Are Labour`s tax plans too moderate?

Paul Mason reckons the country needs a "Marshall Plan on steroids", with a "huge fiscal and monetary stimulus" directed at the "heartlands of poverty and decay", with opposition parties showing "leadership and vision" (A country in a critical condition, 23rd November, 2018). His view was supported by the UN`s special rapporteur on poverty whose recent investigation "exposed the baleful effects of austerity" (Crumbling Britain, 23rd November, 2018). Yet when the shadow chancellor says a Labour government would increase corporation tax to 26%, reduce the 45p threshold to £80,000, and tax at 50% earnings over £123,000, these plans are criticised for being "too unimaginative" (The tax conundrum, 16th November, 2018). 

   I am not sure the majority of the population, whose earnings average around £26,000 would agree. In fact many would see little wrong if  Labour`s proposals went further, with incremental increases imposed on earnings over £250,000 and £500,000, culminating with a 90% tax band on earnings over £1 million. Tory propaganda would claim such taxes curb aspiration but this lacks supportive evidence, as does the so-called Laffer curve which claims higher taxes do not increase revenue. The fact that this was dreamed up by Reagan`s advisers in the 1980s to justify lowering taxes on America`s richest, needs to be publicised more!

t does seem the Labour party, at least in its current guise, cannot win. Your Leader states that the Tory cuts to corporation tax saw "no resulting surge in investment", and adds that "in an era of weakening social trust" and austerity, the Tories still went ahead with tax cuts for the wealthy (The tax conundrum, 16th November, 2018). Yet when the shadow chancellor says a Labour government would increase corporation tax to 26%, reduce the 45p threshold to £80,000, and tax at 50% earnings over £123,000, these plans are criticised for being "too unimaginative"! How much would have been written about Labour missing open  goals, I wonder, if  restoring fairness to the tax system like this had not been pledged?

      Labour`s proposals, however, can certainly go further, with incremental increases imposed on earnings over £250,000 and £500,000, culminating with a 90% tax band on earnings over £1 million. The idea that such taxes would curb aspiration lacks supportive evidence, and can be classed as right-wing propaganda, but this is an area where Labour should be more imaginative. Even the modest increases McDonnell suggests will be attacked in the mainstream media, so Labour needs to get its retaliation in early. Television broadcasts and social media videos could be prepared, with actors playing roles of people in the workforce, explaining how much they earn , how much tax they pay currently, and how much they would pay under a Labour government. With only those earning over three times the national average having to pay  a modest amount more, and only the very rich having to pay lots more, not only would the aspiration myth be destroyed, the fairness of the proposals would be made obvious.

    The "super-rich" may well be "adept at avoiding taxation", but imaginative legislation making both tax avoidance, and advising on it, illegal, banning tax avoiders from any form of national representation,  honours, or from holding public office, would change a few tunes!

Guardian letter on BBC`s profligacy plus 1

According to your editorial, the BBC has "one card to play: the ability to organise the arrangements for the over-75s differently" (The BBC can`t bear the costs of TV licences for the over-75s. A solution has to be found, 24/11/18). What about the rest of its deck? Ending its profligate ways would be a good starting point. Imposing a salary cap on all its presenters, whilst insisting not only on an equal gender pay policy, but also that no employees are paid via their companies for tax purposes, could follow. Which presenter could claim that earning, say £200000 a year, seven times the national average, was insufficient to fund a very pleasant lifestyle? Similarly,  What is the point of a public corporation complaining about the lack of government funding if its pay policies encourage tax avoidance, deny millions to the treasury, and require years of enquiry by HMRC?

    Then there is the matter of management pay; a report by the National Audit Office in 2017 revealed that the number of BBC managers earning over £150000 was still increasing, despite the corporation`s pledge to reduce it by 20%. The BBC website is still, however, listing well over a hundred managers earning above that amount! Perhaps such profligacy could be forgiven if the BBC managers were actually producing the goods, but popular programmes like Bodyguard and Dynasties are increasingly rare, "younger audiences are using the BBC less and less", top sports events are still being lost, and the sorely needed "watch-on-demand" culture is stifled by a fixation with outdated multi-channel broadcasting.

  Let`s not "squander nor diminish" the role of the BBC, but also not  forget its mismanagement!

It appears that the BBC is "currently in discussions with its presenters and is actively engaged with HMRC" to sort out the problems of tax avoidance at the corporation (Hundreds of BBC presenters risk tax investigations, says watchdog, 15/11/18). Presumably this is part of the review the BBC launched when it was first discovered to be paying presenters "through outside companies, in order to reduce tax bills". The trouble is that this review actually began in 2012 (BBC told by MPs to make presenters pay fair share of tax, 05/10/12)!

