To be scared of Labours Land tax

[Dragongirl10]

Just read about this, Labour are proposing a Land Value Tax on any land owned, could cost thousands a year for anyone even with a small house, not just the rich....they have not publicised this at all.

People with modest homes could be forced to sell or go into debt, or be repossessed...

Thanks Worlds. They weren't at all cheery about the Tory manifesto either, were they? And where does that leave us?

And I heard that they are letting wildlings through the wall, banning the colour blue and declaring all witches are to be drowned in treacle

What does he expect us to do when he rises taxes - stop paying for our kids' after school activities or stop giving money to charity

It's comments like these that really baffle me. Should the money for public spending come from those that are struggling to eat or heat their homes, or those that can afford after school clubs and charity donations?

Not so long ago, we were a higher income paying family. I think it's very, very easy to forget what life is like for the most vulnerable.

posters say - people are poor through not fault of their own, people are rich because they are lucky. No not in many instances......

my husband worked hard at school, worked hard at uni, lives away from home, does a job he hates and earns a lot of money. BIL who had all the same opportunities dropped out of school, has declined any responsibility or training or any travel over about 10 mins to work.

why should husband redistribute his wealth to lazy BIL?

Sure, they could sell up and buy a 7 bedroom mansion

And that makes them somehow worthy of sympathy, poor downtrodden things

Most instances of people requiring state help is because they are feckless and lazy, dreaming? Is that what you're saying? "Not in many instances"...?

A person earning £36k a year hasn't become astronomically wealthy in the sense of being able to shoulder a hefty tax burden just because the paper value of their home increased over a 20 year period.

tiggy makes perfect sense

Janet Brown 2015 I remember at the tail end of the rent acts in the UK where there was just about nothing to rent and people had to sleep on floors and with parents on sofas.

I was living in London when the Rent Act was still in force and never had a problem finding somewhere to rent.

rufus - agreed. and if you think about it those whose value has increased most will be in the south where 36k doesn't stretch far. in the welsh valleys 36k goes quite a long way, but property prices won't have increased that much. so you are taxing most the people who cannot pay

tiggy, exactly. This kind of Labour policy is mann from heaven to the Tories of course. Let us see who is vcoted in in June - hopefully the Conservatives.

The suggestion above that people in the SE who have had to pay so much more than people elsewhere, who pay £24k per child for full time childcare in London, who have huge travel costs, massive house prices suffer rather than benefit. The fact their house might have risen in value £100k is no benefit to them. one of my children is buying a 2 bed flat (has a 1 bed now) and has "made" £100k on her first place BUT what use it ath - she is moving up to a bigger place like most families do so the increase in value of 2 beds is even more. These rises in the value of your home are not of real use to those who won't or can't downsize so it is very unfair for the green eyed jealous labour voters to want to confiscate part of hard worked for capital assets.

I have never said those less well off don't work hard but a good few do work less hard than I do. My ex husband got all my life savings and other assets and a big slug of the house equity. I took out a massive mortgage of over £1m. I don't see why Labour should say I am some kind of fat cat when every penny of equity I have has come from earned income. Other londoners have negative equity or £1m of mortgage debt. We are not sitting there having bought houses for £6k now worth £6m in many many cases. In fact I sold my last house in London at a capital loss. Perhaps Corbyn will go to the money tree and take the sum to compensate me for that loss as richer renters who didn't make losses on buying a house have had an unfair benefit!

Alice, the point is that we don't live a luxury lifestyle. We don't have new clothes, new cars, new mobile phones, a new kitchen... We already pay a lot of tax and we are willing to pay what we pay now, but the cost of living is sufficiently high to mean that we have to make difficult choices. The mortgage and utility bills still have to be paid, so any tax increase would mean less money for the things that make life worth living. Without those small pleasures, like watching your children perform in a theatre production or giving your children French lessons outside school or whatever it is you value, what is the point in working hard to pay your way?

Agreed dreaming. Here are my life choices:

Aged 9, learned of scholarship, 25 per year awarded for private school fees. Studied, took exam and had v scary interview, got it.

Aged 14 onwards, worked all holidays and weekends variously as telephonist, shop assistant, viewings assistant in lettings agency, waitress, bar staff to save for uni.

Aged 21 took out post grad loan and did post grad degree and masters. From 22 onwards worked incredibly long hours to qualify and to do my job, whilst also sitting on the board of a couple of charities and doing activities such as hosting monthly tea parties for vulnerable elderly folk in the area.

Now I pay a shitload of tax. If that goes up a bit and is well spent, great. If it goes up a lot and is spunked up the wall a la Abbott and corbyn's wet dreams, meaning that I have less income for charities and spending in the economy, why would I want to keep on doing it?! But apparently I would be the selfish one for thinking about quitting or leaving...!

what is the point in working hard to pay your way?

