Wednesday 7 December 2011

The British National Interest

Not to be confused with the interest of a separate state, Wall Street's tax haven, which the Queen may not enter without special permission and where the writ of Parliament does not run, thereby denying its British inhabitants parliamentary as well as municipal democracy.
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6 comments:

  1. Anonymous7 December 2011 at 19:07

    Whether we like it or not that separate state (incidentally I thought you liked our traditions?) produces a lot of Britain's GDP. You would need to build up manufacturing elsewhere first before crippling the City.

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  2. David Lindsay7 December 2011 at 20:48

    How is it Britain's?

    The pageantry and charity could all be preserved within the normal structures of local government, as happens routinely.

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  3. Anonymous7 December 2011 at 23:01

    Firstly because most people who work in the City don't live there, and secondly because most of the money raised in taxes there isn't spent there. Do you seriously believe that if the City was hit by a load of taxes and regulations the rest of the UK would somehow be unaffected? Similarly if the US economy goes down the tube we get hit as well.

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  4. David Lindsay7 December 2011 at 23:08

    I don't see why preserving the vast tax privileges of these largely foreign-staffed and mostly foreign-owned companies should particular high on our list of priorities.

    The figures (wildly varying among themselves, which says a lot) as to how much tax the City pays are mostly hypothetical: this is what they would pay, if they could be bothered. They are in London rather than, especially, New York the more easily to avoid any such responsibility.

    If countries at least comparably advanced and prosperous - Germany, for example - do not need anything like this, then why do we? I do not want to abolish Lord Mayor's Shows or anything like that. But that is not what this is about.

    Yes, we do have a once in a generation, even a once in a lifetime, opportunity. We should take it.

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  5. Anonymous7 December 2011 at 23:19

    Fleet Street are so anxious to protect the City because that is where they spend most of their time, the same goes for the Tories in Parliament, and the Lib Dems, and the Blairites. And all because of the funny tax arrangements. Our commentators and legislators are bought and paid for. But remember, the problem is trade union funding, the only clean money in British politics.

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  6. Robert Harley7 December 2011 at 23:22

    Where is our Country Party against this Court Party? Where, even, are our Immortal Seven? Yes, things truly are at that level of crisis.

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