How About Closing the Loopholes for the Rich George?

First there was the freeze on child benefit and the curbs on housing benefit in the budget. Plus the change in the ways that these will be paid out. Now we hear that there are plans to cut incapacity benefit. But what about the various tax loopholes and avoidance methods that the Lib Dems had highlighted George? Why are all the headline measures to cut taking from the poor like some modern day Sheriff of Nottingham?

Of course having worked in the fraud section of the Social Security Agency I know that there are some benefit claimants who should not be receiving it, but in recent months I've been hearing from people more cases of them being re-appraised and even though they have a genuine medical condition they are finding their incapacity benefit cut.

It is something perhaps that George Osborne should talk to his Equality Minister colleague as Lynne Featherstone has pointed out:

"The previous Labour government tried to get people off such allowances and my experience as a local MP from surgery is that the 're-assessment' of people claiming has been variable at best.

"We need to be sure that there is no perverse incentive to determine that someone can work when they cannot. We also need to be sure that those carrying out the assessment are good at it."

Work and Pensions Secretary Iain Duncan Smith added to the debate on Sundaywhen he said unemployed council tenants should to be given incentives to move to areas where there are jobs. Seeing as many of them are living in an area where they have expanded family who may, or may not, be or have helped with childcare in the past, has the provision of moving to a strange part of the country been accounted for into those incentives. Also what about relocation costs? Also what if the unemployed council tenants are a couple and find work in different locations. Is Mr Duncan Smith as a Conservative going to advocating the break up of families?

Of course one of the reasons that leads to such people having a fear of losing their homes when moving, as IDS indicates, is because of the selling off of social housing in such large numbers under the last Conservative government. Oops.

It all seems that the Conservatives had not really thought through the implications of the Social Security measures before they took power, yet somehow it is their policies that are being taken to the front and centre. The Lib Dem policies maintained fairness to the poorest, because it looked at dealing with supplying such benefits to those with need by targeting the tax avoiding tactics of the rich, someone that George is clearly avoiding tackling too much as they vote for him.

So it does beg the question what are those who find themselves in need who have been turning to the Lib Dems in recent years after Labour has failed them get out of the coalition deal? Where is their fairness?

There is Hope For Local LIT

Although the idea of the Scottish Tories was to get an airing for their reformed reformed Poll Council Tax, the vote yesterday in Holyrood for the Abolition of the Council Tax Bill to debate all proposals on the table paves the way for various alternatives to be looked at. It may also be a face saving way for the SNP to not implement a 3p Scottish National Income Tax, which seems to break all sorts of binds to Local Authority accountability, without losing too much face. That is of course if Alex Salmond actually listen to the will of Parliament, which would be a nice change.

Of course there is the Lib Dem proposal for a true Local Income Tax and the Green's proposal of Land Value Tax to be considered in the mix. It may please James @ The Two Doctors to know that over the years at various party conferences I have been at fringe events looking at LVT as well as LIT so I know there are benefits to each, just as everyone will also be pointing out there are disadvantages in both (or for that matter any tax system). However, looking at what is on offer in the essence of fairness the ability to pay has to be paramount LVT is still linked somewhat to the property you live in, irrelevant of when you purchased that, while closing up a few loopholes for acquisition of land and leaving it empty and unused.

One thing that recent Labour shenanigans at Westminster over taxes is clear though is that reform is needed. For years now under Labour and the Conservatives our tax burden has been increasingly borne by those less able to pay it while those most able have been getting greater and greater tax breaks. A friend of my said yesterday that they had overheard an elderly couple out food shopping and putting something back because the price was a mere ten pence higher than previously and outwith their budget.

It's not just the credit crunch that is affecting the worse off though it has been the tax squeeze from Labour stealth taxes and high earner breaks, which they picked up and ran with from the Tories that has been endemic in the system for long enough. We need to sort out the tax and benefit system, make it comprehensible, fair and based on ability to pay and true need.