It's stupid political game playing of the sort that is entirely unnecessary in the circumstances.
Well, from Labour's point of view it's a game which will reap rewards at the ballot box.
Not really, they're winning a landslide anyway. And they're guaranteeing that they'll face the same sort of nonsense back when they do.
Today they've probably just given the Lib Dem's 15-30 seats that would previously have been winnable with a different Tory leader.
But now every Tory MP is going to go into the next election trying to explain why they want fracking in their area.
Let's have a look at what the government is actually proposing:
to consult to ensure there is a robust system of local consent, and clear advice on seismic limits and safety, before any hydraulic fracturing for shale gas may take place; and believes that such consultation must consider how the views of regional mayors, local authorities and parishes should be reflected as well as the immediate concerns of those most directly affected.
Which effectively means no fracking.
The thing you don't understand is that No one is going to read or care about the detail. The leaflet will say (On October 19 2022) the Tory Candidate voted to allow Fracking in this area- with a picture of the local beauty spot.
Labour are going to lie?
The Tories have been doing it for years aided by their arse licking right wing papers . Labour don’t need to be lectured on morality and standards .
That's quite a long winded way of saying "yes".
It’s about time Labour realized that you have to play the Tories at their own game so yes !
And we get to revive 'hilarious' punular soubriquets like 'Liebour' and (you can have this one for free) 'Lier Starmer'.
The reality of the situation has changed. A wealth tax to include pensions and ISAs makes sense because there are now a huge number of people who have badly deployed pension and ISA wealth that is ripe for taxing. As the evidence has shifted, so had my position on wealth taxes.
I put this through Google translate and it gave me "as I have a relatively high income and relatively low level of wealth my position is that income taxes are bad and wealth taxes are good."
High income taxes do work against social mobility, but I agree that @MaxPB shows a vindictive streak in his attitude to taxation that wouldn't be out of place in a Socialist Workers Party meeting.
Not vindictive, pragmatic. The UK has become a nation where too many people now live with their hands in someone else's pocket and call it a career. Using the tax system to discourage that and encourage risk taking is pragmatic.
It's stupid political game playing of the sort that is entirely unnecessary in the circumstances.
Well, from Labour's point of view it's a game which will reap rewards at the ballot box.
Not really, they're winning a landslide anyway. And they're guaranteeing that they'll face the same sort of nonsense back when they do.
Today they've probably just given the Lib Dem's 15-30 seats that would previously have been winnable with a different Tory leader.
But now every Tory MP is going to go into the next election trying to explain why they want fracking in their area.
Even if I'm not grasping some sort of 4D chess from Team Truss on this, at the very least pissing off a good chunk of your back bench over what is basically a weirdo Britannia Unchained shibboleth that has very little impact either way in real life does not seem like good politics.
There is no 4D chess. The fracking reversal decision is just part of the same peculiar mindset that thought it's a good idea, politically or economically, to give tax-cuts to millionaires whilst hammering those less well off. Instead now we have the hammering of local communities for the (low probability) profits of small groups of speculators.
Fracking was the first clear signal with Truss, in power, that she was properly bonkers and so it goes on until Tory MPs do the decent thing by the country and chuck her out.
To the labour party this isn't 4d chess it's just absolute ruthlessness with a long-term payout. Vote with the Tory party today and you've lost all the Nimby vote in your constituency forever.
NEW: Message to Tory MPs from deputy chief whip Craig Whittaker declares that this afternoon's vote on fracking (Labour want to ban it for good) is "a confidence motion in the Government".
Lots of Tory MPs are opposed to fracking in their areas.
'Fracking caused an earthquake every day at the UK’s only active site at Preston New Road in Lancashire, analysis has found.
Between 2018 and 2019, the site near Blackpool was responsible for 192 earthquakes over the course of 182 days , according to analysis of House of Commons Library data by the Liberal Democrats.[...]
There are understood to be at least 40 Tories who are vocally against fracking, and the Guardian understands a letter, signed by dozens saying they could not support fracking, has been delivered to the business and energy secretary, Jacob Rees-Mogg.'
There's plenty of arguments against fracking but are these 'earthquakes' really doing any harm? They are tiny. I've never noticed anything from the site at Misson (Notts).
It would be nice to have a sane discussion about issues of this kind.
Market Rasen in 2008 was a proper earthquake (and entirely natural).
All's fair in politics ... but do bear in mind that that is from a (IIRC) single well, not a whole array of the kind that would be needed for actual production.
It might be 'fair' in politics but exaggerated arguments on one side only enable them on the other.
By arguing in this way it allows JRM to dismiss anti-frackers as loons (see: Dartford Bridge).
I don't want to see fracking sites covering the whole of North Notts either but a balanced discussion would be nice.
I am being balanced. A test well is one thing, but a production array of dozens or hundreds will be worse by roughly that factor (but bearing in mind that seismic scales are logarithmic). And that is not going to reassure people, which is partly the issue here.
That's the point, though. Thousands of tiny earthquakes cannot add up to the effects of one big one.
As I say, I'm not keen on industrialising the place and I'm not definitely not accusing you of being unbalanced, but there is a lot of noise on this subject that is not entirely helpful.
Still, the one thing it is definitely going to blow up is Liz Truss. She does seem to collect land mines.
Indeed. On the other hand, there is the (common-sense, at least) factor that stress release in one place can begin a progressive failure elsewhere*, so it's not a simple equation. I certainly wouldn't want to defend it.
*edit: bit like a minefield. Normally they explode individually but if you screw up, you sometimes get a serial triggering.
It's stupid political game playing of the sort that is entirely unnecessary in the circumstances.
Well, from Labour's point of view it's a game which will reap rewards at the ballot box.
Not really, they're winning a landslide anyway. And they're guaranteeing that they'll face the same sort of nonsense back when they do.
Today they've probably just given the Lib Dem's 15-30 seats that would previously have been winnable with a different Tory leader.
But now every Tory MP is going to go into the next election trying to explain why they want fracking in their area.
Let's have a look at what the government is actually proposing:
to consult to ensure there is a robust system of local consent, and clear advice on seismic limits and safety, before any hydraulic fracturing for shale gas may take place; and believes that such consultation must consider how the views of regional mayors, local authorities and parishes should be reflected as well as the immediate concerns of those most directly affected.
Which effectively means no fracking.
In which case, why are the Tories putting it there in the first place? They know it's unpopular, and just further trashing their brand for nothing.
Because when there is an energy shortage, they want to be able to say that they've tried things.
So why haven't they put lots of money into fusion research? That's about as relevant this winter.
Because fusion isn't producing energy elsewhere in the world. Fracking is.
Some climate change wazzock on Politics Live being rounds berated by all including Labour's Kim Leadbeater.
Incidentally I was one of the first vehicles to cross the reopened Dartford Bridge last night after more wazzocks were finally removed from the cables.
"We're not doing this for publicity". Fuck Right Off.
Andrew Lilico @andrew_lilico · 1h I'm "obsessed" with the implications of a nuclear attack. Yes. I guess I am, a bit, what with that now being considered quite likely by folk that know about these things.
Having reflected on some of the discussions that I have read on here, I've come around to the view that the best way forward is for a form of NI to be payable on all forms of income. This would include pensions, dividend income, capital gains etc.
