Why?

[Mr Scruff]

I work alongside a few ex-cops and firemen (the forgotten front-line heroes in some of this - who put out the fires as they were being bottled etc?) and the consensus is that the police weren't allowed to confront and engage. Apparently this isn't how to control the angry mob: lessons from Ulster and other forms of crowd control (usually large demo's etc). I'll take their word...

 

But as I see it, there simply weren't enough cops in attendance and they looked pretty impotent and unable to control themselves never mind the angry mob e.g. I can't imagine this happening in say Paris; where the polis would have been half-cut and ready to rumble. (Drinking is apparently allowed with lunch. How French! ) Also, did I see a cop with pepper spray just spraying it around his colleagues like Lynx? WTF was that about? Poor guy - and they are just people (workers in uniform if you want to get all political) - was probably wondering why he ever joined up! However, were they to get stuck in then probably an eleven year old would have ended up with brain damage and the PR damage would have OTT. So softly softly seems to be the very British way.

 

A few points: the actions of the mob (probably Tottenham aside) were without motive so were arguably not political. However, the solution has to be political and who knows, maybe the government will take stock and decide that they have to have a look at what their policies are doing to today's youth: lack of employment, training, piss poor education etc etc. You've probably heard it all from me in other threads and I can bore the a*** off myself trying to wind-up some of my chums on this DG. But the points are serious and, who knows, some of this might even lead to some cuts being shelved. (Police, education and social work budgets are being hammered under the cuts.)

 

But there is one fact that stands out and that is that the government has been given a fright (the fact that it's a Tory coalition isn't the point). They'll talk the talk about law and order but privately in cabinet this might lead to the brakes being put on one or two of their more ambitious programmes e.g. widespread court closures, reductions in police numbers etc. Fact is, their system was severely tested and found wanting... (Just as well their plans to allow offenders to enter guilty pleas and the have sentences halved were recently shelved. How bad would that have looked for looters and rioters?)

 

Do I have answers/ Probably I don't. Politically I'd like to see radical change, but this must come through the ballot box and it is debatable if, in the immediate short-term, this would ever be capable of sorting out the mess that the policies of successive governments have made of our communities. Why it didn't happen in Scotland is another discussion for another day... (Just thought I'd throw that in in case there are any takers!)

Don't often agree with you MJ, but this is spot on, 100%.

 

Concensus probably won't last into working out solutions...

[Meister Jag]

I completely agree with the sentiments in the Oborne article. But, for me, you have to separate criminality from 'moral correctness'.

 

Don't often agree with much the Torygraph says but Oborne nails it in a well-balanced attack. Today's Morning Star asks: "What would Stalin have done?" I think we all know the answer to that one!

[Meister Jag]

Don't often agree with you MJ, but this is spot on, 100%.

 

A compliment from a fellow Habbie; well I never... And I thought I was the only Jags fan in the village! (Didn't really, have come across one or two in The Trust )

[Phoenix]

The problem seems to be a total lack of discipline and lack of consequences. These problems affect both rich and poor and both of them are equally to blame because of it. From Politicans who screwed their expenses, to Police who accept bribes to look the other way, all the way down to the unemployed youth who decides it's easier to steal a TV than get a job and buy one.

[jaggybunnet]

The problem seems to be a total lack of discipline and lack of consequences. These problems affect both rich and poor and both of them are equally to blame because of it. From Politicans who screwed their expenses, to Police who accept bribes to look the other way, all the way down to the unemployed youth who decides it's easier to steal a TV than get a job and buy one.

 

 

there is no personal responsibility, it is always someone else's fault, and there is no deterrent as jails are holiday homes now with TVs, PS3 and the likes, prisons don't have time to rehabilitate as most of there time is spent stopping the poor we souls getting bored.

 

Edit: ref the holiday home, yes maybe some of you and me might not think so but for the people it needs to affect it is a holiday home.

Edited August 12, 2011 by jaggybunnet

[jaggybunnet]

I think a lot of the problems relate to technology. It now seems to be accepted that everyone must need a mobile phone. Er, Why? Why does anyone who is not on call as part of their job need a mobile phone? Surely a pay as you go with a tenner in it would cover any supposedly emergency phonecalls. Unfortunately because we now see the carrying of a mobile phone as an essential item, people would now feel alienated without one.

 

Twenty four news doesn't help these situations either. I'm all for freedom of the press but there was a bit the other evening when both BBC and SKY channels were openly telling all and sundry that law and order had broken down and that looters were running around completely unchecked. If that is not an invitation to every crook in London to get up of the settee and fetch the SWAG bag then what is?

 

A lot of this comes from the stupid materialistic culture where people only judge anything by its appearance and/or monetary value and what some celeb fuelled media nonsense says about it all.

 

We need to start switching off.

