How to Erase that Brown/Balls Dividing Line
Tim Montgomerie is asking for ideas to counter the deliberately drawn Brown/Balls 20% VAT political dividing line. He makes five suggestions: admit VAT will rise to 20%, time limit it, ameliorate the regressiveness, promise a focus on spending cuts and launch a growth manifesto.
Guido has an alternative policy – rule a VAT hike completely out of the question. It is regressive, it hits the poorest hardest, it punishes the many. Labour can’t counter – they can hardly claim it is necessary if they themselves won’t do it. Keep on the Balls/Brown side of that dividing line, then mercilessly whack them for raising taxes on jobs, taxes on small businesses and implementing anti-poor regressive taxes.
Promise to do what Obama is doing – cut payroll taxes, cut taxes on small business and get more money flowing in the economy to get it growing again. Boosting the supply side to drive economic growth will increase government revenue from a faster growing economy and, in fact, cause overall revenue to increase. The dynamic effects were proven during the Reagan years:
- Real economic growth averaged 3.2% during the Reagan years versus 2.8% under Ford-Carter years and 2.1% during the Bush-Clinton years.
- Real median family income grew when supply-side policies were implemented under Reagan
- Interest rates, inflation, and unemployment fell faster under Reagan than they did immediately before or after his presidency.
Either the Tories believe in the merits of a low tax, high growth economy or they don’t. You don’t grow the economy by taxing it more.
why not cut mps , we wouldnt have to put up with the spin
Yeah, propose a flat tax while you’re at it.
That has just as much chance of ever becoming Conservative Policy.
Newsflash, taxes are going UP.
Will the Conservatives cut services ?
Of course they fucking will.
And Labour would too after the next election if they ever got the chance but cuts on their own simply won’t be enough. So taxes are going up.
Keeping Labour’s VAT rise is only the first of many new taxes so you’d best get used to em.
Cut the state drastically.
It’s the only way to sort this mess out.
Raise the Personal Allowance by a significant amount, scrap the tax credits scheme.
And finally make sure that MPs don’t have special tax privileges.
Introduce Estaxcy – tax on party drugs.
This is all explained by the fact that Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher were complety idiotic and rabid Right wingers. The fact that the poor got richer is one of those embarrasing facts that need to be hidden away as – like Global warming – it doesn’t fit the generally accepted and respectable liberal model. No.
Besides, who can take a Mathematical device called a ‘Laffer Curve’ seriously? We’ll see it all ourselves next year when the UK economy goes through the predicted ‘Balls Swing’.
Absolutely, Throbber – CUT THE STATE DRASTICALLY.
It’s the one area in which zero-based budgeting makes sense. (For readers unfamiliar with the term, it assumes nothing and puts in place only those activities deemed indispensible. Unemployment among elfinsafety advisors, equality officers and others would boom.)
Does the Heir to Bliar have the cojones to do it, to stand up to the blast from the Unions? Does he even believe in Conservatism? Probably not.
While praising Reagan, do not forget that he raised the US deficit to (then) record levels as part of his ‘miracle’ – the UK doesn’t have that option now!
If you’re looking for a radical proposal – legalise drugs, sell them via pharmacies and tax them like tobacco or drink. Prisons, courts and the police would be left with not much to do (yielding enormous savings) and the exchequer would get a serious tax income.
Not me mate, I’m going to take early retirement and they can whistle for their friggin taxes.
If they put up VAT I’ll cut back on my spending to compensate for it.
Umm, Rebel, what is the point of taking early retirement when pension funds are worthless at the moment… unless you are one of the privileged slackers with a gild-edged public service pension?
The Tories will believe in whatever their focus group tells them to believe in.
And then do whatever their new world order puppet-masters tell them to do!
Did anyone see that Devilish grin from Gordon when Darling announced VAT would stay at 17.5%?
He just could not help himself…and now we know it is because He and Balls bullied Darling into it.
EU rules would not allow reduction below a floor of 15%.
Better to just withdraw from the EU and save £65 billion a year.
Vote UKIP for flat tax instead mansion tax: UKIP Policies
====================================
FGS will you get them to redesign their website along the lines of ConHome – the present one is hopeless.
Things could get nasty if we try to cut VAT below 15% (or try to reverse any increase above the current level). Petulant little feet would stamp in the corridors and meeting rooms of power. Intense diplomatic pressure would be applied…
Our Foreign Office minister might even be frozen out of key policy-making decisions.
Oh, he has been?
As you were TaT, your plan could work.
Start by cutting housing benefits .
Start by cutting down on housing benefit fraud.
There are 785 Euro MP’s for alleged 500 million people.
The UK has 650-ish leeches for 63 million.
Looks to me like there are far too many MP’s in the UK Parliament.
Next. Sorry Guido, but VAT should be for everyone to pay, rich or poor whatever the rate. If you want to help the _genuine_ poor, then you can target other benefits to help offset some of the VAT. Those that are put on incapacity benefit (exploded in numbers under New Labour) should be checked out.
There should NOT be literally dozens of different benefits to claim, each with their own ways of being fiddled, meaning those in the know can claim tens of thousands of pounds, and those poorest or the ‘middle class’ that fell on hard times but don’t know the scams don’t get the money they deserve. Yes, I’m mainly talking about Labour voters who most know how to fiddle the system.
Those on benefit SHOULD be taxed, the same way a person in work is taxed. Why should they get their benefits tax free? Feel the pain like those in work do.
You need to install in people the feeling that they should not get something for nothing, whilst those in work get their a*ses kicked with taxes.
Why was the “poll tax” so unpopular? Because the layabout Labour voters were suddenly being asked to pay some of their way, instead of leeching off everyone else.
What it boils down to is that the tax system is hopelessly complicated. We need MUCH less pencil pushers, and much less accountants who look at different ways to fiddle for the clients that can afford their services.
The Great British Tax Revolt has started here >> http://www.taxrevolt.co.uk
Tim Montgomerie is asking for ideas to counter the deliberately drawn Brown/Balls 20% VAT political dividing line.
Simple. Get out of the EU. Save £12 billion a year – and VAT can be reduced below 15%.
