The TaxPayers' Alliance - Campaign

"Local councils are unpopular" shock

After a torrid six months contributed to more than a little by our Council Spending Uncovered campaign which revealed huge amounts of waste and excess in local government, the Local Government Association's Head of News, Richard Stokoe, has written in PR Week, making a heartfelt plea for sympathy for Town Hall spin doctors. I suspect there will be a decidedly small number of tears being shed by taxpayers whose record tax bills go to fund the myriad communications officers in town halls around the country.

Essentially, Stokoe reveals, being a PR man for a council is awful because:

• People like the TPA annoyingly insist on pointing out when you're wasting money or failing to deliver services.
• Opposition councillors...erm...oppose what the council do.
• Central Government, that traditional whipping boy for any council's problems, doesn't defend them from criticism enough.

Diddums. Well, I suppose the £450 million annual budget for local government publicity must provide some comfort for the thousands of people who make a good living with a generous pension and bonuses in return for defending councils in the media, eh?

Great minds think alike...but fools seldom differ

Local councils are notorious for their foolhardy love of shiny new logos - that cost unsuspecting taxpayers tens or even hundreds of thousands of pounds.

Blackburn and Barrow councils in the Northwest, though, have excelled themselves by managing a new feat. Not only have both of them spent taxpayers' money on new logos, they have managed to get identical designs - heart-shaped versions of the letter B:

Whilst both authorities now look rather silly, it's Blackburn who particularly have egg on their faces. They spent a disgusting £60,000 on their green heart logo, whilst Barrow got theirs at a snip for £140. That's frankly still £140 too much, but it's a damned sight better than the cost of three police officers' annual salaries.

Worryingly, Barrow are threatening to let down their so far fairly thrifty record by bringing copyright action against Blackburn. Copyright action? It's ridiculous - not only have they all spent their taxpayers' hard-earned money on these primary school doodles, they are actually thinking about getting m'learned friends involved, for a fee of goodness knows how much.

According to reports, a spokesman for Blackburn's town-centre partnership said: "Great minds do think alike." There's a second half to that saying, though - "Fools seldom differ." I'll let you decide which of the two is more appropriate

Cracks starting to show in the green stealth tax crusade

Via Iain Dale comes a very interesting blog post by Stuart King, the Labour Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Putney. It is made particularly interesting by the fact that it shows the growing doubts about green taxes that are spreading even amongst supporters of this high-taxing Government, and even amongst people, like Stuart, who describe the environment as their "political passion".

Whilst he remains an enthusiast for green taxes per se, Stuart publicly recognises the fact that green motivation has been widely and repeatedly used as an excuse simply to, as he puts it:

to squeeze even more money out of [people] on the pretense that its for the environment

The blizzard of stealth taxes and charges that have been slapped on people in recent years under the guise of being "green" is both unfair to taxpayers and hugely unpopular. Such is the dishonesty and unpopularity of this approach, argues Mr King, that it is actually harming the Green agenda as a whole.

This is an important development. Until recently, advocates of Green taxes actually seemed to relish the fact that they were causing people discomfort - welcoming the scratching of the hair-shirt as a sign that some kind of deserved penance was being paid. For the most extreme, the more ordinary people's pips squeaked, the better.

Many are now waking up to the fact that not only are these extra taxes economically harmful in these tough times, but they are actually so unpopular and indeed environmentally ineffective that they are doing harm to their own cause. Whilst some people have apparently just got zealously carried away with green taxation, many others in Westminster have jumped on the green bandwagon in order to use it as an excuse to revenue raise for the Treasury. It is that latter practice in particular that Stuart King has identified, and which is picked out clearly by our opinion polling on the subject as being unpopular and resented.

The other problem the green tax lobby have got is that whilst they point avidly to Stern, the IPCC and others when it suits them, they try to conveniently ignore the fact that even according to those same sources, we pay too much in green taxes already. Their own favourite sources put specific figures on the social and environmental cost of CO2 emissions, but the amount we currently pay far exceeds those costs. In short, their is no case for further green taxes, and any extra charges brought in should be matched by reductions in fuel duty and/or VED for a start.

Public opposition to stealth taxes dressed up in green clothes has been growing hugely in recent months, and the pressure being brought to bear will hopefully see a lot more people like Mr King change to his tack. As he says, councils and government should be willing to use the carrot of tax cuts and rebates if they want to change behaviour - the stick of taxes is too often unfair, unpopular and in practice abused as a way to make money.