 

Anway as I was

 

 

def the case, if it hadnt had the 24hr bit i dont think it would have spread to other citys, 24hr news has a lot to answer for. just thinking drop the dead donkey and them going out to make up news

[Woodstock Jag]

Nailed it, and in the Tele as well...

 

The saddest thing and what makes me sick to the stomach, is that it seems that "we/us etc" have become so used to graft, corruption, lies, greed and being on the make, that it no longer surprises us. As Peter Oborne says in that article, everything from Philip Green avoiding tax (yeah Woodstock, very clever of him - not) to Gerald Kaufmann's £8000 B&O television. The emotions that we feel of anger and jealousy are largely suppressed, but it's no great surprise that some folk at the bottom end of society thought that they could get away with it just as easily.

 

So now we have a whole line up of middle class wnakers sitting in courts handing down draconian sentences (as society, for quite sensible reasons, demands) and indignant commenteers (new word I just made up) on blogs and websites suggesting that the offenders homes should be taken away from them. How fecked up is that?

 

Sometimes I despair.

 

Tax avoidance has nothing to do with greed, corruption or lies, but that aside I agree with this post. There's nothing morally virtuous in and of itself in taxation. People avoid tax every time they pay into a pension scheme or donate to a charity. They're hardly actions motivated by opportunistic greed.

 

There's a distinction to be drawn between being prudent in your financial affairs and acting out of unadulterated materialistic greed. Avoiding tax is the former; using taxpayer's money for fancy televisions and looting are the latter.

[honved]

Tax avoidance has nothing to do with greed, corruption or lies, but that aside I agree with this post. There's nothing morally virtuous in and of itself in taxation. People avoid tax every time they pay into a pension scheme or donate to a charity. They're hardly actions motivated by opportunistic greed.

 

There's a distinction to be drawn between being prudent in your financial affairs and acting out of unadulterated materialistic greed. Avoiding tax is the former; using taxpayer's money for fancy televisions and looting are the latter.

 

They are actions set up by government to alleviate stress on other parts of the system. Avoiding tax in the Philip Green fashion is not the same as putting cash into an ISA. Tax avoidance in the Philip Green/Vodafone/Boots/Tesco fashion has everything to do with greed. If it wasn't then the altruistic and politically astute Mr Green would surely divert his tax avoidance to a charitable trust and use it for philanthropy. The fact is, he uses it to buy his wife more designer handbags.

[Woodstock Jag]

They are actions set up by government to alleviate stress on other parts of the system. Avoiding tax in the Philip Green fashion is not the same as putting cash into an ISA. Tax avoidance in the Philip Green/Vodafone/Boots/Tesco fashion has everything to do with greed. If it wasn't then the altruistic and politically astute Mr Green would surely divert his tax avoidance to a charitable trust and use it for philanthropy. The fact is, he uses it to buy his wife more designer handbags.

 

Implicit in this is the assumption that it's the government's money to give away. It's not. Tax avoidance stops it becoming the government's money in the first place because they never demand it. It's not the same as a tax credit or a benefit. The idea that government is arbitrarily allowed to appropriate the assets of an individual without express authority is absurd. Why don't we just send HMRC round with some heavies to every house, let them have a quick look round and decide how much they're going to take-away on the spot?

 

Philip Green does donate millions to charity annually. He pays VAT and corporation tax. He pays UK income tax on all the income he earns in the UK. Any payments of dividends from UK companies are still subject to income tax whether they live in the UK or Monaco. His companies provide thousands of jobs, paying significant employer's NICs. The idea that he's not done his bit and that he's just greedy is nonsense. When people have done their bit what they do with income they've rightfully earned is their business. And earned is the operative word. No looter has earned the right to a plasma screen television. No MP has earned the right to a Bang and Olufsen television supplementary to their salary. Tax avoidance is just not the same at all.

[Meister Jag]

Implicit in this is the assumption that it's the government's money to give away. It's not. Tax avoidance stops it becoming the government's money in the first place because they never demand it. It's not the same as a tax credit or a benefit. The idea that government is arbitrarily allowed to appropriate the assets of an individual without express authority is absurd. Why don't we just send HMRC round with some heavies to every house, let them have a quick look round and decide how much they're going to take-away on the spot?

 

Philip Green does donate millions to charity annually. He pays VAT and corporation tax. He pays UK income tax on all the income he earns in the UK. Any payments of dividends from UK companies are still subject to income tax whether they live in the UK or Monaco. His companies provide thousands of jobs, paying significant employer's NICs. The idea that he's not done his bit and that he's just greedy is nonsense. When people have done their bit what they do with income they've rightfully earned is their business. And earned is the operative word. No looter has earned the right to a plasma screen television. No MP has earned the right to a Bang and Olufsen television supplementary to their salary. Tax avoidance is just not the same at all.

