Sounds like a pretty bloody simple policy, right? The new Lib-Dem ‘big idea’ is that those with houses worth over a million pounds should pay slightly more tax than every other fucker, for the simple reason that they have more money – clearly, they must have more money if they have a big house. Right? And these people with their big houses – about 1% of the population – should pay more because they have more. Trouble is, this simple moral outlook has an even simpler scupper. Why the hell should we pay more tax simply because we have worked hard to earn more? And what about those who own a million pound house but don’t actually earn all that much? If they’re retired, or inherited it, or whatever excuse they have.
In the economic system we have accepted to live by – and we have accepted it whether we like it or not – everybody has the opportunity to work hard and earn lots. You can go to university, get educated, and then go work in a bank and sell sub-prime mortgages and then cut and run before anyone can catch you and put a brick through your face. So why on earth should these people who have worked hard to earn well give their money arbitrarily to people who have shirked education in favour of state handouts and idleness? Why should they pay for pensioners? They have a state pension, don’t they? Well, there you go then, anyone can live on £80 a week, it’s not like pensioners need much money anyway, they don’t actually ‘do’ anything, do they? And as for these families living in council houses on the dole with eight kids. Well, they made their choices and got into that mess. Why should I, who have worked hard all my life, pay for these good-for-nothing scroungers?
Sound familiar? It’s the kind of thing people blurt out when they’ve just looked at their wage slip and seen how much has been confiscated in tax. OK, maybe not about the pensioners, but certainly the situation in this country when it comes to social welfare is particularly fuckin galling. On the news this week were two stories which hit home to me and sent me into exhorts of vitriolic rage. The first was the Lib-Dems’ new dream of arbitrary tax for the rich, and the second was the story of women attempting to escape domestic violence being denied refuge by councils attempting to save money.
On the one hand was a stupidly idealistic idea that has absolutely no chance of coming to fruition, and on the other is a desperate case for the implementation of this stupid idea immediately. The fact is that councils are shit, and they cannot be trusted to spend the money we give them responsibly. They allocate money for road maintenance when it is needed to finance child protection services so that vulnerable children like Baby Peter can be removed from their dangerous parents before they batter them to death. Road maintenance is important after all. Otherwise people will complain about pot-holes. And as for these women fleeing their violent partners, well, an entire family on the dole with matching heroin addictions have a much fairer case for social housing than she does. There are more of them, for a start. And she was probably a nag anyway.
The fact is that you cannot justify the arbitrary taxation of the rich. What are we, communists? If we are then maybe we should be debating whether or not to put dole scroungers into factories and forced labour camps rather than debating the taxation of a whole 1% of the country. We have the infrastructure to protect the less wealthy in this country, it just doesn’t work very well. It’s not about underfunding, it’s about mishandled funding. Tax doesn’t need to go up or down, it just needs to be controlled and monitored as and when it is spent, and unfortunately this power lies in the hands of the government and the councils they umbrella. And they’re all fuckwits. But this is as much the fault of the rich minority as it is of the poor majority
We are all responsible for the behaviour of the people we put in power. We knew all about MPs’ expenses long before the numbers came out, but we did bugger all, and we’re still doing bugger all. They still regulate their own expenses, we have achieved nothing with our media outcry. We sit on our arses and complain but we actively do, and thus achieve, nada, zilch, NOTHING. We all know what we have to do. We have to massively increase income tax. That’s THE GOLDEN RULE NUMBER ONE on the road to equality. This raise in tax can then fund and sustain the raising of the minimum wage to a decent level, so that exploitation is eradicated and financial stability is guaranteed for the majority over the minority. Those are the first actions that need to be taken.
Those are the absolute fundamentals. Everything else can wait, we just need those two first. Then we can build. And as for the argument that “the brightest minds will leave”, then let the treacherous little swines leave, there are plenty who will gladly step into their places. No end of them in fact. Everyone wants in on this country, all over the world they want to be here. So those that want to leave may feel free to do so. We don’t want you.