As the public look on in horror as a spate of killings sweep inner London, anti social behaviour sky rockets and fear of crime rises, the government come out with more clichés – handcuffing themselves with their own incompetence.  Take this case in point:  Gordon Brown announced the other day that problem families will be evicted from their council homes.

It sounds like a great idea; those causing problems for their community should be removed.  But so ingrained is ten years of politically correct policy prescriptions that there are structures in place to keep problem families in their homes, making it more difficult for the government to evict them in the first place. 

See our non-job here from Southwark Council.  Read closely where the job description says the apparatchik should “intensively support problem families” who risk losing council tenancies through anti-social behaviour.  It’s as if the left hand doesn’t know what the far-left hand is doing.

On everything from crime, to tax, to immigration, the government have talked tough but delivered a pathetically weak response.  Labour tried to spin the abolition of the 10p tax as a tax cut, compensated by reducing the basic rate from 22% to 20%, when it was nothing near when fuel and other stealth tax increases are factored in.  On immigration their ‘British jobs for British workers’ policy was exposed as a farce when it was revealed an overwhelming majority of new jobs went to migrants.  That’s not to criticise their immigration policy per se, but it should describe a history of this government’s lack of purpose and honesty.

Your money in the past ten years apparently served as ‘investment’ in public services.  In return you get dirty hospitals, police barricaded in their stations through an avalanche of paperwork and a government employing PC bureaucrats – as mentioned above – to help problem families stay in their council houses.  After 11 years and so many broken promises, there is no reason now to think this discredited government will gimmick its way out of the crisis on our streets today.  Reverting to type, it’s more waste, more flannel and more incompetence from the government.

The Communities and Local Government department’s White Paper on local democracy, which was published this week is utterly lamentable. Entitled Communities in control: Real people, real power, it even comes in at the knock down price of £33.45. I’d love to know who if anyone actually buys these things (other than you and me, the poor schmucks who had to pay for it to be produced in the first place).

Before you reach for your chequebook to order a copy, don’t. After a somewhat lacklustre foreword by the PM, Hazel Blears introduces the White Paper in uncharacteristically hand-of-history-on-my-shoulder tone. She rather grandly gives the proposals a place not just in the history of managerial blather, which it perhaps merits, but in a rather more eminent timeline, which apparently reads:

1647: Putney Debates, English Civil War
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1819: The "Peterloo Massacre"
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1838: Chartists rally at Kersal Moor
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1844: Foundation of the first Co-Operative
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1900-1920: Suffragette Movement
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1939-1945: World War Two
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2008: Hazel Blears publishes glorious ‘Communities in Control’ white paper

That would be overstating the case for the best of White Papers, but it’s just incongruous for this shoddy example.

Local democracy is a really big issue, and has a host of serious problems that need solving, but do we hear any truly radical suggestions to put services under democratic control, throw open the doors of bureaucracy and introduce genuine transparency? Not a bit of it – they’ve dodged the question. To continue the historic theme, if they carry on behaving like this they’ll have the Peasants Revolt 1381 on their hands.

Throughout the 157 pages they talk the talk in the opening sections of each chapter, for example describing their "simple aim: to pass power into the hands of local communities so as to generate vibrant local democracy in every part of the country and give real control over local decisions and services to a wider pool of active citizens." They even drag Aristotle into it, which could explain his less than chuffed expression (see right).

Having talked about the importance of giving people meaningful power, and the problem of the democratic deficit, they then propose very little to solve it.

Amongst their proposals are (my comments in italics):

- bribing people to vote in return for cakes.  Rather undermines Gordon’s healthy eating speech.

- allowing council officers to be active in party politics. The last thing people need is even more bias and partisan wheeling and dealing in town halls. If anything we need to beef up laws on civil service impartiality.

- loosening the laws on partisan bias and propaganda in council publicity. Our research has shown that there’s already more than enough propaganda paid for with council tax – people want council spin abolished, not freed up even further.

- More quangos to work with Muslim groups and young people. Yet more top-down, Whitehall derived, politically correct though-shalt-take-part preaching. People will vote if their vote actually means something and has genuine power over the things that affect their lives, like tax rates, policing, bin collections, crime and care, not because they receive yet more patronising glossy literature.

