George Osborne may have been the worst chancellor of modern times, but he understood one thing. Subordinating the national interest, i.e. those of British business-in-general to the narrow concerns of the Conservative Party, allowed for good press and the accumulation of political capital. It didn’t matter if these actions weakened the economy or made life worse […]
Posts under ‘Taxation’
Taxation – challenging everyday libertarianism
Apr 21st, 2016 by Maria Exall.In his Left Futures article on the 7th April, Intense Relaxation, David Osland took John McTernan to task for advocating tax avoidance as a ‘basic British freedom’ and for making reference to the political theorist Robert Nozick and his argument for freedom from taxation in Anarchy, State and Power (Basic Books, 1974). The ideological libertarianism […]
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Dave finds out what it’s like when the gutter press have it in for you
Apr 10th, 2016 by Phil Burton-Cartledge.As readers may know, I’m not a politician and when I worked in politics, it wasn’t at the spaddy level where you’re actually listened to. Yet me, a lowly ex-bag carrier responsible for caseloads in an obscure constituency, knows the first rule on resolving a political crisis is to wrap it up as quickly as […]
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Intense relaxation: John McTernan and the freedom to not pay tax
Apr 7th, 2016 by David Osland.Peter Mandelson famously declared himself “intensely relaxed about people getting filthy rich, as long as they pay their taxes”. His successors now appear intensely relaxed about the wealthy not paying their taxes at all. Senior Blairite John McTernan has responded to last weekend’s Panama Papers revelations by reassuring Telegraph readers that “tax avoidance is an expression of […]
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Labour, John McDonnell and the New Economics
Mar 13th, 2016 by David Pavett.Once the surprise and the shock of Jeremy Corbyn’s election as Labour leader had sunk in, many (including me) became impatient for policy initiatives and membership involvement in policy formation to come to the fore. Clearly cutting through media hostility is a major task but I find it difficult to see that more could not […]
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Osborne gambles on a windfall – something you can’t do on a zero hour contract
Nov 26th, 2015 by Phil Burton-Cartledge.In war, there’s only a short amount of time your weaponry has an edge over the enemy. Labour has spent the last couple of months shelling the Tory trenches with the party working tax credit shells. This week, the new ‘police funding’ gun has been pressed into service. Both pasted the Tory position to the point […]
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Corbyn strikes a rich vein with taxes on the very rich
Sep 20th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.Jeremy Corbyn’s latest move – to give reassurance that Labour will campaign to remain in Europe and then, if elected in 2020, reverse from the inside any diminution of workers’ rights which Cameron may have secured – is a smart move when it is linked with pushing through the £50bn financial transactions tax on almost […]
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Chris Leslie has got Corbynomics wrong
Aug 3rd, 2015 by Richard Murphy.I noted a report in the Independent yesterday about comments that the shadow chancellor, Chris Leslie, had made about why he called Corbynomics. These are, I presume, the policies announced by Jeremy Corbyn nearly two weeks ago. I spoke at the launch of those policies and since they were largely lifted from this blog I […]
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Osborne’s budget is not dissimilar to 2010 – it will have the same effects
Jul 10th, 2015 by Michael Burke.Most media coverage of the Budget is predictably sycophantic and wrong. An objective assessment is that the amount of fiscal tightening planned in this Budget is exactly the same as outlined in the June 2010 Budget. The June 2010 Budget planned tightening of £40bn, but £3bn of this was the projected fall in interest payments. […]
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It isn’t a ‘lower tax, higher wage’ economy as Osborne boasts, it’s actually a higher tax, lower wage economy
Jul 10th, 2015 by Michael Meacher.One has to give it to Osborne, he’s extremely good at branding whatever he doesn’t like with a clever, pejorative – but false – jingle. ‘The merry-go-round on welfare’, ‘strivers versus shirkers’, ‘Labour left behind this economic mess’ , and ‘austerity’s painful decisions are the only way to cut the deficit’ immediately spring to mind. […]
