O/T Boris Johnson tells Tories to get behind May

[ragingpup]

Lol. In my typical working day I have to be able to interact and relate to people from across the whole range of society, to the point where I sometimes joke to the interested that I have to be several different people every day and sometimes forget who the real me is.

If you want me to be a Tory supporter I can do that. I’ll be a card carrying member if it meets some sort of need that you have. I'm always happy to help. The fact that I have never voted Tory in a General Election is a minor detail that we can agree to skate over.

It is you who advocates a rise in corporate taxes, so tell me how high you would take it. As I say, if it can be increased with no adverse effects as you repeatedly assert or imply, surely you’d take it to 100%? Imagine the money you’d have to spend on public services!

Here’s a link to the article by the Adam Smith Institute: https://www.adamsmith.org/blog/the-e...orporation-tax

I appreciate that the ASI is an organisation that champions free-market economics and that its views have probably never been repeated with approval in The Guardian, but, perhaps you could formulate a response to the arguments in the article as opposed to simply repeating the mantra that Corporate Tax rates are higher in some countries than in the UK? That has been the only response to date.

Thanks for that article. I somewhat biased interpretation of the revenues raised. You might want to check the Full Facts which states:

"The amount collected by the government hasn’t risen simply because the rate has fallen. Successive policy costings done under the Coalition and Conservative governments suggest it would have collected more in corporation tax if it hadn’t lowered the rates (even though such estimates are quite uncertain). You’d expect the cash value of corporation tax receipts to rise each year as the economy grew, all else being equal" https://fullfact.org/economy/corporation-tax-rates-and-revenues/"

In short, yes we raised record amounts, but how much extra could we have raised with a higher tax rate?

I've already made clear that I don't believe in raising corporation tax above and beyond the G7 or other countries with whom we compete, for obvious reasons that we are in a market economy. So don't ask me to justify an argument I'm not proposing. Instead please finally answer my question about where you would stop with your corporation tax cuts? If you are so confident that cutting corporation tax = increased public revenue, why stop at 20% Why not 10%? Or 5% Or 2%? Why won't you answer that question?

For my part, I would probably go along with Labour's proposed rise to 26%, which would still be the lowest in the G7 and highly competitive in the world market. Hence why you know, in your heart, that wealth will not flee the country as there ain't many places to go! The Institute for Fiscal Studies has a fairly balanced of the economic logistics of this here: https://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/9206.

So you've never voted Tory, despite your obvious passion for a deregulated free market system, satisfaction with the achievements of such a system with the world you see around you as you walk around our streets, and fear of an even vaguely socialist alternative that might be in the offing? You've never voted Tory? So what have the Tories done not to deserve your vote? On what do you and them differ that stops them securing your X?

[caytonmiller]

My understanding in politics on a football forum
Scott managed us in the 70s. Dull as dishwater. The powers that be got rid of him replacing him with evans in the 80s.
Ruthless not like by the massed but liked by the few..
in the 90s we get redfearn. Looked promising but failed miserably.
Into the noughties. We get Stubbs. Eeek. Horrid time spending the cash and setting us back years.
Now we have the fitness coach. Radical changes living on a knifes edge. which way will it go? Time will tell.
I guess if left to some we would have had Warnock's dog incharge.

Am I right?

[millmoormagic]

I’ll keep harping back to the 1970s for as long as you advocate voting for a party that wants to repeat the failed economic policies of that decade and which is funded by the unions... I’m not sure whether we disagree with who was to blame for the troubles of that decade given your reluctance to answer simple questions about your views upon them. Read animal’s three day week link and then answer the questions I asked above: So if we are talking the strike that led to animal’s three day week. What do you think the bosses could have done differently? The miners wanted a 35% pay rise and were willing to turn the country’s lights off to get it. The Heath government said ‘no’ - increases like that are merely adding to an inflationary spiral where wages chase prices, which chase wages and which impoverish those on a fixed income and make British industry increasingly uncompetitive. Do you disagree with Heath’s position? Labour apparently did, given that they threw in the towel as soon as they were elected then did the same thing a year later. Would a Corbyn led government with McCluskey funding the party and delivering the block vote for the leadership be any different?

Is there any reason why you won’t answer?

In what way are you saying that you get a lesser service from privatised utilities? Do your taps run dry? I can safely assume from the fact that you are posting that you have an electricity supply to your home.

Where your post really gets interesting is when you describe ‘fewer workers’ as being a feature of privatised business. I completely agree with you on that. They are, indeed, more efficient than the nationalised behemoths that they replaced and which the Labour Party wants to borrow money to recreate. The question for you is this though. If Labour were to achieve their aim, who would be paying for the extra workers? Not the shareholders, because there won’t be any. So would the nationalised companies be putting up their bills to pay their wages, or would a Labour government just borrow more money so that our kids, grandkids etc., could pay for them?

