Don't advertise on the web

Well what I mean by that is that if you are one of those who share their talents for a few bob, you know a bit of piano, art, dance footy and you neglect to tell the taxman about Tarquin popping round to tinkle your ivories then get you services down off the web and pronto.

PRIVATE TUTORS will be the subject of the taxman's next campaign against tax avoidance, it announced today.
HM Revenue & Customs has said that there is a greater "risk" involved with those who provide private tuition.
It said this campaign will "address the risk posed by all professionals who, because of their field of expertise, are able to earn money from providing tuition and coaching - either as a main or a secondary income". It will cover people providing private lessons, "regardless of whether they have a teaching qualification, and could include, for example, fitness/dance/lifestyle coaches through to national curriculum subject tutors and others".

And trust me, where the taxman cometh, than the chap waving a CRB form will surely follow. Then the regulator, and the snare-toothed woman in ghastly NHS specs demanding that you have passed a EU certified qualification.

And I love that HMRC use of the term 'risk'. To whom?

We are obliged to put people out of work

Sorry, you see only by trashing their futures can we theoretically save the planet.
Seems a perfectly ane and reasonable thing for our Government to do. After all, because of those nasty Europeans they have no choice now do they.

When will they wake up?

The Laffer Curve explained

Dan Mitchell of the Cato institute is a friend of mine, and he has just posted this little video explaining one of the basics of modern taxation policy.



Just a shame that our own politicians don't seem to understand it.

Liverpool City of idiots 2008

What value for money the Liverpool City Council provide their ratepayers. This evening they are hosting a reception celebrating their hosting of the European City of Culture next year. They invited all the North West MEPs and no doubt a whole plethora of EU panjandrums (or should that be panjandra?) to an event which including flights, hotels incidental expenses and so will have cost the ratepayers of Liverpool thousands.

The purpose is to spread the message about 2008," said a spokesperson for the company.'During the reception, the Liverpool 08 team, led by Sir Bob Scott, will deliver a short presentation about the 2008 programme and will also use short films to demonstrate how the programme is also addressing social and community engagement via a range of innovative programmes,' says the invitation.

Which is marvellous, apart from the fact they have invited everyone to a piss up at the UK Representative office in Brussels, while everybody they have invited is in Strasbourg.

Have football, won't torch town

This has absolutely baffled me. In an effort to stop arson, Cleveland Fire Brigade is offering youngsters football training in the run-up to Bonfire Night to reduce the number of dangerous fires.

This is a follow up to an earlier event in their Play With a Football Not with Fire campaign.

I just don't get it. How will getting a crowd of children, at the taxpayers expense, playing football for a day make any difference to the incidence of arson? How much is this costing? Will all the firemen involved have to go through the process of background police checks to ensure they are 'child safe'?

Taking a few of them off the streets for a couple of hours will make precisely no difference whatsoever. And the underlying message that Guy Fawks night is dangerous is one that is becoming increaseingly prevalent. As a national celebration I cannot see it lasting the decade.

Is Hain thick? Or merely dishonest

Peter Hain, the permatanned, boyo from South Africa has been off my radar for a while. After all it has been a while since he was wittering about how wonderful the EU Constitution. But today, today I am almost forced into the venerable community of swearbloggers by his astonishing claims.

"Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, Peter Hain today revealed that his commitment to see more people move from benefits into work was strengthened by seeing statistics from a number of countries around the world showing that being out of work is not only bad for the health and well being of parents, but of their children as well".

Well bend me over and fire pellets at my posterior.

"Since taking up this job, I have been shocked by the statistics I have seen about the impact that living in a household in which the parent or parents do not work. The notion that life without work - whatever the level of income through benefits - is a stress-free experience is not just wrong, it's dangerous".

No Mr Hain, people like you are dangerous.

"A study published in the British Medical Journal showed that the death rate from all external causes for children of parents classified as never having worked or as long term unemployed was 13.1 times that for children of professionals".
"Also the prevalence of psychiatric disorders among children in families whose parents have never worked is around five times greater than those with parents in professional occupations.
"And while overall the rates of deaths from injury and poisoning in children have fallen in England and Wales over the last 20 years, they have not for children in families in which no adult is in paid employment.
"This is shocking and underlines for me even more starkly why our crusade for full employment in our generation is so important".

And Mr Hain gets paid by the taxpayer! It took a study in the BMJ to wake him up to this basic fact of life. So how about making being unemployed just that little bit less of a lifestyle choice? Hows about cutting regulation on small businesses, rather than making employing people more expensive. If you really cared about the unemployed you would do something that would allow the market to employ more of them rather than tie its hands with increased costs and more and more absurd regulations. But no. What is it you plan to do?

Oh yes, increase the public sector, your client state. Further leaching off the wealth generating aspects of our country into the dead hand of intervention. Damn it, Mr Hain, but you are either thick, blind or dishonest. I have met you; I am sure you are not blind. I have heard you before; I am sure you are not stupid. So by a simple piece of deduction you must be dishonest.

Now where do I find a number for the local tumbril service?

The Bumper Book of Government Waste

The latest book to come out the excellent Taxpayers Alliance is The Bumper Book of Government Waste. Published only last week, it is the perfect book if you want to understand why it would be possible to cut taxes by upwards of £4,000 per household and still not cut services. (Now whether services could or indeed should be cut is another story, and one I will go into in future).
Currently it is only in hardback so it is ideal for throwing at any passing politician or bureaucrat. It estimates that £101 billion is wasted per annum by the British Government. This is a scandal and one that should be addressed immediately.