In the interests of fairness and to avoid hardship, the actual rate payable could be varied based on total personal income; but the total amount should be at least 13.5% in the case of pensioners who have an income that is higher than the median average wage, but for those who are relying on the state pension, or have a very small private pension the rate should be zero. This would be the core revenue raising part of the policy.
The flipside of this would be that the state pension would rise slightly, and the triple lock would remain - and is paid universally. So the policy would benefit a majority of pensioners.
Politically I think a revolt of wealthy pensioners would be comical and counterproductive. Their mouths have been stuffed with gold for too long.
Is your last paragraph right? The alleged stuffing is the triple lock on the STATE pension which is irrelevant because it is pocket money to anyone describable by any stretch as wealthy. What else? Bus passes?
If the state pension is your main source of income, it isn't that great; it just covers your living costs, assuming that you have housing sorted out. The policy is targeted at those pensioners receiving the state pension plus significant incomes through either a) defined benefit or private pensions or b) savings and investments. I'm suggesting they should just pay an extra circa 13.5% tax. In the case of the very wealthy it would have the effect of negating the state pension, they just pay it back in tax. So the policy just really targets the very rich who don't really need the state pension.
Yeah i am not against your plan, I have proposed an alternative assault on the universality of the state pension elsewhere in the thread. My question was what breaks are wealthy pensioners getting at present?
They don't pay the same rate on their income as those working for a living do.
Utter bollocks you halfwitted cretin, they get the exact same tax allowance and pay same tax rates as the whiners like you.
So they pay National Insurance?
Or are you just thick as pig shit and haven't followed the conversation?
Smartarse NI is not Tax. Rich an absolute diddy like you trying to say someone is thick. I paid NI for 51 years you cretin, more than a snivelling whinging arsehole like you will ever pay. Same goes for Tax and still paying to keep bellends like you going on benefits.
Berlusconi back in the Senate and being massively, perhaps purposefully, erratic. Such that I just begin to wonder whether PM Meloni is a done deal:
- FI abstained on the FdI presiding officer in Senate - Berlusconi left notes uncovered in the chamber describing Meloni as an arrogant nightmare - A discussion with the now elected presiding officer at which he seems to tell him to go f himself
- Peace talks (at which some agreements made on cabinet posts).
He then tweets: "I'm back in touch with Putin. He sent me 20 bottles of vodka and a really nice letter for my birthday. I replief with a bottle of Lambrusco and an equally sweet letter. I am the first of his 5 real friends."
Now very possibly the rest of FI tiptoe around him (internal democratic mechanisms not strong in Italy's right wing parties), but he's not making things easy!
In the Commons tea room, the mood is mutinous. Even newer MPs normally reluctant to stick their heads above the parapet are telling the whips she should go. Members of the Old Guard are in despair, not least at the calibre of the Cabinet. “There needs to be a total clear-out and the return of experienced, wiser, greyer heads,” said one.
Telegrph
Boris cleared out nearly all the old guard. The destruction of the Tories starts with him. Truss is simply a symptom. HYUFD thinks he is their winner, whereas Boris is the cause of their collapse.
No he isn't, the Labour lead was half what it is now when Boris left No 10
What part of 'starts' don't you get? What part of 'simply a symptom ' don't you get?
Yep Labour lead was half then. So what. He created the mess that has led to Truss with his half baked Brexit, his lies, his corruption, his attempts to corrupt the constitution. He is the cause of this mess. The Tories are now relying on one of the sane old guard to finally stop the slide.
Truss is simply a symptom of the destruction Boris caused.
No, it is Truss and her mini budget which has led to this not Boris.
Tory MPs listening to whingers like you and BigG got rid of the best Tory PM since Thatcher and ensures the Tories likely face a decade or more in opposition
You are just wrong. It is difficult to imagine how wrong you can be. Truss is there because the Tories removed Boris. Why do you think they did that? Nobody else could. Why do you think you are right and they are wrong and they could see his corruption at first hand.
Yes so Truss would not be there as PM if Tory MPs had listened to me and kept Boris not you and BigG
I can assure you not a single Tory MP listened to me nor BigG, They did this all by themselves, because of the mess Boris had got them into.
If Boris was still there the lies and corruption and the disruption due to those lies and corruption will still be going on and the Tory vote would be where it is now or even lower.
No it wouldn't, Boris' net favourability with the public was 44% higher than that for Truss yesterday and indeed also 5% higher than that for Hunt too
That is because he hasn't been PM all this time standing there lying, corrupting, etc. Do you think all that stuff was going to go away if he stayed. It would have been the same now (if not worse) as it was the weeks before he stood down and during all this time the polls would have gone down and down with all the understandable Tory infighting.
As usual you are comparing Apples with Suspension Bridges.
The last Opinium poll taken mostly before Boris resigned had the Labour lead at 5%, the Labour lead is now 21% with the same pollster.
Firstly I did not hate Boris. I rather liked him actually before he became PM.
I also did not care about the birthday cake. I thought he was wrong to get fined over that (and Rishi was very harshly done). I also did not care that he had drinks in his garden.
Other than that you got it 100% right. That is you got nothing right about my views whatsoever. Nothing at all.
And as usual you think all Boris did wrong was eat cake and drink wine. I can't believe you thought that was what he did wrong. Nobody else thinks that is all he did wrong. Did you not follow the news at all?
Once again, Hunt needs to be radical and make the next budget the budget for workers. £12.50 minimum wage, end all in working subsidies and move to additional household or personal tax allowance for families, no more perverse incentives to work 16h per week to hold on to benefits because the taper is so high. End the child benefit taper, end the £100k allowance withdrawal taper.
Increase taxes on rentseeking - higher rates of income tax for unearned income, NI on unearned income, CGT on non primary residential property pushed up to income tax rates, stamp duty surcharge on additional property purchases pushed up to 10% from 3% and a new wealth tax of 6% charged every 10 years on a person's personal wealth excluding their primary residence and a reasonable allowance of say £200k (mirroring how discretionary trusts are taxed). Wealth tax includes ISAs and pension assets, DB pensions taxed at DC equivalent pot size rates.
A wealth tax would encourage risk taking as a person's wealth would need a minimum capital return to ensure their overall wealth doesn't decrease during their lifetime.
I think one of the lessons of the 'mini-budget' fiasco is that it isn't wise to make big changes to the whole taxation system in one budget with no political mandate to do so.
No, the learning is to ensure there is a credible forecast that shows debt falling over the medium term. As long as the measures make working people better off, discourages rent seeking and keeps the debt ratio falling I expect markets will be happy and debt yields to drop off further.
Perhaps. But it would lead to immense economic disruption (massive and unaffordable rise in the wage bill for low wage employers), and probably be inflationary as a result, and lead to mass unemployment. Politically it would also attack two groups dispropotionately (benefit recipients and the very wealthy). People who already earn £12.50 an hour would find themselves regraded as minimum wage workers, can't see them being too happy about that. Unfortunately the politics of this kind of change doesn't work, in a similar way that the politics of the cut to the 45p income tax rate didn't work.
People have said high minimum wages would cause mass unemployment many, many times. Each time we've pushed the minimum wage up that hasn't been the case. A higher minimum wage would force companies to invest in worker productivity, something that has been sorely lacking for the last 20 years.
It's stupid political game playing of the sort that is entirely unnecessary in the circumstances.
Well, from Labour's point of view it's a game which will reap rewards at the ballot box.
Not really, they're winning a landslide anyway. And they're guaranteeing that they'll face the same sort of nonsense back when they do.
