There could hardly be a more poignant vignette of Britain today than the hidden truths revealed by the HSBC Swiss bank. Five years after this colossal tax evasion and avoidance scam was known to the UK authorities, there has been 1 prosecution. At the same time, in just one of those 5 years (2013), no […]
Posts under ‘Earnings’
HSBC: Ministers who lie or refuse to tell the truth should be made to strand down
Feb 13th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.The lies, mis-statements and blatant evasions over the HSBC Swiss bank are beginning to build up. We were initially told that no Minister had any knowledge of wrongdoing at HSBC Suisse until this last week. This has now been contradicted by several different sources. Lin Homer, the besieged and rather ineffective head of HMRC, told […]
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How we should get tougher on the tax cheats
Feb 10th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.The revelations in the Guardian, BBC Panorama and elsewhere are truly staggering. It shows how a HSBC-owned private bank in Switzerland actively colluded with hyper-rich clients to enable them to avoid EU taxes, to conceal undeclared ‘black’ accounts from their domestic tax authorities, to help them withdraw bricks of cash in foreign currencies so as to launder […]
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Why isn’t inequality a central issue in this election?
Feb 4th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.Inequality ought to figure much more sharply in this election than it has done so far. The reasons are obvious: the grotesque injustice in the widening gap between the top 1% (and more particularly the top 0.1% and most of all the top 0.01%) and the rest of us; the way that austerity has been […]
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Unequal Britain – one million millionaires, another million depend on foodbanks
Jan 30th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.The latest report on UK wealth has just discovered that there are 840,000 persons in the UK who are dollar millionaires (i.e. have assets of at least £660,000 excluding their main home) and that this number is expected to reach a million $millionaires within 3 years. That’s the same year when average wages are predicted, […]
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The on-demand economy is an even greater threat than zero hours contracts
Jan 26th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.Much of the debate about the fast-growing on-demand economy has centred around Uber. Their drivers get paid only when they work and are responsible for their own pensions and health care. Risks borne by companies are being pushed back on to individuals, and this has huge implications for the organisation of work, the potential insecurity […]
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The economy should be Labour’s turf, not the Tories’
Jan 21st, 2015 by Michael Meacher.It is astonishing that the Tories have opted to fight the coming election on their economic record (maybe because fighting on any other issue would be even worse?) – and equally astonishing that Labour has made such a poor fist of retaliation. The simple truth is, there is nothing at all about the Tory economic […]
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Obama imposing $300bn levy on banks & hyper-rich: how about UK?
Jan 20th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.It is remarkable that in the citadel of capitalism Obama has just unveiled a plan to impose a levy on the biggest banks and on the wealthiest families that is expected to raise $300bn, yet in Europe any such idea is taboo. In the US the new tax is being crafted to affect only the […]
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Tories revert to their age-old policy of stopping the poor breeding
Jan 19th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.Occasionally the mask slips and the truth becomes clear. We had already been told that the Tories planned to limit child benefit to the first two children because it would save money. Then IDS (Iain Duncan Smith) let the cat out of the bag: he said it would promote “behavioural change”. This element in the […]
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20,000 London bus workers go on strike – with the public on their side
Jan 13th, 2015 by Jon Lansman.Picket lines were in place across London’s 70 bus garages today as over 20,000 bus workers working for 18 bus operators take part in a 24 hour strike to end unfair pay disparities across the capital’s bus network. With very solid support for the strike the bus workers’ union Unite urged TfL and the mayor of London […]