All in all, what a missed opportunity – and a waste of paper.

The EU Commission issued a press release yesterday proposing a cut in the rate of VAT on house repairs and improvements, which is encouraging for the prospects of the Cut the VAT campaign.

With over 100 MPs signed up to the Early Day Motion supporting the campaign, and a number pledging to raise the issue with the Treasury, pressure for a cut has been mounting – topped by the delivery of a 10,000-signature petition to Downing Street (see right). It’s encouraging that the Commission have taken on board the message, but there’s still a great struggle ahead to achieve the VAT cut.

Any VAT reduction requires unanimous agreement by all EU member states, once it has been proposed by the Commission. By allowing the EU to take control of this particular tax, our democracy has been hobbled. I’ve argued before that tax competition is a good thing, but even if you think it’s a heinous sin, reducing VAT on home improvements is hardly unfair competition – these aren’t tradable, mobile goods or even services you can register for under a flag of convenience, they’re houses, which are about as fixed as assets can be.

But to stand any chance of reducing VAT on repairing our homes, we don’t just have to persuade the Government, we have to persuade the EU Commission and 26 other Governments across the European Union. I still think it’s worth doing, but it’s absurd that how much tax should be charged on someone doing DIY in Walsall should be able to be decided by a Government sitting in Warsaw.

On this occasion, so far, we’ve been fortunate in that the Commission are at least suggesting the idea – and even then it will be an uphill slog to achieve a reduction, requiring the UK Government to wield genuine "top table" influence to persuade the other nations – something which would be in stark contrast to the bulk of British experience at Brussels.

Whilst these are encouraging noises from the Commission, there is a salutory lesson to be learned from the difficulty of securing a reduction even in one, sector specific area. Once sovereignty is given away – or "pooled" as the EUphemism has it – to Brussels, it is a hell of a lot more difficult for democratically elected countries to do what their voters want. For that reason, as well as so many others, we should not let Brussels get its hands on Justice and Home Affairs or Defence as is now being suggested in the cause of "ever closer union".

The government, in a familiar Machiavellian fashion, snuck out this week a new plan to seize more and more Council Tax from those who simply can’t, or won’t, pay.  After years of locking up pensioners and other protestors, they stared defeat in the face after Derby City Council decided to write-off Josephine Rooney’s unpaid Council Tax bill.  As she declared the Council weren’t getting a penny more, the Council marked the money unrecoverable and, as a result, wrote off the debt.  Setting such a precedent, which could see other taxpayers withholding Council Tax increases, the Government have unveiled new plans to invade personal bank accounts to get the money come-what-may.

In a speech to the Local Government Association conference, local government minister John Healey announced plans to have the government invade personal bank accounts to get any money withheld through protest. 

Healey said that it’s a matter of forcing those “who can pay, but won’t” to pay up.  But this is a complete misnomer.  Many Council Tax rebels I have spoken to, and campaigned with, do pay.  They just refuse to pay the often extortionate increases, when we all know the money isn’t exactly going to the frontline.

We have frontline staff pegged at 2% pay increases, yet Councils splash out on whopping pay increases for Chief Executives and other pen pushers sat in Town Halls.  Add onto that the all too frequent pay increases for councillors, the non-jobs and waste and you can see why some taxpayers refuse to pay the increases.

Rather than bleeding more money out of taxpayers, the solution – that everyone can see apart from the governing political class – is to find ways to cut taxes at the local level.  We released a series of reports stating how Councils can cut taxes.  Did they recommend a cut in services – no.  In fact it’s been the TaxPayers’ Alliance who has defended weekly bin collections as the political classes fought to restrict yet another frontline service. 

Should the government attempt to implement such an invasive measure to plunder the bank accounts of Council Tax protestors, it will no doubt be met with the fiercest of opposition from this end, because it simply isn’t the solution.   