Vote UKIP for lower taxes
Vote UKIP for Labour to win, or for a hung Parliament.
For every vote the Tories lose to UKIP, Labour lose one to the B*P. That tired old mantra about vote UKIP get Labour is getting very boring.
Vote UKIP get Labour.
Vote Conservative to get Tony Blair’s understudy and Blu-Labour
Vote Labour get fleeced
Vote fir me laddie, or I’ll chin ya… ya ken?
agreed – it happened at Stafford the last election – the Tories after a massive campaign almost overturned David Kidney – but were a shorted by UKIP …. result? another 4 years of Labour mismanagement and the hospital of death…..
The answer is simple then. Tell CMD to reverse his decision on the Lisbon Treaty, get tough on immigration and to get off of the global warming bandwagon and actually look like he’s going to act on his election promises. Otherwise it’s just BluLabour, no difference except some policies to make his mates even richer.
Road hog. Lisbon is law NOW. It would be utterly ridiculous to try to overturn Lisbon now. It is too late and the rest of the EU will NOT let us, referendum or not.
What we CAN do however is have a referendum on membership, but Cameron does not believe that we should be given any say whatsoever on whether we give up our sovereignty and democracy to be consumed by a dictatorship.
That is why I am voting UKIP!
@Mr.Ned, I’m fully aware of what Lisbon means, and my post was a subtle suggestion that the referendum would effectively be an in or out question.
@Mr Ned
What would/could the EU actually do if we just said “ta ta, we’re outta here”? Invade us? Refuse to trade with us?
I suspect that whilst the second option is the more likely, neither would actually happen. They might say none of their member states can trade with us*, but those that decide it’s to their benefit to do so will just ignore that particular instruction, just like they do many other EU laws. It’s only muggins UK that obeys every one to the letter. I suspect that if we had a more lax attitude towards the sillier parts of EU law, there would be a far smaller number of EU sceptics.
*Mind you, not that we’ve got much left to trade with these days…..
“What would/could the EU actually do if we just said “ta ta, we’re outta here”? Invade us? Refuse to trade with us?”
——————————–
Bitch and moan a fair bit, but in law, with international trade agreements in place (GATT etc) there is nothing that they can to to stop us from having the same trading status as Norway and Switzerland.
BUT, do you think that the tories are going to say, ta ta, we’re outta here?
Not a chance! They will not even deign to ask us if we should even consider it!
That is why I am voting UKIP.
Vote UKIP get labour? What is the fucking difference between labour and tory under the EU dictatorship anyway? Cameron is completely fucking pointless now that we have President Rompuy!!! Cameron will be forced to implement the same policies that labour were going to implement anyway!
Vote labour, liberal or conservative for more years of von Rompuy and whatsername, the EU Foreign secretary running the show with the destruction of democracy, higher taxes, more state control, ID cards, state databases and a never ending EU lead nanny state on steroids in the name of the bogus “man-made climate change” scam.
Vote UKIP to give the UK back to the people. Low taxes, individual responsibility, self reliance to be rewarded, and the protection and enhancement of our sovereignty and democracy and COMMON SENSE and genuinely scientific approach to climate change based on the fundamental principles of science. (all cynically undermined and abused under the IPCC regime)
This country could be a low tax, dynamic, entrepreneurial power house economy. Or it can be strangled by the dead hand of an enormous multi-level state bureaucracy.
That is not even getting into the far more serious aspects of the loss of sovereignty and democracy that both labour and tory have actively colluded in.
In your wildest fantasies do you seriously expect UKIP to be anything more than a marginal protest vote. However I’ll grant you that Farage may become the unique exception. This is no longer a by-election huff it is now politics for the grown ups my friend.
No 1 priority is to eject and humiliate Brown; he must be thrilled at the though of UKIP!!
Bring on the election,
You are happy to see five (and then indefinite) more years of new labour policies forced on us by the EU then?
There is no significant difference between Brown and Cameron’s policies.
I hate Brown with a passion that exceeds most people I know. I am very violently opposed to his foul and rotten and decrepit, corrupt misrule, BUT what the fuck do you want to replace him with? SERIOUSLY?
WHY does Cameron prefer a Brown win, over giving the people of this country a say on membership of the EU? Why is Cameron PISSING on you and telling you that it is raining? Hmmmmmmmm?
I really cannot understand how tories only want to get rid of the incompetent fuckwit personality of Brown, but leave all the foul and rotten and foetid policies in place as will surely happen under Cameron.
I am a realist, clearly among a sea of delusional and heavily conditioned fools, and it is these delusional fools who will go out and vote labour and conservative like the programmed robots that they are, spouting BULLSHIT about IF you don’t vote this way, THEY’LL GET IN! SO FUCKING WHAT? THERE IS NO DIFFERENCE! If you want change, you will have to vote for it. You cannot get a change from the EU dictatorship by voting Conservative.
WHAT POLICIES DO YOU WANT?
HOW THE HELL ARE THE TORIES GOING TO GIVE YOU THEM UNDER ROMPUY’S DICTATORSHIP?
Vote for Cameron OR Brown and you will enslave us to the SAME Global dictatorship to which, they are but willing puppets!
“No 1 priority is to eject and humiliate Brown; he must be thrilled at the though of UKIP!!”
——————————————
So WHY didn’t Cameron do the deal to kill off UKIP, and guarantee an election landslide victory when he had the chance?
The tories simply refuse to grasp the significance of that don’t they? They are so heavily conditioned that they cannot believe that their own leadership is lying to them and taking the piss out of them.
Answer me that question. Why does Cameron prefer a labour victory to giving the people their say? Whose side is Cameron on? It does NOT feel like it is the people of THIS country.
Yup, when UKIP make a cast iron guarantee, they stick to it.
Surely VAT is a Euro tax? Would it not be abolished completely?
VAT is an EU tax, the government takes a commission for collecting it on behalf of the EU. The laughably termed “british government” had to go to Brussels and beg for permission to temporarily lower it by 2.5%.
The EU sets minimum amounts that it can be set at and no “government” can do anything about it, without permission from the EU.
End of story.
So, let me get this straight.
Out of Europe then there’s no need to pay VAT?
Yes you will still have to pay it, until a UKIP Government repeals it.