   The public owned BBC`s disregard for the country`s urgent need for everyone to pay their fair share of tax, allied with its profligacy with licence fee-payers` money, beggars belief. The obscenely high salaries paid to sports` highlights programme presenters and newsreaders, and the gender bias in pay, can be coupled with the less well-known over-generous payment to its managers. Another report by the National Audit Office, this time in 2017, revealed that the number of BBC managers earning over £150000 was still increasing, despite the corporation`s pledge to reduce it by 20%. The BBC website is still, however, listing well over a hundred managers earning above that amount!

    Perhaps some of this could be forgiven if the BBC managers were actually producing the goods, but programmes like Bodyguard are rare, young viewers are not tuning in, top sports events are still being lost, and the sorely needed "watch-on-demand" culture is stifled by a fixation with outdated multi-channel broadcasting.

The public accounts committee clearly has plenty to do, and listening to explanations from the Director-General has to be high on its list of priorities!

Corbyn should consult members over EU

As John Harris says, the "misery and resentment" caused by deindustrialisation in the 1980s and by recent Tory austerity policies were important reasons for people voting to leave the EU, which makes the  absence of anger from the Labour leader, and indeed from the "big unions", about the economic problems Brexit will inevitably cause, difficult to fathom (Brexit is a class betrayal. So why is Labour colluding in it, 19/11/18). 

   Corbyn clearly needs to be reminded of what he said in 2016 after decisively defeating Owen Smith for the Labour leadership: the "huge membership" of the party "had to be given a greater say", and "be reflected much more in decision-making", not least because they are "the people who raise the money, knock on doors, deliver the leaflets, do the campaigning work". It would only take days to organise a membership vote on whether there was satisfaction with current policy on Brexit, or a need to support a people`s vote (Jeremy Corbyn "vindicated" as he pledges more power to Labour members, 25/09/16).

   Increasing democracy in the party goes hand in hand with Corbyn`s leadership, or at least, this is what members were led to believe. Could there ever be a more opportune moment to put it into practice?

Improving Labour`s explanations

Your editorial on education`s underfunding rightly stated that Labour needs to "explain more forcefully" how the true effect of the Tories raising the tax threshold "actually benefits those at the top of the heap" far more than those at the bottom (Morning Star, 13/11/18). This highlights a problem Labour faces continually - the fact that the way policies are interpreted by the media not only distorts the truth, but discriminates against Labour. It means Labour, especially with Corbyn probable favourite to win, has to prepare more cleverly for the onslaught it will face, especially over its tax policies.

         A party political broadcast on the topic, and available on social media, is essential. Rather than have John McDonnell merely explain the policies, and why they are fairer, he could share the spotlight with a number of "characters" with different incomes and different jobs, explaining how much they earn, how much tax they pay now, and how much they would pay under Labour`s new regime. This would show, of course, how the majority of people would be little, or not at all, affected by the changes, except for the examples at the top, the ones earning what most people consider to be "mega-bucks"!

 The main broadcast would only show perhaps four examples, below-average, average, just above and way-above average earners; they could be shop assistants, nurses, teachers, junior doctors and bankers. Too similar to the old Two Ronnies sketch about class? Not really as more videos could be put online at various times, to include a wider range of employment, targeting also CEOs, hedge fund workers, City accountants, but also the under-paid and even zero-hours contracted workers.

    In their brief statements, some could include, of course, simple explanations of how levels change the more you earn, to counter Tory arguments about tax increases leading to a reduction in aspiration. Effect would be maximised if the characters were played by actors like Maxine Peake and Bill Nighy who hopefully would not object to putting Labour`s case "more forcefully" and effectively than the politicians!

Need for a "general referendum"

There were many reasons for the 52% vote in favour of leaving the EU, with scaremongering about Turkey, false promises about NHS funding, and anti-immigration all playing their part. Also important, however, were the government`s austerity policies, and the resulting fall in living standards, allied to the fact that many areas of the UK had been allowed to become investment-free zones! Now that "our real options" over Brexit have become obvious, and support is growing for a "new referendum", questions need to be asked about whether there exist any reasons for Leavers to have changed their minds about their mistreatment by government (Our future rests on parliament recognising there is no good Brexit, 11.11.18)? There certainly hasn`t been any change in government policies which might have resulted in some lives being improved, "burning injustices" rectified, and inequality addressed. They still have to pay huge proportions of earnings to greedy landlords, rely on benefits despite working, and witness the underfunding of schools and hospitals.