We’ve seen government invade our privacy, misusing anti-terrorist legislation to spy on individuals going about their daily business.  Now we face seeing the government using its powers to invade bank accounts and appropriating as it sees fit.  Everyone in the real world has to make careful decisions over their spending as the economy enters tough times.  Government should do the same and not treat the British taxpayer as their private pot of cash. 

Back in February, in our Council Spending Uncovered paper on pensions we pointed out that instead of just talking in Westminster about how the burden of public expenditure might be lifted under a possible future Conservative Government, the Conservatives should, if they really meant it, use their vast presence in local government to make a difference now:

There have been welcome calls for public sector pension reform from the Opposition. In November 2006, Shadow Chancellor George Osborne said: “Let me make this clear – a future Conservative government will not consider itself bound by the deal done between the Labour Party and the unions. Those retiring on public sector pensions are increasingly being supported by those entering the private sector workforce. That is plainly unfair.”

The Conservative Party does not need to wait for a change of government to help alleviate the burden of local government pensions on ordinary taxpayers. The Conservatives are now the largest party in local government and so have a real opportunity to put taxpayers first and campaign hard to make reform a reality.

That, of course, doesn’t just apply to pensions. Indeed, there are many areas where councils have near total control of their policies and could make a big difference to the council tax burden very quickly. In areas like waste policies, wage inflation and unnecessary spending the Conservatives should be walking the walk now at a local level if they expect anyone to believe their talk about Government nationally.

It’s encouraging to learn, then (from a Tory Councillor who is also a TPA supporter) that last week Eric Pickles, the Conservatives’ Shadow Local Government Minister, wrote to all of his party’s councillors to warn against bin taxes.

I reproduce the letter here in full:

Dear Councillor *****,                                                                      

GOVERNMENT PLANS FOR BIN TAXES & THE 2009 ELECTIONS

I wanted to provide you with an update on the Labour Government’s plans to levy new bin taxes on family homes. Despite repeated briefings by Downing Street that Gordon Brown is scared that bin taxes will be unpopular, the Government is moving ahead with legislation to introduce new charges for the collection of household rubbish.

Initially, five pilot schemes will adopt these new taxes; the Government’s own predictions then forecast that the taxes will be extended to two out of three homes. Ministers have written this week to every local authority chief executive, to try to invite councils to take part in such schemes. This is a trap to attempt to entice Conservatives councils into supporting the Government’s deeply unpopular plans. I believe that every Conservative councillor has a key role to play in defending families from these taxes.

The key arguments against participating in such pilots are as follows:

·          Higher taxes on families: Families across the country are suffering from a soaring cost of living. Bin taxes will punish families for having children. Even the Government’s own optimistic Impact Assessment admits that families will pay £72.31 a year more. The Treasury has openly admitted the new ‘waste incentives’ are officially a tax.

·          Increasing the tax burden: Labour Ministers claim that such schemes could be revenue neutral. They made the same empty promises about the council tax revaluation in Wales. Representations from councils across the country have warned that the Government’s sums do not add up due to the set-up, administration, collection and enforcement costs of a brand new tax, as well as the need for new lockable bins. As the Chartered Institute of Water and Environmental Management have warned:

"Costs will be incurred to councils for administration and enforcement. This means that in terms of value added such initiatives would therefore do nothing to assist councils manage their waste budget in the face of rising costs. If the costs for administration are expected to increase substantially in order for householders to be monitored and billed accordingly, but with overall council tax remain bill remaining the same, then either householders who are recycling will pay a proportionately larger slice (this may be significant sums per annum, as has occurred in Ireland, where costs of 300-400 Euros are not uncommon for waste collection), or other council services might have to be reduced in order for revenue to be redirected to cover waste administration."

·          Harmful to the environment: Bin taxes will lead to a surge in fly-tipping and backyard burning. Fly-tipping has already soared in the last three years due to higher landfill taxes. Bin taxes will give perverse incentives to households to dump their rubbish, stuff it in bins other than their own, or contaminate recycling collections. In the Republic of Ireland, bin taxes have led to 4 in 10 households now burning their rubbish, and such burning of now causes 73% of all dioxin emissions. Under the Government’s proposals, civil amenity sites will have to remain free for household waste. Many residents will therefore drive to the local dump to avoid bin taxes – increasing carbon emissions and congestion.