Time to stand up and be counted.
Get on the offensive, claim the higher ground, attack, attack attack! Enough pussyfooting around , it’s as though nothing has happened out in X Factor/Christmas shopping land.
While I/m at it, this just makes me sick
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6954597.ece
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6954744.ece
Both these links give “404″.
Works for me.
Unexplained 404′s are a symptom of your internet connection being, shall we say, tampered with?
“Lord Bates, the Conservative Cabinet Office spokesman, said: “It debases the institution of the privy council if its gift is handed around like confetti.”
Quite so, but this is just the way NuLiebour operates; we really shouldn’t be surprised by it. Did anyone say that political patronage was dead? McBust is just doing what comes naturally to grubby little NuLiebour politicians.
So much for the labour charge of “Bankrolled by millionaire toffs!”
Labour, shooting themselves in both feet, repeatedly!
Excellent article here on the madness of crowds…
http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/story.asp?sectioncode=26&storycode=409454&c=2
no tax increases. Cut cut cut cut
Slash burn, slash burn, cut cut cut, eviscerate the public sector, bulldoze the quangos, napalm the fake charridees. I want to be paying 60% less tax, and I don’t care how many untermensch starve to get that.
Job done.
Yep
Can’t fault a single word of that. Nuke the fucking tapeworms in the public sector. Let them take their sense of entitlement out on somebody else for a change.
Flat tax. 10%, with a tax free pay threshold of £10.000.
Now.
Not very “flat” is it, if there is a threshold. Try again.
Well said, Frank. We can’t afford all these pointless non-jobs; they generate no wealth for the country whatsoever. It’s way beyond time to move back to the small-state model of a mixed economy.
Do you mean like nurses,doctors,teachers etc etc A little rash to get rid of the whole public sector or you could do your own brain surgery.Well that’s a thought.
Quite clearly doctors, nurses, police officers etc are not non jobs – are you really as thick as your comment suggests?
Well not nurses or doctors, but lets have a cull of teachers. After being a schoolteacher for a few years they develop a ghastly habit of treating everyone as though they were ignorant schoolchildren. Anyway most people go into teaching because they cant think of anything else to do. That and the holidays of course.
There are more administration staff in the NHS than doctors, nurses and ancillary workers put together. In Nottingham they have over 2000 police officers, yet only 14 are on the beat some nights. The list of waste, incompetence and corruption, is virtually endless in this country these days. Ever wondered why, when you go past some road works or infrastucture repair works, it is always the same contractors doing the works?
It is not coincidence.
what is abso.utely outrageous is the one eyed fucker announces we can afford to give GBP 1,500m to help climate change yet we cannot find GBP 24m to fund the territorial army at a time of war.
OUR BOYS DIE IN THE STAN
Today I am announcing the end of personality politics.
May I congratulate the X Factor winner. It’s been an incredible journey.
But look here, The little one eyed hero will be saving opur chaps from roadside bombs, personally it seems!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8411191.stm
Does anyone else see this as cynical electioneering and spin? I dont mean the extra resources that our troops directly, but brown in the ‘stan pledging to help our troops. Seeming to claim that HE is the hero here for his generosity
If it wasnt for that hoon he they would have been better equiped years ago!
I only hope his pledge to cut roadside bombs is to get himself in one of them landrovers and drive about till he drives over one of the fuckers. Perhaps him and the rest of the troughers should sacrifice their lives to save the lives of our troops by finding landmines in the simplest way possible. Its about the only honourable thing they could do.
I think you mean:
Does anyone not see this as cynical electioneering and spin?
And the answer is no…
The army lads aren’t impressed with his visit and I don’t blame them, thread starts off pretty tame but then it gets quite funny as they go on the attack. http://www.arrse.co.uk/Forums/viewtopic/t=140051.html
Isn’t it touching that they always find happy ethnic women soldiers to pose with the dear leader.
But imagine the stink there would be if soldiers had remained sullen, pulled faces or sat in silence when Brown turned up, and this was then posted on Youtube.
It is another Stalinist cropped and censored picture brought to you by Pravda.
It probably wasn’t a genuine soldier. I would not be surprised to discover it was all played by actors with water-tight NDAs on a film lot at Shepperton, or wherever.
I’m afraid that I’m not allowed to comment on that allegation.
agreed …. even further though I just don’t get why we need to be giving even more money to help the developing countries…. they get (and squander) billions as it is….. 1,500 M would go a long way to sorting out our own “green” credentials…. then we can lead the world by example, not drag everyopne along at a snails pace…..
Just think of all that CO2 produced in idiots flight, more important the cost.
The lads out there must be thrilled to see their “leader” poncing about in a ill fitting flack suit.
The one eyed twat is an embarrising joke.
All that money spent for a load of photo shoot bullshit.
Copenhagen is not about reducing THEIR production, or cost, of CO2, it is about charging the plebs a fortune for OUR use of CO2.
Those econo-fuckers do not give a shit about CO2, If they did then they would travel by wooden sailboat in boats made from sustainable forest wood.
What did they do? Charter 140 extra private jets, just ONE of which has completely overturned my personal reductions in CO2!
to give GBP 1,500m to help climate change
Has BluLabour Cameron announced he will cut that?
We need an effective alternative, not more of the same.
Don’t forget our massive contribution to the £62bn per annum to be handed over every year for the next 40 years – for no good reason and most of which will simply be squandered.
I’m now wallowing in a nostalgic stupour for the Reagan / Thatcher years…
Bring back Maggie – even aged and loosing her marbles she would run the country better than Brown!
I fear you are right. Now we know why that Downing street cat was put down… Gordon sensed competition from that quarter.
Yeah, Gordon is just as much of a pussy, but with less common sense!
“it hits the poorest hardest”
But what of the filthy rich who I have no problem with?
Lord Peter, sell them better soap.
soap is for the rich filthy, not the filthy rich
Surely you mean “But what of the filthy rich, with whom I have no problem?”
You sound horribly comprehensively educated, old bean.
‘Comprehensively horribly educated’ might also work to describe 12 years of education under New Labour.
Comprehensively = uneducated.
Just gettin’ down with my peeps!