Today they've probably just given the Lib Dem's 15-30 seats that would previously have been winnable with a different Tory leader.
But now every Tory MP is going to go into the next election trying to explain why they want fracking in their area.
Let's have a look at what the government is actually proposing:
to consult to ensure there is a robust system of local consent, and clear advice on seismic limits and safety, before any hydraulic fracturing for shale gas may take place; and believes that such consultation must consider how the views of regional mayors, local authorities and parishes should be reflected as well as the immediate concerns of those most directly affected.
Which effectively means no fracking.
In which case, why are the Tories putting it there in the first place? They know it's unpopular, and just further trashing their brand for nothing.
Because when there is an energy shortage, they want to be able to say that they've tried things.
So why haven't they put lots of money into fusion research? That's about as relevant this winter.
Because fusion isn't producing energy elsewhere in the world. Fracking is.
Geology doesn't control fusion plant location. It does fracking, as discussed here - and no doubt in the still suppressed BGS report.
This PMQs is going to be so so awkward. I think I’ll be watching it between my fingers.
I’ve rescheduled a meeting so I can watch PMQs.
I've rescheduled a meeting so I can't. 😉
We did all* warn you Truss would be shit
*Except Leondarmus.
I don't care, still glad she won the leadership election. She abolished the Health and Social Care Levy. 👍
I said all along I thought that Truss would be unpopular and would lose the election, but I didn't care. You know how much I opposed the Health and Social Care Levy, you published my article on that.
If you offer me a Faustian pact where I get to choose: Rishi wins and the Tories win the next election, with the Health and Social Care Levy introduced, or Truss wins and the Tories lose the next election, with the Health and Social Care Levy scrapped, then I would not sell my soul to win the next election.
I have my principles, if you don't like them, don't ask for my vote.
Except she’s destroyed a tax cutting agenda for at least a decade if not longer.
You’ve thrown out the baby with the bath water.
Starmer may also not be Corbyn but he is not Blair either. His government assuming he is elected will be the most leftwing in the UK since the Wilson and Callaghan government of the 1970s and taxes will be much higher for higher earners and the wealthy especially
We have only ever had one subsequent Labour Government to Wilson/ Callaghan, so your assertion suggests Starmer's Government will be the second most right wing Labour Government since Wilson/ Callaghan.
Simon Bottery @blimeysimon · 4h Delay may not sound too bad but is in reality just a step away from abandonment. A saving grace may yet be that a) cap costs don't really kick in for a few years and b) surely the govt wants SOME achievements to point to at the next election? #socialcare
What is it with these PMs who go by their middle names? Mary Truss, Alexander Johnson and James Brown. At least you can see why James "Sex Machine" Brown might have chosen to go by Gordon. Is it that common among normal people?
I can see why it might happen in an extended family, or workplace/school, if you have several people with the same first name, that they might come to be known by their second name. Though I can't think of an example in my own family.
The West Cork tradition is often to combine first and second names where there is duplication. So there might be one person known as, say, Mary, and another as Mary-Liz, etc, and there's long been so many Marys in Ireland that some of these have become separate first names in their own right - Mary-Ann, Mary-Lou, etc, but it happens with male names too.
The other thing that happens is variations on the name: John, Johnny, Jo, John-Jo, etc.
I have an extremely unusual first name, which is apparently sometimes unpronounceable.
My paternal grandmother's idea apparently; my maternal grandmother said something to the effect of give him something that people will will know and use.
I've never used my second name, always my first!
Good morning, Plantagenet.
Sorry, wrong. More unusual!
Heliogabalus? Wenceslaus? Is it a regal-type name?
Berlusconi back in the Senate and being massively, perhaps purposefully, erratic. Such that I just begin to wonder whether PM Meloni is a done deal:
- FI abstained on the FdI presiding officer in Senate - Berlusconi left notes uncovered in the chamber describing Meloni as an arrogant nightmare - A discussion with the now elected presiding officer at which he seems to tell him to go f himself
- Peace talks (at which some agreements made on cabinet posts).
He then tweets: "I'm back in touch with Putin. He sent me 20 bottles of vodka and a really nice letter for my birthday. I replief with a bottle of Lambrusco and an equally sweet letter. I am the first of his 5 real friends."
Now very possibly the rest of FI tiptoe around him (internal democratic mechanisms not strong in Italy's right wing parties), but he's not making things easy!
Well Berlusconi is Kingmaker in Italy now and clearly enjoying it
Wealth taxes have their place but they're really just deferred income taxes. With wealth taxes you will end up getting taxed when you earn money, taxed when you spend it, and taxed in between too. And people with a lot of wealth will be able to shield it, so it will end up just being a tax on elderly middle class people. The best way forward is to reform council tax so it is more linear in actual property valuations, but I don't think I'd go beyond that. The real problem for the young is the high cost of housing - to buy and to rent - and that should be tackled at source.
I agree with the thrust of what you're saying, but I think @MaxPB does have a point that some of the tax breaks are astonishingly generous to the better-off. For example, the amount that the Nabavi household has been able to stash away in tax-free ISAs over the years is pretty remarkable, even if we haven't stashed as much as some people. Some time of lifetime limit would have been sensible. Unfortunately it's hard to set that up retrospectively.
It's stupid political game playing of the sort that is entirely unnecessary in the circumstances.
Well, from Labour's point of view it's a game which will reap rewards at the ballot box.
Not really, they're winning a landslide anyway. And they're guaranteeing that they'll face the same sort of nonsense back when they do.
Today they've probably just given the Lib Dem's 15-30 seats that would previously have been winnable with a different Tory leader.
But now every Tory MP is going to go into the next election trying to explain why they want fracking in their area.
Let's have a look at what the government is actually proposing:
to consult to ensure there is a robust system of local consent, and clear advice on seismic limits and safety, before any hydraulic fracturing for shale gas may take place; and believes that such consultation must consider how the views of regional mayors, local authorities and parishes should be reflected as well as the immediate concerns of those most directly affected.
Which effectively means no fracking.
In which case, why are the Tories putting it there in the first place? They know it's unpopular, and just further trashing their brand for nothing.
Because when there is an energy shortage, they want to be able to say that they've tried things.
So why haven't they put lots of money into fusion research? That's about as relevant this winter.
Because fusion isn't producing energy elsewhere in the world. Fracking is.
Except the CEO of the only firm that has tried to implement fracking in the UK now says Fracking simply isn't possible in the UK.
Which is the greatest irony in all this - it's an argument over something that makes zero economic sense unless the world is completely screwed at which point we don't need it for different reasons.
Nigel Lawson wrote a pamphlet in 1988 on the Thatcher government's progress on tax reform. It's well worth reading because it highlights some of the ways in which things have gone wrong since Brown.
...we had to dispel the notion that the way to economic success lies through a sort of fiscal levitation. That was the abiding post-war delusion – that governments could spend and borrow their way to prosperity, and fine-tune the performance of the economy through something known pretentiously as demand management.
It may be hard to remember, but it used to be an Establishment nostrum that you need a budget deficit to get economic growth. That was the belief which lay behind the notorious letter by 364 economists in March 1981. We have given the lie to that, decisively. There can no longer be any argument about it.
-----
The key objective is to reduce marginal tax rates. That is what makes the extra pound worth earning, without recourse to tax dodges; and that, in the long run, is what matters for incentives.
Absolutely right and the Tory Party of Lawson that believed in making work pay is the one I have always tended towards.
