Re: Clegg Vows to Defy ID Cards Law

On Thu, 8 Nov 2007, JohnLoony wrote:
On 7 Nov, 23:39, rosenst...@xxxxxxxxx (Colin Rosenstiel) wrote:

The Poll Tax was deservedly consigned to the dustbin of history due to
the sheer number of people who showed typical British bloody-mindedness
towards it. Many were pursued for breaking the law but paid up eventually.
The number involved meant that the law was unworkable, however. It has
taken most of the last 15 years to recover from the damage done to local
tax collection.

In other words, it was introduced too quickly and with too harsh
consequences because the government was getting a distorted and
unrealistic message about how popular it was. In other words, because
of its large parliamentary majority. In other words, because of
FPTP. If the government had had a smaller majority, or under PR, it
is conceivable that a version of the poll tax could have been
introduced and phased in successfully and sustainably without the
hardships and ill-feeling.

There was also the problem of the failure of the opposition to make a big
thing about it during the general election which preceded its introduction.
I remember thinking that it was nuts, and trying to get people to see that
around abiut 1985 when it was being talked about, I even remmeber using
something similar to the line "a dustman will pay the same tax as the Duke
of Westminster". But no-one was interested.

The interesting thing about flat-rate taxes like the poll tax is that it's
the poorer people who are most opposed to them and most willing to vote
for low tax-rate parties, while the wealthier people who would be prepared to pay higher flat-rate taxes for nice middle class fripperies
(like heavy subsidies to higher education) get frustrated because of the unwillingness of the electorate to go for it. I suspect it was the poll
tax more than anything else whch turned around the assumption that the
people at the bottom support higher taxes than the people at the top.

Matthew Huntbach
.

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