Labour really have no clue.
Conservatives have yet to show they have a clue
Heaven help us all
Politics is in a really wierd state currently. Labour are implementing policies to entrap the Tories rather than address the country’s problems, the Tories know this and are avoiding saying anything that might allow Labour the PR victory they crave. The Lib Dems talk some sense, then ditch it all with a goofy policy announcement (eg Mansion Tax).
Result – the rest of us are frustrated that politicians (of all parties) skate round the country’s real problems, and won’t discuss them openly and sensibly.
We can only hope that Labour are decimated at the next GE, and a period of more honest politics follows. I’m not really holding my breath, though.
Decimate = reduce by one tenth.
I’m looking for a lot more than that!
Do you really think that things will be any different under bluLabour Cameron? More of the same. Same EU policy, same warmist policy. Same old, same old.
Individual tories need to ask themselves some questions.
1. Why would Cameron rather see labour win the election than give the people of the UK a say in how they are governed (democracy vs dictatorship, out or in referendum)?
2.Why would Cameron rather be forced into implementing new labour policies by the EU, instead of having the freedom to implement conservative policies?
3. Why would you, as individual tories, allow and condone Cameron and the Conservatives pissing all over you like that? IF you work or volunteer for the party, and will be leaflet stuffing and canvassing for the tories, why have you allowed Cameron to make your job SO much harder?
Peronally, I’m fine with that. Cameron et al should keep stum on all policies until a week or two before the election when it will be too late for Labour to copy them.
UKIP have all the clues at the moment. From having better policies on the EU and the Budget, to democracy and climate change.
It is a shame that so many tories want desperately to see labour policies implemented though, either that or they are blinded by years of conditioning to the facts that the EU is going to implement labour policies anyway. If you want conservative policies, you cannot get them from the conservatives anymore. Von Rompuy and José Manuel Barroso will not allow them!
The Conservatives COULD have been guaranteed a large landslide. However Cameron rejected that opportunity. Conservatives need to ask themselves why? Why would Cameron rather risk a labour victory, than give the people of the UK a say on how WE want to be governed? And WHY, as conservatives, are you allowing him to take the piss like that?
I think you should get real, the Lisbon Treaty is a done deal – us having a referendum on it after the event wouldn’t change it one iota.
A referendum on coming out altogether would be different…
“A referendum on coming out altogether would be different…”
And hugely welcomed by the electorate – and the Conservatives when they finally wake up to the extent of this vote-winner.
leave VAT at 15%
remove stamp duty on houses under 750,000 to help the property market
Do not give council houses to 16 years old tarts who have gotten pregnant to enable them to leave home – make them stay at home (a la New zealand?) leave council houses for those who really have a need
encourage higher employment by making sure than benefits do not exeed the money that a minimum wage job will pay…. there are jobs out there but peopel need to loose some of their pride to do them…..
remove IHT for all people – if your parents have done well and want to give you their house when they die why should you have to be taxed on it – no matter who you are (and enjoy the savings that will be made when you don’t have to get the district valuer to agree the values or the cost of HMRC administration)
Encourage the development of private power supplies – ok the green agenda is corny but use the planning system to make all new builds green and self sufficient…. it won’t pay in the short term but will save money in the future when power stations don’t need to be built….
don’t tax the bankers differently to normal people – the damage to our services sector will be massive – we need to lead the world sector not chase away all the talent…………..
leave council houses for those who really have a need?
Well it’s not just coucil houses occupied by these “tarts”. I notice whenever the subject comes up, poitiicans always claim it is a a myth regarding young tarts occupying council property. That may or may not be true, but what they always neglect to mention is the number of private properties occupied and paid for by housing benefit.
I can’t imagine I would ever vote BNP, but their policy of Gulags for slags seems pretty spot on. I wonder, did I hear Gordon Brown talk about Hijacking this policy?
Beardy — agree with every word. Fine post.
leave council houses for those who really have a need?
Well it’s not just coucil houses occupied by these “tarts”. I notice whenever the subject comes up, poitiicans always claim it is a a myth regarding young tarts occupying council property. That may or may not be true, but what they always neglect to mention is the number of private properties occupied and paid for by housing benefit.
Gulags for slags is what we need.
“Do not give council houses to 16 years old tarts who have gotten pregnant to enable them to leave home – make them stay at home (a la New zealand?) leave council houses for those who really have a need”
I quite agree, in addition make the fathers cough up for their kids’ welfare – any girl refusing to identify the father should be denied benefits – off to Labour’s workhouses with them!
amen to that idea!
Beardy, good post, but you don’t think that these policies will be allowed within the EU do you? The Conservatives should implement these policies, but they will not. They are not conservatives anymore.
Agree
That would throw the spotlight back onto Labour’s spending plans and make them explain where their axes are going to fall
“Either the Tories believe in the merits of a low tax, high growth economy or they don’t.” The answer is they don’t, next question.
What happened to VAT being a pathetic trifling matter that was of no consequence whatsoever to the Economy when Broon cut it ?
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/society/britain-deciding-which-souvenir-to-hurl-at-brown-200912142306/
“What about York Minster sellotaped to a brick?”
Not bad, but you remember that feller our of Allo Allo got hit with a scaffolding plank during the storm in ’87? That would be okay. Blackpool tower on a chunk of lake district granite would be nice, or perhaps the angel of the north, rammed up his arse and twisted?
A VAT return ingeniously folded
into a Sopwith Camel by a member of the SAS
and launched by said betrayed soldier at Question time and designed to excise
15% of his nasal cavity
Let us, in the best traditions of engineering, examine the problem. We require an article to project in the direction of the current Prime Mentalist, which, on impact, will inflict damage, preferably lasting.
We therefore require:
1) Something readily hurlable by the average enraged voter.
2) Something heavy enough to “deliver a message”.
3) Something readily available at fairly short notice.
4) Something with enough sharp edges or knobbly bits to ensure lots of blood.
I would suggest that keeping things simple is usually a good plan. So, in the best traditions of “message delivery”, a half-brick would be the ideal object.
There is an additional advantage to this plan. Inflicting the Prime Mentalist on a souvenir model of a well-loved British icon may induce The Curse on the said icon, which none of us would want. Cursing rubble would have fewer unwanted after-effects.
