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Sunday, 28 February 2010
Closing tax loopholes could stop the cuts
On Saturday I attended the Making it Public conference in Manchester. A wide variety of people attended and we discussed the issue which the mainstream media seem intent to ignore – in short the fact that there is no need to embark on a vicious round of public spending cuts at all.
Andrew Fisher, an economist from the Left Economics Advisory Panel, spelt out some simple facts that should become common knowledge as we gear up to defend our public services.
He has put some of this down for a leaflet which will soon be available on the Convention of the Left website but I‘ve been shown the draft text and these facts jump out straight away.
“£70 billion is lost every year through tax evasion and a further £25 billion is lost through avoidance, by big business and wealthy individuals. Much of this could be recovered if more tax inspectors were hired and the legal loopholes were closed.
“But the Government is cutting the number of tax staff every year. Last year this meant that another £27.7billion of tax went uncollected by HM Revenue and Customs.
“By just collecting the tax that is rightfully ours, including from the wealthy and big business, we could avoid public service cuts."
So put simply we could close most of the budget deficit by simply collecting the tax that is due – but remains unpaid by the rich and super-rich.
So the task of everyone who wants to see a fairer society is not just to campaign against cuts being promised by Labour, Tory and Lib-Dems, but also to demand a fairer system of taxation where we all pay our due – regardless of the ability to hire a good tax lawyer.
So put simply we could close most of the budget deficit by simply collecting the tax that is due – but remains unpaid by the rich and super-rich.
So the task of everyone who wants to see a fairer society is not just to campaign against cuts being promised by Labour, Tory and Lib-Dems, but also to demand a fairer system of taxation where we all pay our due – regardless of the ability to hire a good tax lawyer.
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