughout Europe to work and be paid the same way those in the third world and China are forced to exist. So that those on the very top band can have complete control.
Nope, they are desperate because the debt chicken has come home to roost. So they need, as you say, slaves to pay it off.
I’ve had plenty on the left suggest that books could be balanced if the citizen is booked in the states accounts. As you say, treating them as slaves. They already run the stud book.
Because, if we do not deal with it from the source, all the impoverishment you place on the head of the ordinary citizen will not save us from devastation.
Yes. It’s too far gone for that. Again, look at the numbers.
Tax revenue – 550 bn.
Deficit – 150 bn (increase in borrowing)
Debt increase – 350 bn (It’s linked to inflation)
500 bn increase in debt over a year. It has tipped. Greece is what is going to happen, and it is inevitable.
GE went bust. It has massive debts to pay off before it can pay taxes. That’s the nature of making a loss.
non tax paying big business is the real culprit in all of this austerity
No its not. Again, back to the numbers.
UK economy is 1400 bn a year.
The government spent 700 bn (50%).
The debt increased by 500 bn last year.
So you need a tax income of 1200 a year. That means you need to tax 1200/1400 or 86% of everyone’s income. From the poor to the rich, from the corner shop to Richard Branson. Each and every year, increasing with inflation.
Here’s a plan. Confiscate all of Richard Branson’s assets. The lot. That pays for the deficit for around 3 days. Now who are you going to go after?
This is a government crisis cause by politicians, most of whom are sitting in the Lords after being kicked out. They have run the UK into the ground.
Don’t forget that on top of the debt, there is welfare. If you combine pension welfare plus the accrued pension debt, is well over 10,000 bn.
The government is effectively 25 times mortgaged, with huge expenses. Schools, defense, police, NHS, roads, …. 2,700 a day per peer. …
It’s not going to work even if you tax all companies to the wall.
@LB:
Now here is a little example of how the government, and those to the right of the party, are moving the country more towards the acceptance of ‘slavery’ than ever before.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2100257/Human-rights-lawyers-bully-firms-Governments-job-programme.html
They are taking the tax payers money collectively, under the auspices that when times are difficult they will use the collective fund to keep us going, whatever that circumstand may be. And in this situation it is the woman was unemployed and forced to recieve her rightful ‘benefit’ only after working for a wealthy organization ‘for free.’ She received only her £54 pounds a week.
She was forbidden to collect her already paid for welfare stipend unless she was willing to work for the likes of ‘Sainsbury’s or ‘Tescos’ as an unpaid cleaner or shelf stacker or whatever menial task they decided they wanted her to perform.
This meant that unless this women was willing to act as a slave to this very weatlhy entity, she was to starve. Even though she was working as an unpaid museum participant in order to enhance her job chances and this procurement for the rich would remove that opportunity from her.
As you know the Tesco family and the Sainsbury family are very, very welathy indeed, and yet they expect the tax payer to fork out for their menial staff as they are too greedy to pay a proper wage to encourage those same people to get a permanent job with them. And the State or government is backing them in their greed by supplying them with unpaid workers.
Have you any idea of the graveness of this situation. The tax payer to fund enslaved people who are working for the heavily wealthy, rather than, say, cleaning up the rubbish we have on our dreadful third world strewn highways, or, taking graffiti off the walls for ‘our’ town halls. No, they are using our unemployed who are ‘entitled’ to their benefit or they wouldnn’t be getting it, for their rich friends who are so hateful toward the people who work for them, they don’t want to give them a living wage for legitimate work.
We are getting closer to the ‘Gone With the Wind’ practices every day. But even in that circumstance, prisoners had to be paid by the employer, even at a reduced rate.
In this matter, the employer is not even willing to pay the full going rate. Or, are they. Is the government selling our people to the wealthy at a reduced rate.
I remember years ago the Conservatives had young people in work full time to companies for £15.00 a week, way, way below the legal rate even then.
And here you see why this government want to get rid of the ‘human rights act.’ Are the nation is so uninformed they don’t realise what is going on here. Because the properganda machines in the media and papers sell the line that the poor are the problem. When it’s the welathy that are in fact the engineers of the chaos we find ourselves in. And it’s deliberate. Or, contrived, and no they are no too stupid to plan this. They know exactly what they are up to.
I gave this some thought and decided that BM has got the vote spot on the right place with the Benefits cap regionalisation.
If I had a kid, earning £130 a week as I do, i would got the Child support people to get a payment to pass on to my partner, who does not live with me.
—————–
Maude’s stridency is misplaced only in so far as things like modern day “slavery” (ie by insurance company clerical staff) should have been sorted out by her long before blogging here. She is absolutely right. some employees are owned lock stock and barrel by the company…. mortgage, loan, sports ground useage, wife in the other office, and so on.
It does not mean that they can not win their freedom by the age of 60-65, with their pension rights!
And yes the government doe like it since all their tax comes from the one well organized company tax department. In the same way as supernations can really only talk the same language as another supernation, so the government finds it much much easier to deal with the company emplyeed, indirectly!
The Tesco “family” which she refers to, is the state of Israel, which Baroness Deech might be able to comment on; that Israel only exists economically thanks to the Zionist enthusiasm of the Jack Cohen business, founded in the early 1950s.
I am happy for them, but most sorry about Palestinian slum conditons, where the human spirit will not be vanquished.