A half-brick. How terribly British – a compromise solution. Either use a proper brick or none at all. I suggest a good, solid engineering brick. One of those with three holes in would be good as you could whirl it round on a piece of string before releasing it.
Forth Road Bridge set on a Granite plinth would be apt
( A model one, difficult to find lifting apparatus to such scale)
What about three bricks in the bottom of a carrier bag? Poetic justice for all those he’s scammed.
Asda bag
If 3 bricks don’t do the job, finish him off with the plastic bag suffocating him.
No at all, a half brick is all you can reasonably throw with dynamic stability over a short range. Also it has, having being halved, numerous cutting edges. It’s a traditional weapon, forthright and proud.
My house is made of those nori engineering bricks. I wouldn’t throw one of those; firstly ‘cus they cost a packet, secondly because they’re actually a bleeding nightmare to cut.
No, I concurr with engineer, a half brick of any local stock, followed up with a pickaxe handle attack, repeated until the man is just a faint greasy stain on the pavement.
Oh – nearly forgot, officer, after a fair trial, naturally.
I’m with Engineer on this. A half brick is easier to launch and aim.
There must also be an size optimum for a thrown object to obtain maximum energy.
Too small and the energy is limited because you can’t throw very small objects any faster than large ones.
Too large and the energy is limited because it is too heavy for your muscles to accelerate or too awkward to hold properly.
A half brick, I suspect, is close to the optimum.
Of course, if you have the advantage of height, the larger the better. Dropping a piano from a balcony would be OK. Or the national debt in gold.
Maybe, in a spirit of EU solidarity, we could import some traditional Parisien cobblestones for use on Brown – always very effective in the hands of French farmers/students/immigrants. Not as many cutting edges, but much denser and fly well.
Follow the Italians – look at the message Berlusconi got!
what about a short plank of wood with nails in the ends – now that would make a mess
Berlusconi was lucky the statuette was of Milan’s Duomo and not Gaudi’s monstrosity in Barcelona, one of those in the mush, steeples foremost, would do more than chip your teeth.
I would go for something that Gordon Understands. Like a fax machine or Nokia
i would like to throw ed balls at the fat fuck
I have heard there are rumours flying around this place that I am a CIA agent.
I am not a CIA agent, okay?
Well, that pretty much confirms it….
Hard labour – turn the national debt into pennies and make the b***d shovel it from one room to another as penance.
Might thin the fat Hoon down as well.
Either the Tories believe in the merits of a low tax, high growth economy or they don’t. You don’t grow the economy by taxing it more.
The Tories do believe, unfortunately call me Dave Call me Cast Iron Dave does not.
Having said That Mrs T raised Taxes and VAT and it worked.
“Real economic growth averaged 3.2% during the Reagan years versus 2.8% under Ford-Carter years and 2.1% during the Bush-Clinton years.”
Nice misleading use of statistics, Guido! Why should Bush(es) and Clinton be lumped in together? If you look at the Clinton years on their own the average growth is 3.8%, well ABOVE Reagan. Clinton cut the deficit. Reagan ballooned the deficit.
Whichever way you look at it, Clinton has by far the best economic record of any recent President. And he raised taxes.
Give that man a cigar (after Monica has finished with it)!
He also was responsible for making lenders give loans to people who couldn’t possibly afford to repay them!
He is responsible for the current economic crisis – a great man indeed!
You are a moron NigelLawson as you clearly can’t tell the difference between genuine growth and growth that has its foundations based on debt.
“you clearly can’t tell the difference between genuine growth and growth that has its foundations based on debt.”
Ummm, Anonymous — did you miss the bit where Clinton cut the deficit and turned it into a surplus. Unlike Ronald “deficits don’t matter” Reagan?
And this is all I have to say on the matter
this guy walks into a whore house,he see’s three doors with blond, brunette, and redhead painted on them.
so he open’s the one marked blond, and there’s three more door’s,big tit’s, medium tit’s, and small tit’s.
so he open’s the one marked big tit’s, and again three more, this time marked,small Hunt, medium Hunt, and big Hunt.
so he open’s the big Hunt door, and he’s back out in the street.
Was that you?
I don’t th’ink you’ve use’d enough’ apostrophe’s he’re
All doors lead out to the s’treet!
Wise words indeed Mr Fawkes.
Priority to remove the increases and even LOWER the payroll tax (employer’s NI). No need to promise, but should work to merging NI with PAYE. The ditherer has used it as a stealth tax pretending that he has not raised taxes! Banker.
GB – TAX REVOLT here >> http://www.taxrevolt.co.uk
* Real economic growth averaged 3.2% during the Reagan years versus 2.8% under Ford-Carter years and 2.1% during the Bush-Clinton years.
* Real median family income grew when supply-side policies were implemented under Reagan
* Interest rates, inflation, and unemployment fell faster under Reagan than they did immediately before or after his presidency.
How’s he gonna please Guardian readers by supporting Reaganomics FFS, ie something that really works?
Increasing tax levels is now almost irrelevant to reducing the deficit. The dial on the taxometer has already been turned up to 11 and is running at a World-War level. Governments here and elsewhere will at last have to turn their attention to controlling expenditure. They will finally have to grow up and start managing their financial affairs in an adult way. They’ve had a good long run with student economics, but the loans are now out of hand and they need to sober up, calm down and start doing some serious financial work.
Guido says that VAT hits the poor the hardest but he forgets that the necessities of life are zero rated. Except VAT on domestic fuel which the Tories introduced.
Are you telling us that a 50′ flatscreen HDMI TV with Sky isn’t a necessity mate? Fuck off!
Clothing is standard-rated.
Furniture is standard-rated.
Gas and electricity are taxed.
If you’re too poor to have anywhere to cook, hot food is standard-rated.
Pot Kettle Black must live a strange existence if he doesn’t find any of these things essential.
It’s only a matter of time until breathing(AKA CO2 emissions) becomes subject to VAT. The Socialist solution will be to eliminate the opposition as Right wing CO2 will be ‘pollution’ and left wing CO2 will be ‘essential for life’
Mad- well about as crazy as offering 1.5. billion to the world to prevent global warming but neglect to mention it in the PBR.