But a Tory Party that exists to protect the incomes of those who aren't working, and taxes workers to fund the inheritances of those who aren't working for that income too - that's not a Tory Party I'm interested in supporting.
Either make work pay, or what good is there left in the Party?
The reality of the situation has changed. A wealth tax to include pensions and ISAs makes sense because there are now a huge number of people who have badly deployed pension and ISA wealth that is ripe for taxing. As the evidence has shifted, so had my position on wealth taxes.
I put this through Google translate and it gave me "as I have a relatively high income and relatively low level of wealth my position is that income taxes are bad and wealth taxes are good."
High income taxes do work against social mobility, but I agree that @MaxPB shows a vindictive streak in his attitude to taxation that wouldn't be out of place in a Socialist Workers Party meeting.
Wealth taxes have their place but they're really just deferred income taxes. With wealth taxes you will end up getting taxed when you earn money, taxed when you spend it, and taxed in between too. And people with a lot of wealth will be able to shield it, so it will end up just being a tax on elderly middle class people. The best way forward is to reform council tax so it is more linear in actual property valuations, but I don't think I'd go beyond that. The real problem for the young is the high cost of housing - to buy and to rent - and that should be tackled at source.
I don't see how 6% every 10 years would cause ructions in the economy or have ultra rich shield their wealth. In fact all this would do is mirror the arrangement the ultra wealthy use because discretionary trusts have the same wealth tax mechanism.
Council tax is collected and spent locally, so what we'd get is London and SE councils with huge revenue and northern ones with low revenue. A wealth tax would be collected and spent nationally. I'm shocked that I'm having to convince you of the benefits of taxing wealth rather than taxing working people's income.
I don't like the idea of a wealth tax because it is a moral hazard.
I'm one of these people who doesn't spend much money, partially because I don't have the opportunity right now, and partially because I don't like 'stuff'.
Deferred enjoyment of your labours through eg, early retirement, should not attract double taxation.
I can see the argument for a tax on certain assets (property or land, for instance) but a blanket tax on earned wealth seems unbalanced.
The reality of the situation has changed. A wealth tax to include pensions and ISAs makes sense because there are now a huge number of people who have badly deployed pension and ISA wealth that is ripe for taxing. As the evidence has shifted, so had my position on wealth taxes.
I put this through Google translate and it gave me "as I have a relatively high income and relatively low level of wealth my position is that income taxes are bad and wealth taxes are good."
High income taxes do work against social mobility, but I agree that @MaxPB shows a vindictive streak in his attitude to taxation that wouldn't be out of place in a Socialist Workers Party meeting.
Wealth taxes have their place but they're really just deferred income taxes. With wealth taxes you will end up getting taxed when you earn money, taxed when you spend it, and taxed in between too. And people with a lot of wealth will be able to shield it, so it will end up just being a tax on elderly middle class people. The best way forward is to reform council tax so it is more linear in actual property valuations, but I don't think I'd go beyond that. The real problem for the young is the high cost of housing - to buy and to rent - and that should be tackled at source.
I don't see how 6% every 10 years would cause ructions in the economy or have ultra rich shield their wealth. In fact all this would do is mirror the arrangement the ultra wealthy use because discretionary trusts have the same wealth tax mechanism.
Council tax is collected and spent locally, so what we'd get is London and SE councils with huge revenue and northern ones with low revenue. A wealth tax would be collected and spent nationally. I'm shocked that I'm having to convince you of the benefits of taxing wealth rather than taxing working people's income.
There does seem to be a big age divide on wealth taxes. Most under 40s on here seem to support it regardless of their political leanings. I think that is because in the last decade the distribution of new wealth has been exceptionally skewed to the wealthy.
I fear those older posters who are against them have still not understood this and assume a level of balance that no longer exists.
Wealth taxes have their place but they're really just deferred income taxes. With wealth taxes you will end up getting taxed when you earn money, taxed when you spend it, and taxed in between too. And people with a lot of wealth will be able to shield it, so it will end up just being a tax on elderly middle class people. The best way forward is to reform council tax so it is more linear in actual property valuations, but I don't think I'd go beyond that. The real problem for the young is the high cost of housing - to buy and to rent - and that should be tackled at source.
I agree with the thrust of what you're saying, but I think @MaxPB does have a point that some of the tax breaks are astonishingly generous to the better-off. For example, the amount that the Nabavi household has been able to stash away in tax-free ISAs over the years is pretty remarkable, even if we haven't stashed as much as some people. Some time of lifetime limit would have been sensible. Unfortunately it's hard to set that up retrospectively.
And 6% every 10 years isn't some earth shattering number that will impoverish these people, it's small enough that people won't try and avoid it, but large enough that people will deploy their wealth better to generate enough capital return over the period to ensure their wealth doesn't fall.
I say this as someone who would almost certainly get caught up in a wealth tax.
Simon Bottery @blimeysimon · 4h Delay may not sound too bad but is in reality just a step away from abandonment. A saving grace may yet be that a) cap costs don't really kick in for a few years and b) surely the govt wants SOME achievements to point to at the next election? #socialcare
Good, it absolutely should be abandoned.
The idea that people who are working to make ends meet, should be taxed so that people with a million in assets only spend 150k and the inheritance gets protected is repugnant.
Taxing to fund doctors or teachers, that's for the common good, taxes to fund inheritances - no, no, no.
Wealth taxes have their place but they're really just deferred income taxes. With wealth taxes you will end up getting taxed when you earn money, taxed when you spend it, and taxed in between too. And people with a lot of wealth will be able to shield it, so it will end up just being a tax on elderly middle class people. The best way forward is to reform council tax so it is more linear in actual property valuations, but I don't think I'd go beyond that. The real problem for the young is the high cost of housing - to buy and to rent - and that should be tackled at source.
I agree with the thrust of what you're saying, but I think @MaxPB does have a point that some of the tax breaks are astonishingly generous to the better-off. For example, the amount that the Nabavi household has been able to stash away in tax-free ISAs over the years is pretty remarkable, even if we haven't stashed as much as some people. Some time of lifetime limit would have been sensible. Unfortunately it's hard to set that up retrospectively.
And 6% every 10 years isn't some earth shattering number that will impoverish these people, it's small enough that people won't try and avoid it, but large enough that people will deploy their wealth better to generate enough capital return over the period to ensure their wealth doesn't fall.
I say this as someone who would almost certainly get caught up in a wealth tax.
On the other hand, it's perhaps easier for you to say that, as you are clued up. A lot of people will find that much more difficult to cope with, and they will resent the way that smart alec financial wide boys (as they will be seen) and the rich can evade the tax in all sorts of ways - British Virgin Islands, CHannel Islands, etc. etc. Just at the time when many are elderly and finding it difficult to make safe judgements - remember what happened with private pensions: the financial sharks came out en masse when an earlier Tory government threw skips-ful of fish guts and blood into the water.
In the Commons tea room, the mood is mutinous. Even newer MPs normally reluctant to stick their heads above the parapet are telling the whips she should go. Members of the Old Guard are in despair, not least at the calibre of the Cabinet. “There needs to be a total clear-out and the return of experienced, wiser, greyer heads,” said one.
Telegrph
Boris cleared out nearly all the old guard. The destruction of the Tories starts with him. Truss is simply a symptom. HYUFD thinks he is their winner, whereas Boris is the cause of their collapse.
