Council
tax or free access?
Pleased with your latest council tax bill? This tax on property was
introduced in 1994 by John Major as a replacement for Thatcher’s poll
tax which was removed (along with Maggie) after it caused widespread
public resentment and riots. Council tax has risen by up to 60
percent since 1997. It leapt 12 percent on average last year, and after
the latest increases it’s also now causing considerable upset and anger.
This government like previous ones wants to stay in power, so while it
likes to be seen attempting to improve services delivered by local
authorities, like education and policing, it doesn’t want to be seen
raising taxes to pay for them. Whitehall and local governments both
understand and play the resulting game: get what you can from each, but
blame one another – and blame other parties – if and when the public
complain. Councils blame central government for not providing enough
money, and the government accuses councils of inefficiency,
mismanagement and proclaim that they will cap unacceptable increases.
While the government is worried about a popular revolt against council
tax – something Gordon Brown tried to diminish in his March 17 budget
with a œ100 reduction-cum-sop for pensioners over 70 – it seems likely
Labour will keep this property tax but reduce future increases by
allowing councils to raise additional money by charging for more local
services.
The council tax is a property tax but it is only a pin-prick for those
who own the most property. In fact, the more property you own the less
painful it is. While the Duke of Westminster, worth œ4.6 billion and
owner of some 190,000 acres in Britain is able to live a luxurious life
in the grandest of mansions, his council tax bill will be no more than
a few thousand pounds. Rich aristocratic and agro-industrialists who
represent just one percent of the population but who own 70 percent of
the land in Britain, are actually paid property subsidies and grants of
tens of thousands each year.
Those on high incomes can also shrug it off. Tony Blair and Cherie’s
council tax can be paid off with just half-a-day’s worth of their
earnings, Michael Howard and Charles Kennedy’s with a mere couple of
days worth of theirs. This reflects the inequalities of ownership and
income that are at the basis of present-day society.
Despite appearances, in the end it does not matter to most people what
form or level taxes take. To enable us to remain fit to work, our wage,
salary or benefit has to cover all the normal costs of living,
including any taxes. Abolishing or reducing taxes wouldn’t leave us any
better off since it only allows them to pay us less. National and local
finance is not really our problem. Whatever the system’s politicians
decide, our after-tax income is never going to be much more than enough
to keep ourselves fit to work.
Free access
We in the Socialist Party say people should have full access to
services like public toilets, education, properly maintained roads,
refuse collection, libraries etc, but we ask you to reject
taxation or direct charges as ways of providing them. Instead, we ask
you to support free access to these vital services as well as to all
other needs, like food, housing, public transport, domestic appliances,
furniture, gas, electricity, clothing etc.
A society of free access to whatever people need is readily achievable
by replacing today’s capitalism with a new system where we all
collectively and directly own and democratically control the means of
production and distribution (i.e., farmland, factories, raw materials,
power stations, water supply, roads network, railways etc).
If we all directly own and control these assets – rather than them
being owned by private individuals and, or, the state – then we will
also collectively own all that they provide, resulting in free access
to all goods and services. People don’t have to buy what’s jointly
theirs already.
Nothing will have a monetary cost with real socialism. In fact, money,
having no function at all, will be redundant. People will still work,
but the purpose will then be for meeting society’s needs – not making
profits for, and rewarding, a tiny minority class who have taken
possession of the vital resources and machinery that make life possible.
Do you want to stick with council tax, local income tax, national
income tax, value added tax, stealth taxes, National Insurance – a tax
by another name – or get rid of the lot of them, along with the
time-wasting, bureaucracy, confusion, stress and worry they cause, by
choosing to have classless moneyless leaderless free access from
democratic real socialism instead?
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