      Andrew Rawnsley suggests that with their "boggling political, geographical and economic illiteracy", pro-Brexit politicians think "blame must be assigned elsewhere" (A bad Brexit will not be as bad as the Suez crisis. It will be far worse, 11.11.18), but isn`t there a real danger that is exactly what pro-Leave voters will do, with the EU officials the guilty party?

       The most sensible idea has to be not only allowing the British people an opportunity to "give their verdict" on Brexit, but on this government too, preferably at the same time - a general referendum!

Profligate BBC in crisis

Roger Mosey is right to point out that when younger viewers are clearly not being properly catered for is a "particularly bad time for the BBC to be facing a cash crisis" (Off the Air, 9th November). Saying, however, that the corporation "must bear some responsibility for this outcome" verges on understatement, with the decision to retain multiple channels rather than output on demand a costly management error. 

Mosey omits to mention the fact that there have been so many other mistakes made by BBC bosses, from failing to use the year`s notice sensibly prior to the pay declarations, with the publication revealing obvious gender bias, plus the tax avoiding scandal involving the offer of self-employment contracts to highly paid presenters, to its list of well over one hundred managers earning over £150,000 a year. Public sympathy for its financial problems is unlikely, even if some of the blame lies clearly with George Osborne. The co-author of the current austerity programme damaged society in ways far more serious than cause cash problems for our spendthrift broadcasting corporation!

 It is impossible to have years of profligacy with licence fee payers` money, with massive salaries for mostly male presenters and managers, and low pay for production staff, without whom no programmes would be possible, without eventually receiving a "reputational hammering". 

Keynes was right about peace

"Yes" is surely the answer to the question posed by Margaret MacMillan at the start of her excellent article on the Treaty of Versailles (The consequences of Mr Keynes, 2nd November, 2018). The "brilliant, self-assured British economist" was "right", and "all the assembled statesmen" at the 1919 peace conference "wrong". Even in the context of an angry public opinion spurred on by a right-wing press, determined like Geddes to "squeeze Germany until the pips squeaked", the Diktat`s punishments of land losses, demilitarisation, "war guilt", Rhineland`s occupation, and excessive reparations appear ridiculously harsh and myopic.

     Keynes`s idea of "getting Germany`s economy going again" should not have been treated with such disdain, especially as only seventeen years earlier the British after the Boer war, despite similar media-induced hysteria, and huge suffering on both sides involving atrocities and concentration camps, imposed the lenient Treaty of Vereeniging in 1902. This not only promised self-government to Transvaal and the Orange Free State, but granted three million pounds from the British to repair damage done to Boer lands. Unsurprisingly, South Africa fought on the British side in the first world war!

     Sadly, as MacMillan intimates, "building lasting peace" seems beyond our politicians, but that doesn`t mean it`s rocket science!

i letter on police chases

Will someone please ask police chiefs what they expect to happen when trained drivers in souped-up police cars start to chase stolen cars driven by youngsters, mostly male, at high speeds through built-up areas (Named, father and baby killed after police chase, 12/11/18)? The risk of a crash has to be phenomenally high, and with it serious injuries or worse. Arresting thieves is important, but not important enough to warrant putting lives at risk, so that arrest targets can be met, and policemen can play at being Steve McQueen in Bullitt!

         How many more innocent lives have to be lost before either police chief constables ban them in their areas, or a politician takes notice and starts campaigning to have them banned nationwide?

Education system in need of reform

Jyoti Wilkinson`s excellent article on the failure of academisation rightly condemned school academies for "lowering the pay of the workforce and increasing the pay of management", but ignored another aspect of their behaviour (Morning Star, 08/11/18). Not only does "one of the government`s favourite academy trusts", the Harris Federation, pay ridiculous salaries, especially to its CEO, it is one of the four chains which have the highest number of 15-16 year olds leaving their schools. According to a report in the Guardian, the three other academy chains are Delta Academies Trust based in Wakefield, London based Aldridge Education, and the Inspiration Trust, based in Norwich.

  These academy chains are "off-rolling", with a view to keeping pupils not expected to do well in GCSEs away from the exam room. The effect is that results look better than they really are, and that academies can claim to be improving education!

  Is this any worse, though, than what most private schools do? In the independent sector schools often do not even enter their pupils for GCSEs and A-levels, preferring iGCSEs and Pre-U exams, both run by Cambridge Assessment. The latter have a very high percentage of grade A*-As awarded, far higher than traditional A-levels, explained by the chief executive by the "above average" cohort.