 

Sorry Woody, you're just showing that you get off on £££s and are probably aroused by those who appear to have loads of it. Fact is that he doesn't give enough - him and others. And for some bankers - thinking Fred G etc - I'd happily pay them a we visit on behalf of HMRC. Tax avoidance in this country is a major problem and theses robbing b******* are stealing from all of us. It's ok for the ordinary worker to be taxed and to pay what's due but not these guys. Why?

[Woodstock Jag]

Sorry Woody, you're just showing that you get off on £££s and are probably aroused by those who appear to have loads of it.

 

Nonsense.

 

Fact is that he doesn't give enough - him and others.

 

Based on what, exactly? The top 1% of earners contribute 23% of income tax revenues, the top 5% contribute 42.3% and the top 10% contribute 53.1%. Our tax system is more progressive than the social democratic utopias of Norway and Finland, contrary to popular belief. We find if we pay attention to the figures that the tax burden on the richest has proportionally increased ever since the top rates of income tax have been cut from 83% and 60% in the recent past. Indeed we're finding that the 50p rate is costing us money because the elasticity measurements assume that the richest 1% are less economically mobile than they were in 1980! The Treasury's own figures suggest that a 45p additional rate would lead to the richer paying more UK income tax.

 

And for some bankers - thinking Fred G etc - I'd happily pay them a we visit on behalf of HMRC.

 

 

Tax avoidance in this country is a major problem and theses robbing b******* are stealing from all of us.

 

No they're not. Tax avoidance is not stealing. It's their money!

 

It's ok for the ordinary worker to be taxed and to pay what's due but not these guys. Why?

 

You present a false choice. They DO pay what's due. That's the point! If they didn't they'd be defaulting or evading tax, which are both crimes!

[Lionel J. Botch]

 

You present a false choice. They DO pay what's due. That's the point! If they didn't they'd be defaulting or evading tax, which are both crimes!

 

Tax avoidance is a choice and a privilege of the rich. It is not an option open to the vast majority of the population. We are all PAYE. The more you earn, the more you can legally avoid.

 

While they do not need to avoid it, it is an option open to the rich. You pay an accountant to do their best with your money, they tell you to put it into x, y and z and you you pay little or no tax. The problem is that the loophole exists. Close the loophole and then it cannot be done.

 

However, don't expect the multi millionaires in the cabinet to change it. I might be wrong here but I am sure there was a channel 4 despatches episode that pretty much pointed the finger at tax avoidance by some of the cabinet.

 

Remember we're all in it together.......

[Woodstock Jag]

Tax avoidance is a choice and a privilege of the rich. It is not an option open to the vast majority of the population. We are all PAYE. The more you earn, the more you can legally avoid.

 

While they do not need to avoid it, it is an option open to the rich. You pay an accountant to do their best with your money, they tell you to put it into x, y and z and you you pay little or no tax. The problem is that the loophole exists. Close the loophole and then it cannot be done.

 

First up of course it's a choice. No one was saying otherwise. It's absolutely right that everyone should be allowed to arrange their affairs within the law so as to minimise their tax liability. Tax is not a moral construct but a very specific arrogation of assets based on a set of strict criteria legislated for.

 

Secondly it's not true that everyone is on PAYE and further it's not true that it's even relevant. If you pay tax under PAYE it's because you're an employee who works in and is almost certainly based in this country. PAYE is just a collection mechanism. If someone works in the UK but lives somewhere else they still pay UK tax on that income. Philip Green pays UK income tax on share dividends paid in relation to his UK operations.

 

Thirdly, of course the more you earn, the more tax you are likely to be able to avoid. But equally, the more you earn the more tax you pay and the higher the rate at which you pay it! Green isn't eligible for certain considerable tax reliefs the average Joe on the street gets: he has no personal allowance, for example. The simple truth is that those who are richer tend to have much more complex sources of "income" which then becomes more difficult to define compared with employment income.

 

As the government tries to catch as much of it as possible under taxable income the tax system then becomes more complex. The UK tax code is several hundreds of pages longer than pretty much every other major western country. A complex tax system creates loopholes. They are unavoidable. And the best accountants will always be one step ahead of the tax-man when it comes to them being closed. That's sort of their job.

 

The thing is in the Philip Green example, it's not that he was exploiting an accidental tax loophole. Some of the proceeds of his business activity goes, via various foreign investment vehicles, to his wife, who is a resident of Monaco. Where she lives is entirely her prerogative. The UK has no business taxing people who live in other countries and make their income outside of the UK. I'm sure you'd be absolutely appalled if a German company owned a UK company who you worked for then tomorrow morning, after having been given a tax bill already by HMRC, the German equivalent sent you a demand to pay another 20% or so of your income to them, wouldn't you?