Maybe ask those that work as hard as you for less pay.

Tiggy I agree. And it doesn't just affect London. Housing across most of the country is absurdly expensive relative to earnings so anyone who has owned a house for 20 years is sitting on a massive capital gain. The reality is taxing wealth won't impact the Duke of Westminster. It will impact ordinary people living in ordinary homes.

It's not going to happen.

1. Labour will not win.

1. If by some miracle they did win, such a policy would be political suicide.

Can we all stop frothing now? I'm sure Tory HQ willl back in the morning to let us know that Labour are going to fit everyone earning over 20p a year with meters and charge them for every breath they take.

SIon, similar here but whenever I post that kind of thing others say it's lal down to good luck and nothing to do with wise choices and hard work.

My main riposte to that is views that you do have a say in whether you succeed or not keep the poor down. If you tell those with no money at school that they cannot move up and do well and the system is against them then they won't bother trying. No one is saying it is easy to drag yourself up from the bottom of society particularly if you have a single parent at home and no money and your shcool isn't very good but it is possible. The Tories accept that you can do well and Labour instead wants everyone rooting around at the bottom - uniform in their poverty with no incentive to succeed.

Gene, hits it home on the London land tax. that is the problem - younger people in London have less money free but higher incomes so the idea they should pay more not less tax is so unfair. Childcare alone is much more, even hair cuts cost more in London. We pay a lot more out in London and have less income. In a sense we should have a land tax which is higher in places like Newcastle (where I am from) where property is cheaper than in London where we already pay ridiculous amounts of stamp duty on tiny one bed flats.

The only party which will try once we balance the books to keep taxes down and give the working person a fair deal is the Conservatives.

But Alice - however bitter you are about that (and you do sound bitter!), the simple fact is that their higher taxes are more beneficial than anything amount of rhetoric.

And where exactly should my responsibility towards others end? When I have sold the very shoes on my feet? Do I have a duty to work in the highest paid profession I can so that I pay more tax to support those citizens in lower paid professions? Why would I put up with having to pay thousands of pounds extra a year in wealth and income tax, on the off chance that the government spends it well and radically changes society for the better. I have worked with children from very disadvantaged backgrounds and I am yet to see any government policy from any political party make serious inroads into changing things for the better. I have seen innumerable jobs and layers of bureaucracy created with the aim of making a difference, but with very poor results most of the time.

Higher taxes are not beneficial. They are morally wrong. Also the higher the taxes the lower the tax take.

If we tax big houses people will move to smaller places. My neighbours house grand parents, parents adult children and someone else in one house - 7 adults. We had 7 in our house until fairly recently. If instead we 2 groups of 7 bought 14 homes is that really desirable? The same issue was there with the mansion tax.

Also someone like my children's father who doesn't house or see the children who might spend their money on gold or cars or women doesn't pay whereas someone who chooses to house a family i.e puts lover first is taxed to the hilt! Terrible idea, terrible values.

The French wealth tax at lesat taxes your gold, cars and all the rest too not just your home.

I agree with a PP who says why the rich are lucky yet the poor are unlucky. How does that work? I started off in a single parent family. We weren't poor but certainly not rich. Both my parents worked.

I have I hope made some good decisions but not all of it is down to luck. The people who choose crap partners, who don't want to work more than 16 hours because its affects their tax credits. Who pretend to be living separately when in fact they are living with their latest partner (who could be someone they met a few weeks ago).

The scumbag teenagers who broke into our house and beat up our dog. Are they the poor and needing support? The mother who gave her son an alibu resulting in the case nearly collapsing? They were caught, got a telling off and some community service. Meant to pay £5 per month but we didn't see a penny.

Please no bleeding hearts saying we need to discover WHY they did this. Its the crap parenting, the lack of any boundaries when growing up. In the end we moved house. Couldn't stay there and the dog died not long after.

Those boys had no intention of ever working. Much better to rob from someone who was.

Janet, I could add hair cuts to the list of luxuries I can't afford to indulge in. Once a year for me. No colour. Which is why any tax rises will hit my children, the people who have small businesses that teach my children and the charities I give to. At the moment I give 10% of what is left after tax mortgage and utility bills.

Do Germans not work hard? I thought their economy had done rather well over the last 50 years or so. What about the Danes or the Swedes?

Other countries have higher tax burdens the people vote for it and support it. This 'morally' questionable attitude towards tax seems to work well in other countries. Or we could look to the US with its low taxes and child mortality similar to developing countries in some States.