These exams are taken by mainly privately educated pupils, mostly set and marked by teachers in the independent sector, and not subject to the "additional rules" which Ofqual applies to A-levels. Should they be eligible for university entrance, when the government has gone to great lengths to reform "national qualifications based on content set by the government" - in other words, A-Levels? Cambridge Assessment, unlike all the other awarding bodies, is not even required to compare similar qualifications when setting a grade level to ensure a measure of consistency! 

     It is especially worrying to have such significance attached to these lightly-regulated exams after they were involved in a cheating scandal in the summer of 2017. Chief executive Michael O`Sullivan even admitted to the select committee on education that there has been a "sharp rise in the number of cases of exam malpractice" involving his exam board, rising from 269 in 2013 to 719 in 2017!

  Has our education system ever been in more need of reform?

Guardian letter on tax increases

With “a fifth of workers earning below the £9 national rate set by the Living Wage Foundation”, Polly Toynbee’s ideas for “most of us” to pay more tax need a little tweaking. Depending on universal credit should exclude many households from a higher level of income tax, but those with above-average incomes must pay more.

It makes little sense for those earning £49,000 to be paying the same rate as those on £149,000, nor should those earning £500,000 pay the same as those getting £200,000. The Laffer curve was only created to enable Ronald Reagan to lower taxes so it needs to be discredited, and draconian measures introduced to ensure that the rich, for the first time in our history, pay their fair share. Let’s start with a 90% tax on incomes over £1m.

All tax avoidance should be made a criminal offence, as should giving advice to enable it to take place. And of course, VAT needs to be imposed on private-school fees. 

Letter on Hammond`s appalling budget

The Tories` utterly despicable budget this week was yet another example of a callous government at work (Morning Star, 30/10/18). Prioritising tax cuts at a time when public services are at breaking point, and giving another billion to "contribute to the Trident nuclear weapon system" are typical Tory responses when the country`s least fortunate have to rely on charitable donations to survive.

   Having nuclear weapons is no defence against terrorism, and can serve no purpose other than to claim Britain is deserving of a "seat at the top table". What about the real necessity, which, yes, is defence, but against the real enemies?

  How much importance does this government attach to defending our children from ignorance? None whatsoever, judging by the massive underfunding of the state sector, and Hammond`s deeply insulting £400m for the "little extras". Meanwhile uncharitable private schools continue to avoid paying 80% of their business rates because of their charitable status!

 Then there`s the defence, urgently needed, against illness and mental health conditions. Does anyone really believe the generous chancellor has given extra funds "with his fanfare announcement of £4 billion" to deal with the crisis, when the truth is that it is a part of the already promised and insufficient £20bn for the NHS?

     More defence is needed to protect the country from tax avoidance and evasion, but this unsurprisingly is ignored. So too is defending the people against exploitation, both from greedy employers who do their utmost to pay workers as little as possible for as many unpleasant hours as possible, whilst pension funds disappear, and from Rachman-like landlords whose abominable behaviour should be penalised with imprisonment.

   There`s more, of course; defence against global warning, against injustices like the rights lost by trade unionists and pensions lost by women born in the 1950s, against homelessness, against monopolies who overcharge and under-invest, and perhaps most importantly of all, against poverty.

How can you claim to be defending the country when ignoring the most important dangers, selling arms to war-mongering nations, and ripping off the people you are meant to serve?

Hammond is not out of touch with education - it`s deliberate!

Labour`s Angela Raynor is right to criticise the chancellor for his failure to inject serious money into the underfunded state school system, but like Andrew Morris of the National Education Union, mistakenly puts the blame on  Hammond being "desperately out of touch" (Headteachers insulted by Hammond`s "nice gesture", 31/10/18).Tories know the situation very well; it was they who so underfunded schools that teachers would have to be either removed and not replaced, or so badly paid recruitment crises would ensue. Even using the contemptuous term, "little extras", reveals how deliberate is this government`s attempt to undermine state education.

   When headteachers are driven to protest, even Tories in their Whitehall bubbles get the message! The truth has to be that this government does not care about state education, otherwise it would take action to end schools having to close early, reduce staffing and cut subjects. A smirking chancellor making "nice gestures" is again taking us for mugs!

Geoff Barton of the Association of School and College Leaders is right to criticise the chancellor for his failure to inject serious money into the underfunded state school system, but surely the failure has little to do with Hammond`s "complete misunderstanding" (Schools to get £400m towards "little extras", 30/10/18)? Tories know the situation very well; it was they who so underfunded schools  that teachers would have to be either removed and not replaced, or so badly paid recruitment crises would ensue. Even using the contemptuous term, "little extras", reveals how deliberate is this government`s attempt to undermine state education.

   When headteachers are driven to protest, even Tories known for being out of touch and residing in Whitehall bubbles, notice, and know why; they understand perfectly!