Tomorrow VAT in Ireland will be slashed to 9% on discretionary spending and the tourist industry. When they did this for restaurants and hotels in France at the beginning of 2009, it’s reckoned that around 29,500 jobs were created in the entertainment industry. The British Beer & Pub Association are putting the pressure on for a similar move to take place in the UK:

“Cutting VAT could create thousands of jobs in British pubs, bars and restaurants, boosting tax revenues, and helping out consumers. It’s time for the UK to catch up. With this sensible, job-creating move, Ireland is just the latest in a long line of EU countries to cut VAT on food in the hospitality sector, with the UK looking increasingly like the ‘odd one out’”

Guido won’t say this very often, but, Balls is right on this one, a nice summer VAT cut would do wonders for consumer spending, confidence and growth.

The pen-pushers at IPSA are meant to restore confidence in the expenses system and avoid the pitfalls of paperwork cock-ups, deliberate or not, that have blighted Parliament for so long. Red faces all round then as it seems thousands of MPs staff will get a bit of a shock when they open their annual P60 certificate.

When IPSA was founded, they  hammered home the fact that Members would remain the legal employer of their staff. Their contracts make this very clear:

Staff pay-slips back this up. However, the P60 end of year tax certificates, sent to every staffer, state that the employer is “IPSA 7th floor, Portland House, Bressenden Place, London, SW1E 5BH”:

Simply not the case.

A P60 is proof that tax has been paid and the details are meant to be watertight. Guido understands this is what is known technically as “a massive cock-up” rather than a deliberate shift in the employment rules. IPSA have made clear they will replace the P60 with a correct one if staff complain, but it seems they weren’t going to announce the blunder publicly. MPs will be chortling into their subsidised pints that IPSA has messed up their own paperwork. The fact that IPSA can’t get something as basic  as Parliament’s P60′s right, doesn’t bode well for the rest of their duties…

Data released today by the Office for National Statistics showed UK retail sales slumped during May. Including fuel, sales volumes fell by 1.4% last month, while excluding automotive fuel volumes decreased by 1.6%. George Osborne believes that lower tax economies are higher growth economies, he told us so many times in opposition. Just because Ed Balls advocates it today doesn’t automatically make it wrong to cut VAT. Balls is calling for a temporary suspension of the VAT hike to boost consumer spending and growth. Why not?

Douglas Carswell has spotted a Statutory Instrument slipped in before parliament without prior debate, two pages of legislation which will cost the British taxpayer £9 billion, the equivalent of adding some 1½p to the basic rate of income tax. No debate, no big announcement, just another day of propping up the Eurozone on the backs of UK taxpayers.

The Chancellor was at the Bilderberg conference this weekend, where the global elite discuss important matters without tiresome worries like democracy or transparency, among the attendees were central bankers, financiers and investment bankers – the guilty men of the financial crisis. The Chancellor has clearly fallen in with a bad crowd…

UPDATE: Osborne’s PPS Greg Hands has been rolled out to defend the £9 billion loan. The crucial point he makes is that “Because this is a loan, it has no impact on our borrowing – it is a financial asset that will be repaid.” All being well, however all is not well. Institutions like the ECB itself are in trouble, the US Treasury is on credit watch. We may be approaching the financial equivalent of the rapture, when all the reckoning for decades of loose credit will be made. One only has to look at the price of gold to see that people are losing faith in the paper-money financial system.

According to the BBC 350 of us turned out to Rally Against the Debt, a petition passed round gathered 400 signatures so the actual number is likely nearer 500. The Fawkes girls were unimpressed with their first political demonstration and even their father’s speech until they saw a chihuahua dog which made their day. It was as promised, pretty civilised and good natured, there were no riots, arrests or any trouble – apart from 3 counter protestors. The after party at the Westminster Arms went on till late…

The Rally Against Debt will be held at Old Palace Yard in Westminster, central London, at 11 a.m. Today.

Old Palace Yard (pictured above) is in between Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament, a short distance from Victoria train station and walking distance from both Westminster and St James’s Park tube stations.

The Rally will start at 11 a.m. and finish in good time for the FA Cup final, and during that time there will be the opportunity to hear speakers explain why they are rallying against debt, and to see the TPA Debt Clock – a giant digital display counting up the country’s national debt.

If you need a reminder of the reasons behind the rally, why not take a look at our Why Rally Against Debt fact sheet, or check out the official website FAQ. And if you’re on Facebook, why not join the official event page?

Come and enjoy yourselves, while taking the opportunity to make a serious point about the importance of dealing with Britain’s horrific national debt.

Guido has penned  today’s Thunderer column for the Times  behind the paywall. Before people moan, it is for a good cause, tomorrow’s planned Rally Against Debt and for those of you without a log in, he will push the limits of the fair use rules.

…Government borrowing is merely deferred taxation, so this generation is passing on a terrible inheritance of indebtedness that will burden my children, and my children’s children, with higher taxes. The Chancellor will protest that he is cutting the deficit, that he is overspending less, that political reality will not allow him to do more.

This is simply not good enough. Under Mr Osborne’s plans, the Government will still spend more cash every single year. Debt interest payments are set to double and will eventually cost more than the education budget. That is a stupendous waste of money that could be spent educating our children instead of servicing the bloated debts to the bond markets. Cutting the deficit is not enough: cutting the debt is required.

We don’t have big public sector unions organising coaches to London, and no political party is backing us, so we certainly don’t expect the Rally Against the Debt to number in the hundreds of thousands. I am taking my children with me on their very first demo and my first since back in Berlin 1989, to demand on their behalf: “Mr Osborne, tear down this debt.”

See you tomorrow, 11.00 a.m., Westminster.

Without a hint of irony Gordon is speaking today in Las Vagas to a convention of hedge fund investors. The Salt Conference is one of the largest gatherings in the world of investors, speculators and wealth creators. No doubt he will regale them with tales of how he saved the world from their evil destruction, lecture them about how they are all to blame for the financial crisis, and were it not for him, it would have been armageddon. Or will he just take the nice fat appearance fee, drone on about his book, and run the profit through his limited company to avoid paying the chokingly high income taxes his government forced on the country.

Meanwhile the people of Kirkcaldy still go unrepresented in Parliament. What good is Gordon doing for them in Vegas?  Guido pities anyone in the casinos, it’s going to be big wins for the house tonight with Jonah in town. 

However, there is something you can do to show Gordon, Labour and the rest of the deficit denying, head-in-the-sand, carry on spending brigade that enough is enough. That is to give the Rally Against the Debt an hour of your time on Saturday morning  in Westminster. Guido will be taking to the soapbox and wants to see as many co-conspirators there as possible…