A taxation solution to recession

eddie — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 14:27:16 +0000

The economic crisis has seen the government act with a boldness of which many doubted it was capable. Similar boldness is now needed to confront damaging systemic inequalities, which have contributed to the crisis and which New Labour has all too often sidestepped or papered over. The underlying structural weaknesses of high risk, bonus-crazy capitalism have been exposed. At last, ministers are extending the language of irresponsibility, so often used to try to change the behaviour of those at the bottom, to nail those at the top for their culpability.

As we face recession, rising unemployment and economic uncertainty, Labour must now use what may well be its last chance to reassure and inspire with a concrete vision of the good society and a clear explanation of why building it must be a priority.

Equality, combined with ecological sustainability in an agenda for environmental justice, has to be the central leitmotif of this new social, economic and democratic settlement. The immediate target must be to reduce the gap between rich and poor by the next general election. Despite the improvement since 2000 identified by the OECD, the gap is still wider than in 1997 and than in three-quarters of OECD countries. This means urgently stepping up action against poverty at the bottom while, at the top, a more fundamental assault is required on the huge disparities of rewards than is involved in merely depriving (some) bankers of their bonuses.

At a time when many more may have to turn to the safety net of the benefits system, it is more urgent than ever to strengthen it so as to ensure an income that enables people to live decently and with dignity in keeping with human rights principles. There could not be a worse time to wield new sticks to push jobless people into a shrinking labour market, as envisaged in the welfare reform green paper. A large-scale green reconstruction programme, as recommended in A Green New Deal, could spearhead a new environmental justice initiative.

With public spending and borrowing under pressure, part of the cost of protecting the poorest victims of the crisis, should be met by the wealthy fulfilling their responsibilities to society through more progressive taxes. Exceptional times call for exceptional measures we are told. So, it is legitimate for the government to renege on its manifesto pledge not to raise the higher rate of income tax. The case for a higher rate of 50% for high earners still stands. If applied to those earning over £100,000 per year, it could raise nearly £8bn, more than twice the minimum needed to meet the next child poverty target, even allowing for any behavioural changes in response to the tax increase. Such changes could be minimised through much tougher action on widespread tax abuses. The money is more likely to boost the economy in the pockets of low income mothers than the bank accounts of high earning men. Inheritance tax must also be reformed to reduce wealth inequalities.

In July, a man on incapacity benefit wrote to the Guardian that he and his wife “sit destroyed by poverty … I can speak but have no voice, and those claiming to represent me have failed me. As the gas and electric prices rise for all, they may also become out of reach for many. Now I fear the winter and hope for nothing”. Hope not fear is what the government must now provide for him and millions of others.

“After New Labour”, the second debate in the “Who owns the progressive future?” series, organised by Comment is free and Soundings journal, will take place in London at Kings Place on November 3 at 7pm. Guardian readers can obtain tickets at a special rate of £5.75 by phoning Kings Place box office on 0844 264 0321 and quoting “Guardian reader offer”. For full details click here.

Join the Soundings journal facebook site and continue the discussion.

The Great City Academy Fraud

Ellie Keen — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 23:52:55 +0000

book Review

The Great City Academy Fraud, by Francis Beckett

It is impossible to commend this book highly enough. When the whole City Academy saga started Brent was chosen as one of the first 3 proposed in the country. As local NUT Secretary I was intimately involved from the start. We witnessed the deceit, the spin, the secrecy, the bribery and the downright dishonesty and lying. I collected the papers and the evidence and thought of writing a book. In common with most people I never got round to it. I’m glad I didn’t, I couldn’t have done the job a tenth as well.

It’s an elegantly written book packed with killer quotes and facts. I have the rather desecrating habit of turning the ears of pages down if they have a particularly important or germane fact or quote. By the end of the book almost every other page had been dog-eared.

I read the book whilst camping out at the occupation ‘tent city’ we have set up to oppose an Academy on the Wembley Park site. You can imagine that I and my colleagues have been absorbed in studying and finding out as much information as possible about the academy programme, yet still I found out so many things I didn’t know and gained more insights into the depth and perfidy of these would-be state education privatisers.

Amongst many things, the book shows how Primary schools will not escape and will be included in the academies’ increasing trend to be all-through 3-18 schools (the bigger the school, the cheaper the cost per unit – sorry – child); how private schools are being allowed to become academies; how academies are now being built entirely with public money with so-called sponsors only being expected to make annual revenue contributions to the academy trust; how Local Authorities, as being responsible for education, are to be ended; how democratic consultation and procedures have been trampled into the dust and the legal goalposts bent, ignored and moved with the regularity and speed of atomic clocks; and how there is a determined plan by religious groups to turn the clock back.

So, to quote two brief extracts from the book, the first regarding the role of religion in education, and the second regarding the role of charity, or rather the role it shouldn’t have, in education (but if you use them I want you to promise me that you won’t do it without buying the book, because you’ll miss so many other good ones).

He points out that long before the academies became the vehicle for it (1995) a booklet from a Mr Burn and Mr McQuoid, now involved with the Vardy foundation, said, “In Britain the Christian churches were active in the field of schooling long before the state took over….in retrospect it is a matter of regret that the churches so readily relinquished control of education to the state….”. And there you have it says Francis, “the state must be driven out of education and it should be handed back to the churches, our function as tax payers should be confined to providing the money with which people like McQuoid and Burn can make sure we can bring up a generation in their own image”.

He quotes Clement Atlee, who was later to become Labour prime Minister in 1945, writing in 1920. He said, “If the rich want to help the poor then they should pay their taxes gladly. A right established by law, such as that to an old age pension, is less galling than an allowance made by a rich man to a poor one depending on his view of the recipient’s character and terminable at his caprice”. He quotes Robert Louis Stevenson who called taxes “the true charity, impartial, impersonal, cumbering none with obligation, helping all”.

“ Charity” , Atlee wrote, “is always apt to be accompanied by a certain complacency and condescension on the part of the benefactor and by an expectation of gratitude from the recipient which cuts at the root of all true friendliness”

Francis then writes, “For these reasons, in the early part of the 20th century it became the view of the Labour Party – and broadly speaking remained so until 1997 – that the rich should aid the poor through the tax system, rather than by charitable gifts; and that education, health care, social security – all the elements of the 1945 Atlee settlement – should be paid for from taxation”.

“What city academies represent, therefore, is a return to the idea, condemned by Atlee, that the rich should contribute voluntarily, rather than through the tax system. But there is a new twist. The sponsor can get all the things a nineteenth-century philanthropist could get, and which Atlee grudged him: control of how the money is spent, a ‘monument’ to himself, the gratitude of the recipients. But unlike the nineteenth-century philanthropist, he does not have to pay the cost of the thing he is ‘giving’ – or even a substantial contribution towards the cost”.

Francis, you have done a service to all of us, full credit to you. As you point out, “Each funding agreement contains conditions upon which the Academy can be returned to the public sector”. We should repay you by defeating this attempt to end state education. This means all out war to stop new academies being built, and campaigning and fighting by any and all means to bring all existing academies back into a fully integrated state education system. Over to you, readers. A journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step. We have started and this is an excellent guide.

taxation | ukwatch.net

A taxation solution to recession

The Great City Academy Fraud

book Review