I do have to declare an interest as I am one of the sources for the authors Lee Rotherham and Matthew Elliot.

Next year it will be even worse.

Turn off the lights

The Daily Telegraph, in the person of its Brussels correspondent, Bruno Waterfield has produced some of the numbers for the cost of the Lux Film Prize here in the Parliament, and thus is able to answer one of the questions I raised here the other day,

A cinema will be built then demolished after just a handful of screenings as part of a film prize scheme to celebrate the European Union which is costing taxpayers £240,000.

All of the European Parliament's 785 Euro-MPs are being asked to take five hours out of their working days to see all three shortlisted films, which cover themes of prostitution, sado-masochism, immigration and abortion.

They will watch the films, which were chosen by a panel of EU experts, in a 90-seat cinema being constructed to order in Brussels at a cost of £70,000 and then vote on their favourite.

The winning film will be translated into all the EU's 23 official languages, at a cost of a further £70,000, and the director will be presented with a trophy modelled on the Biblical Tower of Babel at a ceremony in Strasbourg on Oct 24.

After each film has been screened nine times, the cinema will be knocked down. The parliament's administrative costs for organising the Lux Prize, set up to mark "the moment when the European Union is celebrating its founding texts and is in the process of drafting a new treaty", are estimated at a further £100,000.

My question that follows this article is simple. The Lux prize is supposed to an annual affair. Given that they are knocking down the cinema, will they be building it every year, and thus spending the £70,000 on an annual basis?

And what is it with the EU and the Tower of Babel? If I remember rightly the whole point of the story of the Tower of Babel is that it illustrates the hubris of a mankind that wished to rival God. It seems to me astonishing that the European Parliament spends so much time using the concept as a positive. The Louise Wiess building in Strasbourg, where the MEPs offices are located is designed in reference to Bruegel's masterpiece, the Lux prize and its publicity is similarly attired.

Has nobody amongst them actually read the Bible, or failing that have they just not got the point?

Genesis 11

1 And the whole earth was of one language, and of one speech.
2 And it came to pass, as they journeyed from the east, that they found a plain in the land of Shinar; and they dwelt there.
3 And they said one to another, Go to, let us make brick, and burn them thoroughly. And they had brick for stone, and slime had they for morter.
4 And they said, Go to, let us build us a city and a tower, whose top may reach unto heaven; and let us make us a name, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.
5 And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the children of men builded.
6 And the LORD said, Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.
7 Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech.
8 So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city.
9 Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth.

It doesn't rain

According to an AP report out today from the AA's Insurance wing, the summer floods will have a serious impact upon premiums,

"The group said six months of weather related claims had finally taken their toll on home insurance premiums, with the floods in Yorkshire and the South Midlands costing the industry an estimated £3 billion.
The average cost of home buildings insurance rose by 3% to £215.51 during the three months to the end of September, the largest single increase since the group launched its index in 1994.
At the same time, home contents premiums increased by an average of 2% during the quarter to around £149.99.
John Close, insurer relations director at AA Insurance, said: "We now see the result of that devastation reflected in premiums as insurers meet the cost of drying out and repairing homes as well as temporary re-housing of families while their homes were made habitable once again".

They went on to say that the cost is estimated in insurance claims alone, to be £3 billion.

Strike one against the homeowner. Local councils then had to operate the clean up, and due to the EU's Landfill Directive they are raising a tax on the thousands of tons of rubbish that has had to be shovelled up.
As a result of flooding in Hull, 8,160 tonnes of 'flood damaged bulky item waste' was put into landfill. As it was deemed 'contaminated' it was unsuitable for reuse in any way.
The standard rate of tax is £24 per tonne, so we might assume taxation costs of £195,840.
The council has also pointed out that they also had heavy staffing costs.

The Government did, indeed offer assistance to councils, but the £14 million pledged across the country is a sticking plaster on a £ 3 billion sucking chest wound.
Thus water bills and council taxes will have to rise to cover the costs.
Strike two against the homeowner

And to grind peoples faces further in the mud we have this wheeze.

"PEOPLE who went to extraordinary lengths to help their communities during the summer floods are to be honoured with an official Government reception...
Prime Minister Gordon Brown expressed his support, saying: "I want to recognise and pay tribute to the magnificent people who helped their communities in response to the unprecedented floods earlier this year.
"I am proud to support this initiative to recognise our local flood heroes – people who inspire us all and who are among the thousands of Britain's everyday heroes."

So they will throw a cheese and wine party, while raking back hundreds of thousands of pounds in tax, due to a misapplied Euro Directive.

Out.

Unlucky for some.

Ok so we have it bad, very bad. That is according to the Adam Smith institute Tax Freedom in the UK is June 1st. Or you are working a full 5 months (edit) for the Government before you are working for yourself.

But spare a thought for the poor Germans. The German version of the Taxpayers Alliance is the Bund der Steuerzahler and they have calculated that the Teutons Tax Freedom day is Friday July the 13th.

"Tax Freedom Day 2007 is on Friday, 13 July. Studies by the Taxpayer Federation found that Germans starting working for their own purses on this day work starting from this day. The Everything earned before this date, goes straight to the state. Last year the Tax Freedom Day was on 5 July. Thus the day has moved eight day back".

Poor sods

Of course if you are a European Civil Servant or Eurocrat your tax freedom is a more palatable March 6th