No he isn't, the Labour lead was half what it is now when Boris left No 10
What part of 'starts' don't you get? What part of 'simply a symptom ' don't you get?
Yep Labour lead was half then. So what. He created the mess that has led to Truss with his half baked Brexit, his lies, his corruption, his attempts to corrupt the constitution. He is the cause of this mess. The Tories are now relying on one of the sane old guard to finally stop the slide.
Truss is simply a symptom of the destruction Boris caused.
No, it is Truss and her mini budget which has led to this not Boris.
Tory MPs listening to whingers like you and BigG got rid of the best Tory PM since Thatcher and ensures the Tories likely face a decade or more in opposition
You are just wrong. It is difficult to imagine how wrong you can be. Truss is there because the Tories removed Boris. Why do you think they did that? Nobody else could. Why do you think you are right and they are wrong and they could see his corruption at first hand.
Yes so Truss would not be there as PM if Tory MPs had listened to me and kept Boris not you and BigG
I can assure you not a single Tory MP listened to me nor BigG, They did this all by themselves, because of the mess Boris had got them into.
If Boris was still there the lies and corruption and the disruption due to those lies and corruption will still be going on and the Tory vote would be where it is now or even lower.
No it wouldn't, Boris' net favourability with the public was 44% higher than that for Truss yesterday and indeed also 5% higher than that for Hunt too
That is because he hasn't been PM all this time standing there lying, corrupting, etc. Do you think all that stuff was going to go away if he stayed. It would have been the same now (if not worse) as it was the weeks before he stood down and during all this time the polls would have gone down and down with all the understandable Tory infighting.
As usual you are comparing Apples with Suspension Bridges.
The last Opinium poll taken mostly before Boris resigned had the Labour lead at 5%, the Labour lead is now 21% with the same pollster.
It's stupid political game playing of the sort that is entirely unnecessary in the circumstances.
Well, from Labour's point of view it's a game which will reap rewards at the ballot box.
Not really, they're winning a landslide anyway. And they're guaranteeing that they'll face the same sort of nonsense back when they do.
Today they've probably just given the Lib Dem's 15-30 seats that would previously have been winnable with a different Tory leader.
But now every Tory MP is going to go into the next election trying to explain why they want fracking in their area.
Let's have a look at what the government is actually proposing:
to consult to ensure there is a robust system of local consent, and clear advice on seismic limits and safety, before any hydraulic fracturing for shale gas may take place; and believes that such consultation must consider how the views of regional mayors, local authorities and parishes should be reflected as well as the immediate concerns of those most directly affected.
Which effectively means no fracking.
In which case, why are the Tories putting it there in the first place? They know it's unpopular, and just further trashing their brand for nothing.
Because when there is an energy shortage, they want to be able to say that they've tried things.
So why haven't they put lots of money into fusion research? That's about as relevant this winter.
Because fusion isn't producing energy elsewhere in the world. Fracking is.
Except the CEO of the only firm that has tried to implement fracking in the UK now says Fracking simply isn't possible in the UK.
Which is the greatest irony in all this - it's an argument over something that makes zero economic sense unless the world is completely screwed at which point we don't need it for different reasons.
Having reflected on some of the discussions that I have read on here, I've come around to the view that the best way forward is for a form of NI to be payable on all forms of income. This would include pensions, dividend income, capital gains etc.
In the interests of fairness and to avoid hardship, the actual rate payable could be varied based on total personal income; but the total amount should be at least 13.5% in the case of pensioners who have an income that is higher than the median average wage, but for those who are relying on the state pension, or have a very small private pension the rate should be zero. This would be the core revenue raising part of the policy.
The flipside of this would be that the state pension would rise slightly, and the triple lock would remain - and is paid universally. So the policy would benefit a majority of pensioners.
Politically I think a revolt of wealthy pensioners would be comical and counterproductive. Their mouths have been stuffed with gold for too long.
Is your last paragraph right? The alleged stuffing is the triple lock on the STATE pension which is irrelevant because it is pocket money to anyone describable by any stretch as wealthy. What else? Bus passes?
If the state pension is your main source of income, it isn't that great; it just covers your living costs, assuming that you have housing sorted out. The policy is targeted at those pensioners receiving the state pension plus significant incomes through either a) defined benefit or private pensions or b) savings and investments. I'm suggesting they should just pay an extra circa 13.5% tax. In the case of the very wealthy it would have the effect of negating the state pension, they just pay it back in tax. So the policy just really targets the very rich who don't really need the state pension.
Yeah i am not against your plan, I have proposed an alternative assault on the universality of the state pension elsewhere in the thread. My question was what breaks are wealthy pensioners getting at present?
No NI on earned income if they still work, no NI on pension income, dividend tax rates are lower than income tax rates.
You can earn up to 40k on top of your state pension income (including the state pension) through pension income and income from savings and investments, a total of about £50k. There is no NI to pay. The tax rate is 20% (income) and 7.5% dividend, plus the allowances. As you are in the lower tax bracket you pay something like 5k to 10k p/a in tax. So you are 'earning' about £3600 a month after tax, per person within the household. So many pensioner households are sitting on double post tax incomes of £5000 - £7000 per month. They will typically own their houses outright and not have dependents. That is just an astonishing amount of money. Clearly they then expect operations, immediate treatment and care from the NHS, amongst other things, and they are obviously living for longer.
I know many, many people in this category. Where I live, they are buying up many of the desirable family housing for themselves, driving up the price, so they can have large detached houses with multiple spare bedrooms for guests/the grandchildren to stay in. It has actually got to the point where my son's school (built in the late 1990s) is undersubscribed, all the young families are forced to live in the victorian terraced housing in the less desirable parts of town.
By contrast, to earn £3600 a month take home pay as a working person, you need to have a salary of £60k, and you will pay about £15k combined in tax and NI. And out of this you have to raise children, pay the mortgage etc.
I'd say the situation is just indefensible. There needs to be a consensus emerge that the group I have described above needs to pay more tax. Otherwise the 'boat will sink the water'. It would be best if it somehow comes from the group itself, as many of them can see the problem, including to their credit some of the posters on here. I cannot think of any good argument against it.
"up to 40k on top of your state pension income (including the state pension)"
Er, is that a slip? Either the 40K includes the SP or it doesn't. SP is fully taxable as it is counted as taxable income.
It is utter bollocks and WTF on dividends, how many pensioners get them , square root of none. I get taxed on everything , negative bloody tax allowance.
Starmer utterly nailing to the floor that Truss has crashed the economy, is costing everyone a bomb, and the Tories behind her backed her lunatic policies when announced.
And again. Starmer is being heard in UTTER SILENCE from the Tory benches. No defence.
Kevin Schofield @KevinASchofield · 1m Good line from Starmer: "She's asking me questions because we're a government in waiting and they are an opposition in waiting."
Starmer was wrong when he said Truss only had a mandate from "members opposite". She didn't get a mandate from them, the one who got closest to it was Rishi. Truss got her mandate from the idiotic Tory members.
Starmer utterly nailing to the floor that Truss has crashed the economy, is costing everyone a bomb, and the Tories behind her backed her lunatic policies when announced.
And again. Starmer is being heard in UTTER SILENCE from the Tory benches. No defence.