·          Electorally unpopular: The politics of rubbish is very high on media’s agenda and a great cause of public concern. Councils which introduce bin taxes will be vilified in the popular press and punished at the polls. I am sure that Liberal Democrats will happily be two-faced in opposing them locally, even though they support the taxes in Cowley Street. Nationally, we will not hesitate to criticise any supposedly-Conservative council which collaborates with the Labour Ministers and props up Gordon Brown’s discredited stealth tax regime.

In short, bin taxes will harm the local environment and increase the cost of living. This is just another cynical Labour attempt to tax families more by stealth, but with a thick coat of greenwash. The Government should be working instead with councils to extend recycling collections, and make it easier for all households to go green. There is certainly a role for incentives, but not for taxes or charges.

There is great concern in local government about the growing cost of waste. The Government is imposing massive regulatory costs on local councils through LATS and landfill tax. But the answer is not to increase taxes on families, but for the Government to compensate councils for those costs.

With a significant set of local and European elections in 2009, Conservatives need a unified front in opposing these new taxes. We intend to provide a campaign pack against bin taxes in due course, which will provide you with ammunition to take on our opponents in the run up to the elections. We can take the fight to Labour on an issue which will resonate with every household in the land. Opposition to Brown’s bin taxes is a vote winner.

I want every Conservative councillor to show how people can vote blue, go green and keep the cost of living down.

Yours truly,

ERIC PICKLES MP
Shadow Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government

This is encouraging and precisely the kind of thing we were talking about. At the moment, irrespective of what their party leaders might be saying or advising, there are a lot of bad councils from every party. It’s no use leaders talking in Westminster about keeping tax down, reducing unecessary expenditure, not levying unfair and unmanageable taxes like the bin tax if the councils allied to them then go and jump in head first to exactly the opposite. Pickles’ pledge that

Nationally, we will not hesitate to criticise any supposedly-Conservative council which collaborates with the Labour Ministers and props up Gordon Brown’s discredited stealth tax regime.

is particularly significant. If the Tories are realising that the bad, high-spending, stealth-taxing behaviour of some of their local representatives is undermining to their national message then it’ll be good to see some of the local high taxers put on the spot.

I’m sure there will be a lot of councils from other parties, too, that will oppose the bin tax but it’s important for as many councils as possible to realise from the outset that the bin tax is not a solution to the waste problem, and will only add to the crippling financial burden.

From the TPA’s point of view, this is a good start, though it remains to be seen how many Conservative councils will resist the temptation to dress up in environmental clothes and then squeeze taxpayers for even more money. Needless to say, we don’t accept the conclusion that central government should just dish out more taxpayers’ cash to local councils, but the first and most important battle is to stop the bin tax in its tracks.

Transparency is a great thing – in a democracy, it’s only right that we should give people as much information as possible about public policy, service performance and taxation, so they can make as informed decisions as possible. That’s why we applaud Nigel Evans MP for presenting his Ten Minute Rule Bill on Tax Transparency to the Commons today for its First Reading.

Nigel’s bill seeks to encourage shops, bars, petrol stations, restaurants and so on to print on customers’ receipts the amount of tax they have paid on their purchases. That way, the tax burden would not be hidden from people, or disguised in the eventual shelf price.

Just as we believe people should be allowed to see how their money is spent, they must also be allowed to see how, where and when it is collected from them. Hidden taxation is unfair and deliberately seeks to distort the public’s perception of how much tax is gathered.

From a briefing note on the Bill, it’s pleasing to see that the legislation will not force shops to buy new tills or to splash out on new equipment, but that as tills are upgraded shop owners should be encouraged to set them to print tax onto receipts, too. In practical terms, the technology is available and easy to use – a growing number of places already include VAT on receipts.

This Bill, of course, is encouragement rather than compulsion – it can only be a matter of time before a retailer does this themselves to explain that part of the reason prices are so high is that the taxman insists on taking such a massive slice! 

UPDATE: Nigel Evans has written an article for the Telegraph on the issue here.