It's time to delete innocents from the DNA database

The latest report from the Human Genetics Commission, the Government's official genetics advisory body, has piled on further pressure for the deletion of the one million DNA samples of innocent people held on the DNA database. It's long overdue for these samples to be deleted, for a host of reasons.

It is both wrong and ineffective to continue to hold people's details if they have never been found guilty of any crime - especially if they are in fact witnesses who have been sampled as part of coming forward.

Given the recent news that the Home Office has been flogging samples from the database to private companies without the permission of the people on the database, not only have the innocent people on the database had their most personal information abused but there is surely a danger that people will think twice about coming forward if the only reward is to be swabbed then have your sample sold to the highest bidder.

There are serious concerns about the accountability and mission-creep of the DNA database as a whole, and the recent rumblings about the way innocent people are treated perhaps represents a turning point. For example, did you know that the creation of the database was never debated in Parliament? Or that there was, until last year, no ethical committee or group to monitor the way the database and its contents are used, despite it having been established in 2001?

DNA is undoubtedly an extremely useful tool in investigating crimes and prosecuting dangerous criminals. The way the DNA database acts, though - loading itself full of innocent people, witnesses and children; refusing to give those who voluntarily submit samples to help an investigation the right to have their samples deleted when the investigation is over; selling people's personal DNA samples to private companies - is in danger of undermining the valid uses of the technology. All these extra functions also cost a lot of money purely to monitor the innocent, which could be much better spent actually dealing with those we know to be guilty - as we pointed out in our recent report The Cost of Big Brother Government.

The unfortunate fact is that the old "If you've got nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear" blarney simply isn't true. I can think of a host of things to fear: having to pay through the nose for unnecessary technology projects; having my personal data hawked around the marketplace without my permission and used in various research projects; someone losing or stealing my most personal, most irreplaceable data; and, finally and most worrying of all, going through all this cost, angst and intrusion only to see people actually involved in terrorism and crime keep getting away with it because the authorities are too focused on shiny hi-tech measures that impact on the innocent to properly deal with the guilty.

Milibland

David Miliband’s father was a Marxist academic who, throughout his writing career, was sceptical of the Labour Party; it wasn’t Left enough and conceded too much to vested interests, opting for a ‘Labourist’ platform with trade unions and the coalition of Christian Socialists, New Liberals and Fabians within the Labour Party.  Given that, what would he make of his son David's manifesto in today’s Guardian, I wonder?

Two things come clear from Miliband’s article.  The first is that they’re still intent on running a negative campaign against the Conservatives to smother their big government record.  Miliband posts question after question about what the Conservatives stand for.  In his analysis Miliband strikes a confused line, stating the Tories as both reactionary (opposing most of the social legislation brought forth by Labour) and as an empty vessel.  If that’s strategy, Miliband better opt out of the Labour leadership.  Labour’s campaign in Crewe, fighting a vicious class war, failed miserably.  Some people, clearly, never learn.

The intriguing parts come when Miliband attempts to espouse what Labour stand for.  On public services, he asserts that NHS reform should have been implemented sooner.  This, when we look at Labour’s ‘super surgery’ policy as well as years of promised reform, shows how Labour's record is wrapped in a rhetoric of change without any real delivery and choice in our public services.   

On tax, Miliband wades into the Brown stuff.  Triumphantly lauding the windfall tax on privatised industries, he still charts an unpopular high-tax and regulatory course.  Did he not listen when Denis McShane and Gisela Stuart – both Labour MPs – called for lower taxes?  Was it not a warning when Shire Pharmaceuticals announced they were leaving the UK owing to our high tax burden?  From all this you can only assume an Oxford and Harvard education isn’t what it used to be. 

On immigration and asylum he claims success, despite rising numbers of new entrants.  On crime he asserts a fall in offences.   We'd know this for sure if the government had acted sooner to introduce crime mapping.  On the same issue – again exposing the contradiction within his desire to decentralise – there is nothing about allowing communities to hold police chiefs to account as the Direct Democracy group has argued.

The whole thing reads like an apologia rather than a leadership bid.   The muddled analytical confusion – not just of the Tories, but of the current situation within the British political economy – shows how the contradictions in New Labour are coming to fruition and opens the way for a Left critique and definite challenge should Miliband stand.

Top Down or Bottom Up politics?