Wealth taxes have their place but they're really just deferred income taxes. With wealth taxes you will end up getting taxed when you earn money, taxed when you spend it, and taxed in between too. And people with a lot of wealth will be able to shield it, so it will end up just being a tax on elderly middle class people. The best way forward is to reform council tax so it is more linear in actual property valuations, but I don't think I'd go beyond that. The real problem for the young is the high cost of housing - to buy and to rent - and that should be tackled at source.
I agree with the thrust of what you're saying, but I think @MaxPB does have a point that some of the tax breaks are astonishingly generous to the better-off. For example, the amount that the Nabavi household has been able to stash away in tax-free ISAs over the years is pretty remarkable, even if we haven't stashed as much as some people. Some time of lifetime limit would have been sensible. Unfortunately it's hard to set that up retrospectively.
And 6% every 10 years isn't some earth shattering number that will impoverish these people, it's small enough that people won't try and avoid it, but large enough that people will deploy their wealth better to generate enough capital return over the period to ensure their wealth doesn't fall.
I say this as someone who would almost certainly get caught up in a wealth tax.
On the other hand, it's perhaps easier for you to say that, as you are clued up. A lot of people will find that much more difficult to cope with, and they will resent the way that smart alec financial wide boys (as they will be seen) and the rich can evade the tax in all sorts of ways - British Virgin Islands, CHannel Islands, etc. etc. Just at the time when many are elderly and finding it difficult to make safe judgements - remember what happened with private pensions: the financial sharks came out en masse when an earlier Tory government threw skips-ful of fish guts and blood into the water.
We're talking about a 0.6% annual rate of capital growth to keep the taxman at bay. It's not a big ask and it's not going to impoverish anyone who decides to stick with cash or cash ISAs either.
Simon Bottery @blimeysimon · 4h Delay may not sound too bad but is in reality just a step away from abandonment. A saving grace may yet be that a) cap costs don't really kick in for a few years and b) surely the govt wants SOME achievements to point to at the next election? #socialcare
Good, it absolutely should be abandoned.
The idea that people who are working to make ends meet, should be taxed so that people with a million in assets only spend 150k and the inheritance gets protected is repugnant.
Taxing to fund doctors or teachers, that's for the common good, taxes to fund inheritances - no, no, no.
Never mind a million, if you have £200k in assets removing the £86k cap means you and your heirs too lose most of your estate in care costs.
No, no, no. The sooner we get rid of Truss and you, her biggest fan on here, the sooner we stop this betrayal of the last Tory manifesto and our core support
Having reflected on some of the discussions that I have read on here, I've come around to the view that the best way forward is for a form of NI to be payable on all forms of income. This would include pensions, dividend income, capital gains etc.
In the interests of fairness and to avoid hardship, the actual rate payable could be varied based on total personal income; but the total amount should be at least 13.5% in the case of pensioners who have an income that is higher than the median average wage, but for those who are relying on the state pension, or have a very small private pension the rate should be zero. This would be the core revenue raising part of the policy.
The flipside of this would be that the state pension would rise slightly, and the triple lock would remain - and is paid universally. So the policy would benefit a majority of pensioners.
Politically I think a revolt of wealthy pensioners would be comical and counterproductive. Their mouths have been stuffed with gold for too long.
Is your last paragraph right? The alleged stuffing is the triple lock on the STATE pension which is irrelevant because it is pocket money to anyone describable by any stretch as wealthy. What else? Bus passes?
If the state pension is your main source of income, it isn't that great; it just covers your living costs, assuming that you have housing sorted out. The policy is targeted at those pensioners receiving the state pension plus significant incomes through either a) defined benefit or private pensions or b) savings and investments. I'm suggesting they should just pay an extra circa 13.5% tax. In the case of the very wealthy it would have the effect of negating the state pension, they just pay it back in tax. So the policy just really targets the very rich who don't really need the state pension.
Yeah i am not against your plan, I have proposed an alternative assault on the universality of the state pension elsewhere in the thread. My question was what breaks are wealthy pensioners getting at present?
No NI on earned income if they still work, no NI on pension income, dividend tax rates are lower than income tax rates.
First point valid, second misses the point of NI, third point div tax PLUS corp tax is the relevant measure - rare genuine example of taxing the same money twice.
Second is perfectly valid, the point of NI is to raise money for the Exchequer. Wealthy pensioners should pay their fair share too.
For the latter a rare genuine example? Examples happen all the time.
Someone who works for a living has their remuneration taxed three times: Employers NI + Employee NI + Income Tax. If we're abolishing "secondary" taxes, we should certainly abolish tertiary ones.
Or VAT on fuel duty. Not just a tax, but taxing a tax.
The thing about pensions is that you pay national insurance on your pension contributions (but you don't pay income tax), so that's always been the logical justification for only levying income tax on the pension paid - you've already paid the NI due, as pensions are deferred income.
This probably doesn't quite work for DB pensions if the contributions don't fully cover the cost of the payouts. So perhaps there's an argument for charging NI on DB pensions that aren't fully funded. But if pensions are simply deferred income then it doesn't make sense to charge NI on them twice.
NI is charged twice on incomes, Employers and Employees.
Sucks for anyone who thought they'd evade it in the future if they no longer do, but shit happens.
Maybe I'm more sick than I thought. Aren't I the lefty?
I'm not opposed to taxing people more, but just on the mechanisms with taxing pensions the deal has always been to encourage pension saving, so that people are not wholly reliant on the State when they're too old to work. If you tax pension income on the way in, and on the way out, that will discourage pension saving and you'll end up with less pension saving, probably less saving in general, and more pensioners more reliant on the state when they're incapable of working.
Is that really the outcome you want?
I'm not wholly opposed to taxing pensioners more, but there's a risk that you make saving for a pension a way of losing money and then people will stop doing it.
But any other investment gets taxed on the way in, and the way out, too - people still invest in alternatives.
If you get paid you get taxed on that, if you use your taxed income to invest in BTL property, then later sell that property, you get taxed CGT on that, despite having already been taxed on the way in.
If you get paid and used your taxed income to invest in stocks, then later get dividends or sell those stocks, you get taxed on the way out, despite having already been taxed on the way in.
If you get paid and used your taxed income to invest in setting up a business, which later makes a profit, you get taxed on your profits, despite having already been taxed on the way in.
Taxation never stops, because the state's expenditure never stops. All money is always taxed later on. Why, uniquely, should pensioners incomes uniquely of all investments be exempt from taxation on a double taxation principle when any other incomes from investments would be taxed?
All forms of saving, and all forms of investment, and all forms of income, should be treated fairly and consistently.
Well the reason to specifically give tax exemption to pensions is to encourage people to lock away their money for decades. And other forms of investment are also encouraged by tax exemptions of one sort or another, such as with ISAs.
If you tax pensions more then you discourage pension saving, then people will put their money somewhere else - perhaps property? You could drive house prices up even higher.
I agree that wealthy pensioners are an obvious source of extra tax income, but I think we have to be careful about how to raise that tax so as not to create the wrong incentives. I don't think that discouraging pension saving is the right incentive for the British economy. We already save too little, and invest too much into housing, then is healthy for the economy. We shouldn't make that worse.
That's a separate argument.
If you want to argue savings should be encouraged, and there's a case for that, then make that argument. But don't pretend that pensions are "deferred incomes" or "already taxed" when they're not, they're new incomes made supposedly from investments (but often not remotely fully funded) which have not yet been taxed and are not presently getting taxed at the full rate either.
Future incomes, even if derived from income invested from taxed incomes, are always traditionally taxed so there's no "double taxation" point of principle here.