Tell me, who created the fuel duty “escalator”?
And is bluLabour Cast Iron Dave going to get rid of that Tax?
Votign for Cameron is just voting for more of the same.
Brown and Darling have had 12 years to get rid of it – what happened?
There’s plenty more, including IPT on Home & Car insurance, hardly luxury items.
Ken Clarke introduced the fuel price escalator, thankfully his time in government is gone, ask Dave………
Whoever forms a government in 2010 will probably have to increase tax-take somehow, and in the short term, it might be better to raise indirect taxes rather than direct ones. There’s not too much scope for tax increases, because we’re already heavily taxed.
The real key is cutting the deficit hard and fast, and stimulating the private sector. Whichever party does this – and it might be painful for some in the short term – will control the situation more quickly, and will then have more scope to stimulate the economy by all means including tax cuts.
At last a TAX REVOLT In the UK has started here >> http://www.taxrevolt.co.uk
With an election looming Labour strategists are planning ways in which the Tory lead in the polls can be further undermined.
The Tories are currently eight points ahead but this is expected to be reduced after Gordon Brown spent a night in Afghanistan. The PM has been compared to Churchill as the first war time leader to have spent a night in the ‘Front Line’ since the second world war.
Labour strategists are now looking for further similar events to further boost Mr Brown’s ratings.
The BBC can reveal that the PM will spend this years Christmas eve in a stable. The exact location cannot be revealed for security reasons but it is thought to be somewhere in the Middle East.
It is thought that Mr Brown will sleep in a very large manger currently being whittled by several members of the cabinet (no pun intentended) .
Can’t some more floods be arranged somehow?
oooh lool, is that a star I see in the sky to the erm left??
Agh no, it’s Gordons eye glinting in the sunlight
AljeBeeb are really starting to wind-up the public…’The PM has been compared to Churchill’. Yeah, right. Churchill saved Britain from Fascism, Brown enslaved us to it. Grrrr.
labour couldn’t find three wise men
Standard VAT Rates in Europe
Austria 20%
Belgium 21%
Bulgaria 20%
Cyprus 15%
Czech Republic 19%
Denmark 25%
Estonia 18%
Finland 22%
France 19.6%
Germany 19%
Greece 19%
Hungary 20%
Ireland 21.5%
Italy 20%
Latvia 21%
Lithuania 19%
Luxembourg 15%
Malta 18%
Netherlands 19%
Poland 22%
Portugal 20%
Romania 19%
Slovakia 19%
Slovenia 20%
Spain 16%
Sweden 25%
United Kingdom 15%
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value_added_tax
Perhaps you’d like to do another list showing the overall tax grab, y’know just out of fairness?
this country is at its best when it leads, not follows.
Hahahahhaa. You fucking idiot. Britain has “led” nothing for decades. You are the kind of half-brained monkey who probably laments the passing of the empire
You are as thick as shit in the neck of a bottle.
the EU is a corrupt, anti-democratic and illogical organisation and this country’s membership runs contrary to the national interest.
Is Britain corrupt, anti-democractic and illogical? You’re too dim to realise the parallel. That Britain is burdened with twats like you is regrettable in the extreme. What passes for thought in your mind other flush down a lavvy. Get back in the bog you fucking waster.
TaT’s right. The EU is corrupt, anti-democratic and rather illogical. The UK would be better off out of it. We’ve managed our own affairs for the best part of 1000 years, in general pretty successfully, and our contribution to the wider world is immense (first country to abolish slavery, patrolling the high seas and making them safe for trade, many scientific and technological innovations, introducing our democratic political and justice systems to many others nations – who still use them).
I agree with TaT (for once!) – this country makes a better contribution to world affairs when it leads from an independent position. We have many good friends and alliances – NATO, the Commonwealth – we don’t need the EU as much as the EU needs us.
you have no faith in your country, you are a dead weight.
if you have such a low opinion of this country then why don’t you live elsewhere, why don’t you leave?
Course I left Britain you dim-witted shite. I left because Britain is full of retarded turds like you.
SHUT THE FUCK UP YOU SILLY C’UNT BEFORE I BASH YOUR BRAINS OUT!
Fuck off and get back to playing with your maggot in the bog you wanker.
oh and regarding your reference to the empire:
the lingering benefit of the empire are the international links we established.
Only a twat with no knowledge of history could make such a ludicrous claim as this. The British legacy, fuckbrain, has, for so many countries, been negative.
get with the programme you fucking idiot.
And we finish we an Americanism that was passe five years ago. You’re that far behind the times. We you incorrectly weaned as a child? Is what passes for your brain receiving any oxygen? Now fuck off, Hunt, you’re too thick to get involved in this stuff. Get back in the bog and play with your maggot.
“the EU is a corrupt, anti-democratic and illogical organisation and this country’s membership runs contrary to the national interest.”
Much less twattish than usual – have you been listening to Dan Hannan?
Copenhagen – Gordo’s chance for another give-away (of other people’s money – never his own personal money).
VAT at 20% will not of its own bridge the deficit gap.
Since Labour and Conservative policies towards Europe are virtually identical in practice, the fruit-bats of UKIP have their attractions.
Brown has made it his life’s work to steal other peoples money on a global scale.
A man is in a queue at Tesco and sees this busty blonde staring at him, he can’t believe she is staring at him, then she starts waving.
“Excuse me do I know you?” he asks.
“Yes I think you are the father of one of my kids” she says.
The man thinks back and remembers his one act of infedelity and says “Fucking hell are you the bird I shagged on me stag do, whilst your mate whipped me and your other mate stuck a brush up my arse?”
“No” she replies “I am your son’s English teacher!”
It was you!
I would like to congratulate Olly and Edward on their victory in this years X-Factor.
I wasn’t able to watch the event however, because, as frequently reported by the BBC, I was sleeping with our troops in Afghanistan.
You took plenty of Rohypnol then?
My only problem with ‘Growth’ as the economic answers to our woes is with it comes even more immigration and population growth, which in my opinion is the LAST thing we need.
We all know that, it’s the elephant in the room, innit.