You really ought to care about Venezuela. It’s a current and very real example of where Socialism leads a country. For that matter, the subject of immigration from Eastern Europe came up earlier in the thread. Millions of people coming to this country to share in the benefits of an apparently failed economic model. And what do the countries that they come from have in common? Yes, their economies are still way behind ours because of the damage caused by years of the Socialist polices imposed upon them. And yes, you should pay attention to the 70s for the same reasons. What Corvbyn is offering doesn’t’ work.

Before we move on from Venezuela, I can’t help posting a link to this article: https://www.spectator.co.uk/2017/08/...-in-venezuela/

It’s from The Spectator rather than The Guardian and so it makes no sense at all, but the invective made me laugh.

So the use of foodbanks isn’t a complex issue for you? Drug usage, alcohol abuse, divorce, mental illness and poor lifestyle choices do not contribute at all to their usage figures? Just chuck more money at people in benefits is your answer? If that’s the case, why not have a crack at the other questions I asked: … if Labour really wanted to do something about people on low incomes, why aren't they promising to lift the benefits cap as opposed to planning to provide free university education for the kids of mostly middle class families and spunk vast amounts nationalising the utilities. Isn’t that a funny sense of priority? What is your moral antenna saying about that?

You’ll note that I didn’t ask how your moral antenna was doing. I asked what it was telling you. How about answering?

1. The 70's again eh, tories always reverting to your very own stereotypical view of the decade, have a look at the link..
http://www.redpepper.org.uk/the-myth-of-the-1970s/

Question, why do you think miners went on strike for such a large pay rise???

2. Utilities should be a national asset, with profits going straight back into the infrastructure, yes, i've got running water and electricity, guess what, they've also got that in Venezuala....what i don't agree with is extortianate profits at the expense of the customer, price rises are unjustifiable while ever the companies in charge are making massive profits, if you agree with that then there's summat up with you. By the way, many European country's have nationalised utilities and rail, including your Germany.

3. Efficiency in the workplace, ah, in Industry where 've spent my whole working life i know a thing or two about efficiency and the drive to work smarter, and i've got no issue with automation etc as that's clearly the way forward, i live and breath it everyday at work and see it first hand. There's a massive difference however in companies driving costs down in efficiency runs, automation an example, and companies driving costs down through exploitation, and that is more prevalent now than it has been for many a year, something allowed to happen since unions were smashed, you see, you know nothing of that side of life, you opine from a position of ignorance, but remember, unions are all bad arent they.

4. The use of foodbanks, once again, is a scandal which this country should be ashamed, it's not complex at all, people have issues of course, but those issues are complex, not the fact that folk are going hungry day in day out, most of whom will be suffering from in-work poverty, see my point on efficiency....you don't see it because you don't wanna see it. The Labour party is going to do something about it, the rise in the living wage to £10 ph will go a long way to dealing with it.

5. My moral antenna is telling me you havent got one, my moral antenna is telling me that people like you are blatantly ignoring the fact that this country is rapidly going the way of America, good for those who have, absolutely shyte for those who havent, if you're happy with that fine, i'm not, and will do my utmost to prevent that happening.

My antenna is also telling me that this free market economy, which has failed a few times was bailed out by the tax payer, in what can only be described as a socialist ideal, quantitive easing, the state giving private companies money, thought you were against that?

[millmoormagic]

Just one more thing, please read and digest this, because this goes to the hub of all our worries and it must be stopped...

https://www.economist.com/news/leade...man-missing-20

[monty_rhodes]

Just one more thing, please read and digest this, because this goes to the hub of all our worries and it must be stopped...

https://www.economist.com/news/leade...man-missing-20

I did read this and the author suggests - contrary to the repeated view expressed by you and ragingpup - that part of the answer is a significant reduction in Corporation Tax.

[ragingpup]

I did read this and the author suggests - contrary to the repeated view expressed by you and ragingpup - that part of the answer is a significant reduction in Corporation Tax.

It's an interesting article. It proposes that if we find a system of ensuring that we can offset the lowering of corporation taxes with increases in the amount raised through closing tax avoidance/evasion then it's worth looking at. I am not against lowering corporation tax on a matter of principle. If we raise the amounts for public services and the best way to do this is by plugging the huge amount lost through tax 'avoidence' then so be it, at least in the short term.

BUT - if this is used as an excuse to lower corporation tax but once again this goes towards increasing profits for shareholders then absolutely not. Likewise, Kerr shared an article that suggested that lowering corporation tax was the sole reason for increased revenues this year, and again, if it could be proved that this was cause and effect, then I'd be all for it. We want the most money for public services end of. BUT as I said in response to this post from Kerr, when you scrutinise the data closely it can be argued that this wasn't solely down to corporation tax cuts - and that in fact if the corporation tax cuts hadn't happened we'd have raised a good few billion more.

But in principle, the article is right - we've got to stop the hundreds of billions lost to us through tax avoidance and evasion.

[animallittle3]

Why can't we look at taking the lower paid out of taxation all together to boost the economy and go towards ending in work poverty ?

Wouldn't they then be more of an appetite to get after the corporate tax avoiders ?

Clearly if the tories are standing behind the UK that works for everyone then this would be a good starting point .

No me neither because the poor are a moral failure in tory eyes when we all know it's the system that carries the failure .