Like I said, my head is spinning, and I don't know whether it's the fever or this discussion.
I'm sure that when I've previously made the case for restricting pension tax relief to the basic rate (this was John Smith's proposed tax increase that became the 1992GE tax bombshell) that PB Righties have deplored my Communistic attempt to seize private property by taxing income twice, on the basis that pensions were deferred income.
Here I am, about a decade later, making the same argument for the sake of pedantry, and it's a pair of PB Righties who want to soak pension savings. Has the Overton Window really shifted that far left? How did that happen?
The reality of the situation has changed. A wealth tax to include pensions and ISAs makes sense because there are now a huge number of people who have badly deployed pension and ISA wealth that is ripe for taxing. As the evidence has shifted, so had my position on wealth taxes.
You can rely on Fagin wanting to pick everyone's pocket , what a greedy barsteward.
Simon Bottery @blimeysimon · 4h Delay may not sound too bad but is in reality just a step away from abandonment. A saving grace may yet be that a) cap costs don't really kick in for a few years and b) surely the govt wants SOME achievements to point to at the next election? #socialcare
Good, it absolutely should be abandoned.
The idea that people who are working to make ends meet, should be taxed so that people with a million in assets only spend 150k and the inheritance gets protected is repugnant.
Taxing to fund doctors or teachers, that's for the common good, taxes to fund inheritances - no, no, no.
Never mind a million, if you have £200k in assets removing the £86k cap means you and your heirs too lose most of your estate in care costs.
No, no, no. The sooner we get rid of Truss and you, her biggest fan on here, the sooner we stop this betrayal of the last Tory manifesto and our core support
I'm curious as to who except you supports a social care cap on this site?
PMQ's is becoming a waste of time. I suggested this morning that all Truss has to do is parrot the same lines irrespective of the questions in a confident manner and she will survive, and so it appears to be the case.
In the Commons tea room, the mood is mutinous. Even newer MPs normally reluctant to stick their heads above the parapet are telling the whips she should go. Members of the Old Guard are in despair, not least at the calibre of the Cabinet. “There needs to be a total clear-out and the return of experienced, wiser, greyer heads,” said one.
Telegrph
Boris cleared out nearly all the old guard. The destruction of the Tories starts with him. Truss is simply a symptom. HYUFD thinks he is their winner, whereas Boris is the cause of their collapse.
No he isn't, the Labour lead was half what it is now when Boris left No 10
What part of 'starts' don't you get? What part of 'simply a symptom ' don't you get?
Yep Labour lead was half then. So what. He created the mess that has led to Truss with his half baked Brexit, his lies, his corruption, his attempts to corrupt the constitution. He is the cause of this mess. The Tories are now relying on one of the sane old guard to finally stop the slide.
Truss is simply a symptom of the destruction Boris caused.
No, it is Truss and her mini budget which has led to this not Boris.
Tory MPs listening to whingers like you and BigG got rid of the best Tory PM since Thatcher and ensures the Tories likely face a decade or more in opposition
You are just wrong. It is difficult to imagine how wrong you can be. Truss is there because the Tories removed Boris. Why do you think they did that? Nobody else could. Why do you think you are right and they are wrong and they could see his corruption at first hand.
Yes so Truss would not be there as PM if Tory MPs had listened to me and kept Boris not you and BigG
I can assure you not a single Tory MP listened to me nor BigG, They did this all by themselves, because of the mess Boris had got them into.
If Boris was still there the lies and corruption and the disruption due to those lies and corruption will still be going on and the Tory vote would be where it is now or even lower.
No it wouldn't, Boris' net favourability with the public was 44% higher than that for Truss yesterday and indeed also 5% higher than that for Hunt too
That is because he hasn't been PM all this time standing there lying, corrupting, etc. Do you think all that stuff was going to go away if he stayed. It would have been the same now (if not worse) as it was the weeks before he stood down and during all this time the polls would have gone down and down with all the understandable Tory infighting.
As usual you are comparing Apples with Suspension Bridges.
The last Opinium poll taken mostly before Boris resigned had the Labour lead at 5%, the Labour lead is now 21% with the same pollster.
Firstly I did not hate Boris. I rather liked him actually before he became PM.
I also did not care about the birthday cake. I thought he was wrong to get fined over that (and Rishi was very harshly done). I also did not care that he had drinks in his garden.
Other than that you got it 100% right. That is you got nothing right about my views whatsoever. Nothing at all.
And as usual you think all Boris did wrong was eat cake and drink wine. I can't believe you thought that was what he did wrong. Nobody else thinks that is all he did wrong. Did you not follow the news at all?
I'm with kjh. Always quite liked Boris. Wasn't necessarily my number one choice to lead the Conservative Party or to be PM, but a better option than Corbyn by a country mile. So I was pleased, despite some misgivings, that he won. I always found the hatred for him a tad irritating. He delivered Brexit and he handled covid better than most on the continent. Well done him. But when Partygate came out, for me, he had to go. He'd been solemnly telling people not to socialise, and he was socialising. For me, the bigger sin was the first of those: the draconian rules of covid and the hysteria of the messaging is by far the biggest black mark against him, mitigated only by the fact that his counterparts on the continent were just as bad and SKS wanted to go even further. But still, that was it: he had to go after that. No way back. The contempt he showed in that for the voters was uncomebackfromable.
Afternoon all. Back to Brady watch for the next fortnight i guess. What a mess. The Tories havd to split dont they? I guess after a humping at a GE but we are almost into year 30 of the 'Bastards' versus the 'Wets' Will there be anything left to split? In other news, passenger planes on an unusual flight path over me this am, makes me nervous...... Watch the Black Sea, all Hell mighf break loose any moment
Wealth taxes have their place but they're really just deferred income taxes. With wealth taxes you will end up getting taxed when you earn money, taxed when you spend it, and taxed in between too. And people with a lot of wealth will be able to shield it, so it will end up just being a tax on elderly middle class people. The best way forward is to reform council tax so it is more linear in actual property valuations, but I don't think I'd go beyond that. The real problem for the young is the high cost of housing - to buy and to rent - and that should be tackled at source.
I agree with the thrust of what you're saying, but I think @MaxPB does have a point that some of the tax breaks are astonishingly generous to the better-off. For example, the amount that the Nabavi household has been able to stash away in tax-free ISAs over the years is pretty remarkable, even if we haven't stashed as much as some people. Some time of lifetime limit would have been sensible. Unfortunately it's hard to set that up retrospectively.
And 6% every 10 years isn't some earth shattering number that will impoverish these people, it's small enough that people won't try and avoid it, but large enough that people will deploy their wealth better to generate enough capital return over the period to ensure their wealth doesn't fall.
I say this as someone who would almost certainly get caught up in a wealth tax.
On the other hand, it's perhaps easier for you to say that, as you are clued up. A lot of people will find that much more difficult to cope with, and they will resent the way that smart alec financial wide boys (as they will be seen) and the rich can evade the tax in all sorts of ways - British Virgin Islands, CHannel Islands, etc. etc. Just at the time when many are elderly and finding it difficult to make safe judgements - remember what happened with private pensions: the financial sharks came out en masse when an earlier Tory government threw skips-ful of fish guts and blood into the water.
We're talking about a 0.6% annual rate of capital growth to keep the taxman at bay. It's not a big ask and it's not going to impoverish anyone who decides to stick with cash or cash ISAs either.