Yet another reason to leave the EUSSR…
High VAT is also a tax on jobs since “dependency jobs” even on things made outside the UK will suffer from decreased imports, which will not bring about high growth, but a further slump.
Indirect taxes applied with greater efficacy could prove to be more effective, but the scale of the problem is so great that whatever form the adjustment takes it will not be victimless!
was in B&Q the other day and had a rolled up cigarette behind my ear.
the bloke behind the counter said “Sorry sir you cant smoke that in here”
I looked blankly at him for 10 seconds then replied.
“I have a hole in my arse but it does not mean im gonna shit on the conveyor belt does it” !
Mr Fawkes, time to pull the plug on this twat methinks.
Yeah, go on Guido – take what this Off Topic person says on board and turn this place into a censorfest like Labourlist :-/
Fuck off s’pedo shorts.
Huh?
Supply-side economics was a complete disaster. During Reagan the US national debt rose like crazy and it stayed high under GHW Bush. Clinton may have had zipper problems, but one thing that you cannot deny is that he got the US Debt under control (“it’s the economy, stupid!”). Of course when GW Bush got into power the US national debt started rising again. Have a look at this graph during the era of Reaganomics the US national debt almost doubled.
How was Nicky Campbell’ds phone in this morning?
You don’t understand much about how the effects of one leader’s policies often don’t kick in until after they’ve departed do you?
Well these feckless fuck-heads are going to have to come up with something pretty convincing pretty damn quick, because the markets now regard UK government issued debt as more risky even than that of Portugal; a situation totally unthinkable only a few years ago:
…However, the so-called “default risk” associated with gilts has also risen. Investors in financial markets who supposedly know about such things appear to believe that the risk of sovereign default in the UK has risen so much in recent days that gilts are more dangerous than the Portuguese Government’s paper and only slightly less risky that the paper issued by either the Spanish or the Italians. Investors appear to believe that there is much greater safety in the German, US or Belgian Governments’ paper.
- The Independent: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/comment/stephen-king-preelection-politics-dictate-the-bank-of-englands-economic-policy-1840078.html
!!BELGIAN!!??
FFS!!!!!
So the danger of CO2 is now that the oceans are acidifying – NOT climate change. Isn’t that strange!!! I bet the science is conclusive on this as well – a least the bit we are allowed to know about.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8411135.stm
Is Sarah Brown Beard still spending hours on the phone to her lesbian girlfriend in Canterbury?
Does Gordon have a special friend?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1235462/Solved-The-mystery-Browns-midnight-phone-calls-Canterbury-Archbishop.html
Does Gordon have a special friend?
ME
Why not punish the many? They’re the ones who voted this shower into power: they should be the ones to pay for the mess they’ve created.
Since they’re all public sector teat-suckers I’m sure that could be arranged without any pain to the rest of us.
Abolish income tax for all earnings above £ 50,000 p.a. We will all live happily ever after.
Sarah Brown must have some sort of disorder (apart from being married to twot). It seems that when she is not tweeting incredibly inane shit that she has to spend hours on the phone to her “friend” in cu nterbury
Tullett Prebon To relocate cuz they are pissed off with UK taxation
Well, we always new Nu Labour would eventually kill the goose. How many others will follow? This is a really serious blow for Darling & Co!
Stupid Twats playing politics before the National Good.
Expect Mandelson to come out and openly attack Brown. What the fuck is the use of guaranteeing millions of public sector jobs if the wealth creators are forced abroad? Brown is a greater danger to this Nation than Alchy Ada ever were.
there are over 600 foriegn banks in the city…….
taxing them into oblivion and the destruction of the uk will mean that they all relocate.
with modern communications they could all operate from tax havens……….
NO NEED TO BE IN LONDON!!!!!!!
with its crap transport and overpriced housing………
so far from punishing the few thousands of jobs will be lost……….
nice one gordon……..
your experience of walking round with the collection tray at your dads kirk really has given you such insight!
Yes, no need whatsoever to be in London. In a recent survey of the 15 best cities in the world to live in, London didn’t even make it close. The slightest knock to London’s delicate position as the home to the world’s largest capital markets will see mass migration from it. It’s become a shabby shithole from what it once was. Every time I visit I see the deterioration everywhere just getting worse and worse.
Fuck only knows what foreign tourists think when they arrive in Gatwick and take the train up through south London with its sprawling expanse of grimy, Dickensian dilapidation stretching away as far as the eye can see.
Your money? Found it, nicked it, spent it.
There will be no economic recovery untill we purge the debt from the system, and bring government spending in line with the productive capacity of the country. All attempts to implement “solutions” based on Keynesian/monetorist/supply side quack economic theories will fail. Read “Theory of money and credit” by Ludvig von Mises to understand how it works and why all the central bankers and mainstream economists are wrong.
the problem is that every govt hides the truth.
debt will cripple the uk……..but the hoons will just keep on spending.
Quite right. Problem is they are DELIBERATELY crippling the free market and economy for decades. As in the US, saving bankrupt banks, QE and public debt will cause a long depression. This is feudal system politics.
On the contrary.
VAT is the only moral tax we have. It’s a tax on consumption rather than production.
Who is John Galt?
what is moral about disproportionately taxing the poor?
you moron.
Because one assumes they’re Labour voters and therefore deserving of eternal poverty?
1/3 of working population work and pay taxes.
1/3 of the working population are employed by public bodies funded from (1)
1/3 of the working population are not working and claiming benefits funded by (1).
The cost overhead of handling one UK tax pound is 40p.
Government is a very inefficient method of weath redistribution.
Atlas shrugged.
Essentials (Food, clothing) are adequately ring-fenced with low or zero-rate tax bands.
Taxing production is immoral.
Income tax was introduced to fund Napoleonic Wars. Last time I checked, this battle was won.
There is no need for income tax unless you are comfortable with mainly unlelected officials putting their hands in your pockets and TAKING your money on pain of imprisonment.
Moreover, when that’s not enough for them, they can borrow money against this inalienable right to take more of your money in the future. They even promise to pay back substantially more than they borrowed by ensuring that they take even more in tax in the future. Gilts. There’s an auction in January that should be interesting.
