Yes.
If you under go any credit evaluation your rating is based on your gross income. If you apply for any benefits you are accessed on your gross income. If you apply for a mortgage you are accessed on your gross income. It does, however , raise a moral question as to whether this is true or not, and do the same principles apply to corporations as opposed to individuals.
If you do not pay tax you still have a right to vote under universal suffrage. People have fought and died for this so I consider it to be an inalienable right.
Indirect taxes can be seen as voluntary, you have no choice over direct taxes.
Really interesting point. Prior to Brexit I could vote in France for the European and Municipal elections, and the General elections in UK. So there was some element of representation at different levels.
Really interesting ideas Geof.
I think that greater brains than ours could embark on a philosophical discourse on the subject.
See my answers above to three of your points. OOPs, Andy, I see you have already replied very much along the same lines. Excuse me for going over the same ground. As you may have gathered, couldn’t agree more.
You’ve only partially resolved the problems though - perhaps because I summarised them too radically.
This is really a more philosophical point - businesses and individuals like to think that they earn all the money they receive, but in fact it’s largely a social phenomenon - they can only ‘earn’ money because they have received education, health, law, policing, roads, refuse collection, etc, etc, help from the state - tax simply pays for these services. Would you ask for a vote in the management of a shop every time you bought something there? There’s a lot more to this argument - around the actual function of tax in modern money theory for instance - but I’m sure you get the idea. (The argument that you choose to buy things but are forced to pay tax doesn’t hold either, I’m afraid, because you can’t choose never to buy anything in a modern society, just as you can’t choose not to have any law, or to never use any roads.)
Also perhaps a bit philosophical - but if you believe in universal suffrage as a principle, you can’t also argue that voting should in principle be tied to tax-paying - even if de facto everybody pays some tax.
The nub of the point about everyone paying some tax is really that this would extend voting rights to anyone caught in the tax net - even people who just visit, or trade with a country. Obviously this would be absurd - but it does mean you can’t tie voting strictly to paying tax.
This is the other side of the universal suffrage coin - if it means ‘one person, one vote’ can it be right for one person to have votes everywhere they have houses?
I’m anxious only to point out how tricky these issues are - I’m not judging anybody else - but having thought about it a bit more now I don’t really think voting rights should be based either on taxation or nationality, but should simply go with your principle country of residence.
Very cogently and convincingly argued in my less-than-well-informed opinion @Geof_Cox. I shall review and revise my opinion on this matter, weighty though I don’t find it
It is the fact that all of our MP’s are under no legal obligation to represent me or my views and that includes LibDems.
Why would we bother to vote for them if this is the case.
but who listens to them in the corridors of power these days? Their new leader Ed Davey has already said that the party hanging their hat on reversing Brexit was a mistake and the party will shift it’s focus.
My comment about receiving what is now referred to as snail mail was light hearted as tthe emoji suggested but for me I still enjoy receiving letters, as does Alfie when the postie arrives!
I always say no thanks when am asked to change to receiving electronic mail. Call me old fashioned but I love receiving letters even if some think not doing will save the planet.
As for tenancy agreements then your choice but why pay council tax voluntarily when your tenant can?
I am actually a member of the Lib Dems and my problem is that mt MP is on maternity leave and her ‘Senior Parliamentary Assistant’ is labeling anything that is critical of government policy as abusive. and threatening to not accept further communication, not only from me but others too.
They lost the way when they took the right decision for the country and went into coalition.
They could not keep their promise on university fees because of that and their voters did not understand that and deserted them in droves, votes which have never returned.
Because we rent at below market rates to young teachers/nurses/doctors who would otherwise struggle to be able to afford to live anywhere near their jobs. Central London rents are horrific these days, and we don’t need to demand those sorts of levels.
Was it the right decision for the country? I strongly disagree.
I agree that Labour had lost its way at the time but they were certainly not worse than the Conservatives. The UK would have been in a much better place if the Lib Dems had gone into coalition with Labour. They might have tied themselves to a “decaying corpse” in the words of one MP but it is not as though the coalition with the Tories ultimately did them OR the country any good.
Austerity/Brexit = the poisoned chalice of the coalition years. Of course hindsight is a wonderful thing, maybe a coalition would never have been possible. However had the Lib Dems been willing to be a bit more humble they would have come out of the matter a whole lot better.