I’ve added this blog as an addendum to my blog on Norwich yesterday.  At one point, and only one, did my head dip for a moment.  I was speaking to a chap about our campaign.  He agreed with us, wanted lower taxes but then came out with a stonker:

“But it don’t matter what you do, it’ll never happen.”

I couldn’t believe my ears.  Here was an ally in the campaign, someone clearly over-taxed and on side, yet wouldn’t even sign a petition to support the campaign.  Sometimes, talking informally whilst off the clock, I speak to friends and they can refute some zany ideas with the line “it ain’t ever gonna happen, Tim”.  But are lower taxes that far out of the imagination of some that they concede, in the face of polling that shows the country want lower taxes, that high taxes are here to stay?

I say they’re not.  Popular opinion in this country say's they're not.

That brings me to the title of this blog.  The British public have as little respect for politicians now more than ever.  They’ve seen their taxes squandered on waste, over-spending and plush expenses your average Briton never experiences.  Yet, despite being taken to the cleaners by the government at the end of every month - I’ve got to ask again – what are you going to do about it?

Do we want the politicians to decide our politics or are we going to change hearts and minds on the ground, showing how an independent, issue based campaign can lead the agenda, not just in the media, but in the public debate.  The parties have conceded Inheritance Tax is unfair, and have moved to increase the thresholds.  The Liberal Democrats have pledged £20 billion of tax cuts at the next election.  Councils, like Hammersmith and Fulham, have cut Council Tax and will continue to do so.  Bit by bit we are winning and it’s through your resolve and hard work in getting the message out and passing on the ideas for lower taxes and the principles behind them.

You can help us by recommending us to likeminded, over-taxed people you know and ask they join the campaign.  Write and get them to send a letter to their paper, MP and councillors.  Email me if you would like some recruitment leaflets and sign-up forms.  The momentum is with us and with your help we can push further for lower taxes in the UK.

First principles for a low tax society

In talking to people about lower taxes and smaller government, we all use day to day examples.  High fuel taxes, high income taxes, capital gains taxation etc are all examples we campaign against.  Personally, I’d like to share the first principles I take these arguments from, why I work here and why this fight is not only politically just, but morally just.

Taxes are part of a social contract.  The point about contracts is that they’re designed to be mutually beneficial.  Initially taxes are there to pay for national defence, courts and policing, to keep us safe and secure so we may live in freedom.  Isn’t it amazing how far it’s come, how redistribution has been used as a tool to morally blackmail this country into paying higher taxes for add-ons to the social contract that penalise hard working families.  Away from the abstract, look at the past 11 years, how spending has soared yet MRSA and C-difficile ran riot in hospitals and the benefits system has led to all too frequent abuse.

So, I offer you the principle that should refute the redistributive socialism offered to us by government.  It comes from Robert Nozick’s timeless book ‘Anarchy, State and Utopia’ and is known as the Wilt Chamberlain argument (to non-basketball fans, Wilt Chamberlain was a famous basketball player Nozick uses as an example in the rule).  Summarised, it reads thus:  Imagine in a socialist utopia everyone is paid £1 a day for their work.  In free time, however, Wilt Chamberlain likes to play basketball.  He offers individuals to voluntarily part with 50p to watch.  You do, I don’t.  At the end of the voluntary transaction, you have 50p, I still have my £1 and Wilt has £1.50.  Through voluntary activity alone, we’re unequal, despite the best laid plans of the socialist government.  No matter what plan laid down, no matter how equal a government plans for us to be in economic matters, through our own voluntary activity we have dispelled a plan for equality.

Now let’s look at this here in 21st Century UK.  We all go to work, expecting taxation to be taken from our pay packets to pay for our safety and security.  Yet, through our labour, why should more and more be taken from our pay packets to offset the voluntary activity that causes others to be poor as a result of voluntary activity?  This argument has received some timely indirect support lately. 

Anecdotally, why do people who can’t afford school uniforms have I-pods, sky plus and other luxuries in place of the basics?  Moreover, should a welfare system be in place to accommodate the purely voluntary activity of those who value luxury over necessity? 

I say no.  Again, from Nozick, what we earn through legitimate, voluntary exchange we should keep on the principle that our individual graft has secured a wage packet.  What we give up in taxation we expect to safeguard our position for future voluntary exchange.  From the basic principle that it is your money, the state should take as much for the protection of security and your rights to future free exchange.  To Nozick, that’s the courts, police and national security.  To this government, it’s a whole lot more.