Go take a GCSE in economics before you start spouting off.
Income tax is not just immoral. It’s evil.
Wrong – It is a stupid tax.
If people do not consume then there is no tax revenue. Raise it to increase tax revenue and consumption drops. Is that not the reason for fuel duty, cigarette taxes, alcohol taxes etc?
In its last budget the Republic of Ireland CUT the taxes on boose and fags because some revenue is better than NO revenue – everyone was heading up North to get cheaper goodies.
VAT also hits the less well-off disproportionately, therefore it is a regressive tax.
ALL indirect taxes are regressive and hit the less well-off disproportionately.
Were we taxed in proportion to what is necessary to fund the Essentials of a state, VAT would suffice. We require three tax-funded institutions:
1. Police
2. Army
3. Judiciary
No more, no less.
So where’s your Judiciary going to send our miscreants with no prisons provided for in your slimmed-down public sector utopia?
Penitentiarys should be be operated as revenue-neutral or revenue generating. Not a burden on tax payers.
You really don’t have a clue. Mindless sheep. Keep on paying the taxes to fund mindless overspend on a dependency culture that no country can afford.
Hope you get your increased NI rate soon. You deserve it.
Don’t be fucking stupid. Copy Obama? No way.
You forget the most important thing of all.
Obama wants growth. NuLabour wants to fuck up the UK once and for all. Doesn’t anyone know they are made up of the marxist element and their whole aim is to destroy the UK.
For God’s sake, Guido – I know you are extremely intelligent.
Ampers
Wow!
That was a very interesting blog post. Thank you! I will read the rest of your blog.
I have an alternative idea to taxation and such like.
6 years ago that grinning shit Blair gave away our EU rebate in exchange for cuts to the EU common agricultural policy.
Nothing has been done, and the French now want to kick it into the long grass for another 6 years.
When are we going to get our money back from the EU, or will Blair cough up the difference out of his own pocket?
I think we should withhold our contrbution to the EU as we were told CAP reform. As that reform has not happened then our rebate must be retrned.
Surely those Hunts could have inserted such a clause. If not I am sure the French would have stopped the extra payment, so we should behave like our continental cousins
The only way to cut the deficit is to highlight the money that went into the NHS, which went straight into the bank accounts of managers, consultants, and doctors, Nurses.
Then say, as this has produced no real results in healthcare reform or front line services, we will adopt the following policy.
A 25% cut in NHS staff salaries above £64,000 and ALL public sector employees.
Now to set the workers against each other, give inflation busting rises of 3% to any public sector staff earning up to £25,000
Reduce all public sector service workers pensions to a maximum threshold of £35,000 pensionable income. In addition, this will increase by inflation yearly.
Increase the minimum wage for public sector workers to £22,000
Nationalise all NHS Cleaning service companies, put the staff on the 22k wage and make them responsible to the Hospital management.
This would balance the public service area, reduce any strikes by the workers and would be in line with Labours policy of creating a class war. We give them on in the public services.
Therefore, Doctors top civil servants may leave or go abroad let them go, if they retire early ensure the pensions are re-calibrated to the 35k allowance.
Raise the retirement age to 70 for all unless health issues and force companies by Tax to employ a certain percentage of staff who wish to continue working.
With higher pay for the lowest staff this would feed into the economy far quicker, they spend their money. So happy days.
Then we reduce all spending levels across the board including the NHS by 20% and stop it being a world service, just put the basics of health care on the menu and make it the best and then add a pay for service sector for IVF treatment, cosmetics, etc etc.
Welfare and unemployment
Any Afghan receiving benefits should be trained up as Army or Police personnel and sent back. Same for Iraqi’s.
Stop child allowance for EU workers
Stop foreign workers sending money home, it needs to be spent here in the UK.
Next, send out invoices to all those countries with prisoners residing at her majesty’s pleasure. If they do not pay, hire a boat and send them back, for landlocked countries leave them in France.
Create a national Insurance company and via Petrol / Diesel duty insure every driver, this would mean every road user was covered. It is also Green.
Ensure Lorry’s from foreign transporters fill up with Petrol/ Diesel at the UK arrival port.
For drivers wanting extra benefits they can buy comprehensive coverage from existing insurance companies.
With this increase in Petrol and Diesel, we reduce Train, Bus and Tram fares accordingly. Green Tax init.
Create a Graduate Tax for those companies that wish to employ only University Graduates like Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Barclays etc. If they wish to employ graduates then they should pay, therefore a special Tax levied on these types of companies.
The money raised would go into the pot for Universities to keep them well funded and reduce the amount of overseas students arriving at our shores and abusing the systems. Part of this money will be used as grants to disadvantaged pupils from poor backgrounds.
This small adjustment would ensure we had good policies, good social understanding of the problems, reduce the rich/poor gap and return us to health.
Even I might buy sterling on the above.
Great information!
I enjoyed reading this very much. Thank you! I look forward to reading the other parts of your blog.
I take it comment 32 on previous post was both long and unpalatable ??
I agree with your view on low taxation , except I dont think it will deliver the growth before the debt weighs in , but as you say darling is not saying what it looks like . helping the housing market is pointless feeder system is busted as those not working figs still increasing and too high .
thats what I mean its moving out of the realm of normal policy levers , your also making the case for the debt increasing .
Doesn’t matter what pledges are made in election manifesto’s. Was it not John Prescott who said ‘pledges aren’t promises’…
Why bother direct taxes when they have a nice range of Stealth Taxes and they can simply print the money want.
Thats some of the best spinning I have seen. Its almost politician like from you there.
“Real economic growth averaged 3.2% during the Reagan years versus 2.8% under Ford-Carter years and 2.1% during the Bush-Clinton years.”
Forget the fact that the Reagan and Bush Years should be taken together as they had the same economic policies, which changed immensly whenClinton came in. Instead you lump the Bush recession onto Clinton’s growth figures. Of course you do, othewise it shows that there was more growth under a democrat than under the republicans!!!!! And this would counter your main point!
Massaging the statistics to back up your point…..who would have thought….
TAX’s in great britain are REVOLTING this is why a Tax Revolt is needed and it has finally begun here >> http://www.taxrevolt.co.uk