Bit less than that, actually - compound over 10 years, obviously.
PMQ's is becoming a waste of time. I suggested this morning that all Truss has to do is parrot the same lines irrespective of the questions in a confident manner and she will survive, and so it appears to be the case.
It's not a waste of time - if it gets rid of her -good. If she stays equally good - as it demonstrates that the Tory party is functionally incompetent.
Simon Bottery @blimeysimon · 4h Delay may not sound too bad but is in reality just a step away from abandonment. A saving grace may yet be that a) cap costs don't really kick in for a few years and b) surely the govt wants SOME achievements to point to at the next election? #socialcare
Good, it absolutely should be abandoned.
The idea that people who are working to make ends meet, should be taxed so that people with a million in assets only spend 150k and the inheritance gets protected is repugnant.
Taxing to fund doctors or teachers, that's for the common good, taxes to fund inheritances - no, no, no.
Never mind a million, if you have £200k in assets removing the £86k cap means you and your heirs too lose most of your estate in care costs.
No, no, no. The sooner we get rid of Truss and you, her biggest fan on here, the sooner we stop this betrayal of the last Tory manifesto and our core support
I'm curious as to who except you supports a social care cap on this site?
The vast majority of the public and especially Tories do too.
The fact PB has an unrepresentative high share of dementia tax lovers doesn't change that
Simon Bottery @blimeysimon · 4h Delay may not sound too bad but is in reality just a step away from abandonment. A saving grace may yet be that a) cap costs don't really kick in for a few years and b) surely the govt wants SOME achievements to point to at the next election? #socialcare
Good, it absolutely should be abandoned.
The idea that people who are working to make ends meet, should be taxed so that people with a million in assets only spend 150k and the inheritance gets protected is repugnant.
Taxing to fund doctors or teachers, that's for the common good, taxes to fund inheritances - no, no, no.
Never mind a million, if you have £200k in assets removing the £86k cap means you and your heirs too lose most of your estate in care costs.
No, no, no. The sooner we get rid of Truss and you, her biggest fan on here, the sooner we stop this betrayal of the last Tory manifesto and our core support
You have it backwards, I would have a cap against removing the final £86k (or similar) of people's assets.
Replacing it with a £150k cap on expenditure, without a cap on people's final assets means that those with £200k in assets get to keep only £50k of assets, while those with £1,000,000 in assets get to keep £850,000 of assets, not because they've worked for it but because taxpayers are working to fund it.
Caps should be a floor below which people won't have to pay, not a cap so that those with moderate assets lose all of their assets worth speaking about - but a privileged few get to keep their assets funded by the taxpayer.
This must be painful for you to watch. You know your party are sliding towards ELE, and your MPs appear to be happy to let the collapse deepen so much that you can't extricate yourselves from it.
Comments
*edit: bit like a minefield. Normally they explode individually but if you screw up, you sometimes get a serial triggering.
Incidentally I was one of the first vehicles to cross the reopened Dartford Bridge last night after more wazzocks were finally removed from the cables.
"We're not doing this for publicity". Fuck Right Off.
@andrew_lilico
·
1h
I'm "obsessed" with the implications of a nuclear attack. Yes. I guess I am, a bit, what with that now being considered quite likely by folk that know about these things.
- FI abstained on the FdI presiding officer in Senate
- Berlusconi left notes uncovered in the chamber describing Meloni as an arrogant nightmare
- A discussion with the now elected presiding officer at which he seems to tell him to go f himself
- Peace talks (at which some agreements made on cabinet posts).
He then tweets:
"I'm back in touch with Putin. He sent me 20 bottles of vodka and a really nice letter for my birthday. I replief with a bottle of Lambrusco and an equally sweet letter. I am the first of his 5 real friends."
Now very possibly the rest of FI tiptoe around him (internal democratic mechanisms not strong in Italy's right wing parties), but he's not making things easy!
I also did not care about the birthday cake. I thought he was wrong to get fined over that (and Rishi was very harshly done). I also did not care that he had drinks in his garden.
Other than that you got it 100% right. That is you got nothing right about my views whatsoever. Nothing at all.
And as usual you think all Boris did wrong was eat cake and drink wine. I can't believe you thought that was what he did wrong. Nobody else thinks that is all he did wrong. Did you not follow the news at all?
I wonder how that may be used to resolve succession issues.
Simon Bottery
@blimeysimon
·
4h
Delay may not sound too bad but is in reality just a step away from abandonment. A saving grace may yet be that a) cap costs don't really kick in for a few years and b) surely the govt wants SOME achievements to point to at the next election? #socialcare
(the dictation facility is having real fun with the village name!)
And I'm a kind and generous old soul!
Which is the greatest irony in all this - it's an argument over something that makes zero economic sense unless the world is completely screwed at which point we don't need it for different reasons.
But a Tory Party that exists to protect the incomes of those who aren't working, and taxes workers to fund the inheritances of those who aren't working for that income too - that's not a Tory Party I'm interested in supporting.
Either make work pay, or what good is there left in the Party?
Edit: Just to clarify that was when Liz first started speaking.
I'm one of these people who doesn't spend much money, partially because I don't have the opportunity right now, and partially because I don't like 'stuff'.
Deferred enjoyment of your labours through eg, early retirement, should not attract double taxation.
I can see the argument for a tax on certain assets (property or land, for instance) but a blanket tax on earned wealth seems unbalanced.
I fear those older posters who are against them have still not understood this and assume a level of balance that no longer exists.
I say this as someone who would almost certainly get caught up in a wealth tax.
She is bragging about the Energy Price Guarantee. That Hunt has cut from 2 years to 6 months.
He doesn't want to go too hard. She might end up being dumped as PM.
The idea that people who are working to make ends meet, should be taxed so that people with a million in assets only spend 150k and the inheritance gets protected is repugnant.
Taxing to fund doctors or teachers, that's for the common good, taxes to fund inheritances - no, no, no.
@DPJHodges
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1m
Liz Truss lecturing Keir Starmer for ignoring economic reality is quite something.
the financial sharks came out en masse when an earlier Tory government threw skips-ful of fish guts and blood into the water.
Stop this now conservative mps
And again. Starmer is being heard in UTTER SILENCE from the Tory benches. No defence.
@KevinASchofield
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Good line from Starmer: "She's asking me questions because we're a government in waiting and they are an opposition in waiting."
https://twitter.com/hzeffman/status/1582690555196497920
She has repeated it as well.
No, no, no. The sooner we get rid of Truss and you, her biggest fan on here, the sooner we stop this betrayal of the last Tory manifesto and our core support
The Tories havd to split dont they? I guess after a humping at a GE but we are almost into year 30 of the 'Bastards' versus the 'Wets'
Will there be anything left to split?
In other news, passenger planes on an unusual flight path over me this am, makes me nervous......
Watch the Black Sea, all Hell mighf break loose any moment
Top question.
The fact PB has an unrepresentative high share of dementia tax lovers doesn't change that
Hunt decides.
Replacing it with a £150k cap on expenditure, without a cap on people's final assets means that those with £200k in assets get to keep only £50k of assets, while those with £1,000,000 in assets get to keep £850,000 of assets, not because they've worked for it but because taxpayers are working to fund it.
Caps should be a floor below which people won't have to pay, not a cap so that those with moderate assets lose all of their assets worth speaking about - but a privileged few get to keep their assets funded by the taxpayer.