Moreover, it’s a philosophical and moral case for raising the income tax threshold.  Those who opt to work for a low wage should be rewarded for their work because they have chosen not to rely on state hand outs.  There should be a greater incentive to work through taking low earners out of income tax.  Why is this better for high earners?  It provides a wider market for commerce.  It’s a mutually beneficial contract, a social contract even.

From these first principles – that the money you earn should be spent by government for the safety and security of your rights to freely exchange on the market – lower taxes are, for me, a moral and philosophical requirement to a just society.  Futhermore, voluntary activity shouldn’t be mitigated by arbitrary decisions from government.  What the government can plan for, quite easily, voluntary activity can distort.

If you would like to join our campaign and become part of our growing grassroots campaign for lower taxes please join us - for FREE - here. 

The Sun Says: Cut Taxes

There's a great leader in the Sun this morning that throws the weight of that paper firmly behind a tax-cutting, waste-eradicating, value for money agenda:

 

This is great news and a clear signal to Brown, Cameron and Clegg: the TPA's campaign is resonating throughout the country. People want the public sector to tighten its belt, sharpen up its act and lighten the load of taxation - and they know it can be done.

A welcome crime announcement

Regular readers will be aware of our enthusiasm for crime mapping, demonstrated to great effect in the USA and espoused by Boris Johnson in the London Mayoral election - the idea that police should publish all reported crimes with type, date and current status on an online map.

We're very encouraged, then, to read that Jacqui Smith has today announced that crime maps will be available across the country by the end of the year. Judging by the website of the West Midlands Police crime mapping trial, the system so far isn't perfect (specific crime locations would be even better) but it's a great step forward.

As the Home Secretary says,

"The public are the best weapon in helping to fight crime and anti-social behaviour - and to do that people need to know what's going on in their area...We need to make sure that people know what's happening to crime in their neighbourhood, and how they can get involved and work with their neighbourhood police officers."

She's right about the power of informing people, and the importance of getting people involved in policing - she falls down, though, on the question of what to do about it. It's an improvement to use crime mapping to inform people, and it helps people hold the police to account, but if you want people to "get involved" why not give them democratic control over policing? We haven't hear hide nor hair of that idea from the Government yet but then again, they weren't in favour of crime mapping 12 months ago...

NEXT DAY UPDATE: I'm glad to see that today's Telegraph Leader agrees with me!

How Darling can help us and help himself

 

On going into the TPA's local newsagent today, I was confronted first by this sign, and then by a very apologetic shopkeeper. It is signs like this, cropping up across the country, that go a long way towards explaining the reason taxation and Government spending are so high on people's agenda at the moment.

For a start, if my local newsagent's prices are going up, I personally have less disposable income and thus resent it even more when I pay a heavy tax bill, much of which is then squandered. For shopkeepers and other business owners it is particularly worrying, as their customers decide which purchases to continue with and which ones to ditch.

Most grating, though, is the fact that whilst the Prime Minister, the Chancellor and a host of other Government figures parrot the line that they are a bold team, helping the nation through difficult economic conditions that are in no way their fault, in fact they can do something to help - they just refuse to.

Read again the poster above. What are the stated pressures the shop is under?

Congestion charge

Fuel prices

Both of which can be reduced at the whim of the Mayor of London and the Government. Fuel duty makes up the majority of the price of fuel at the pumps, and given the fact that the Treasury is getting a windfall from high oil prices boosting their income for the North Sea fields, they are currently having their cake and eating it.

The "manufacturer and distributor increases" will undoubtedly be largely due to the high price of fuel as well - particularly for distribution and delivery into Central London, where the congestion charge hits as well.

The fact is, whilst some of the problems we are all suffering at the moment are indeed out of the Government's control, there are ways they can ease the credit crunch, put some money back into people's pockets and boost confidence on the high street. Cutting fuel duty, for example, would not only help motorists, it would help all of us out - it's worth remembering that even if you don't own a car, most of the things you buy have the cost of the delivery lorry's fuel as part of the price.

The Government are rightly getting a lot of flak at the moment for the economic conditions, the massive tax burden and the serial failures of public services. They would do well to remember that as well as helping me and my local newsagent by cutting taxes, they would be helping to take some of the pressure off themselves. Whether they do the right thing for self-interest or for the public and economic good, here's hoping they do it soon.