AN UNNAMED ‘senior Labour figure’ – presumably one of the half a dozen or so perennial Blairite malcontents that makes up the list of the usual suspects these days - is aghast at the idea that the very wealthy should pay a higher rate of tax than the rest of us.
‘£150,000 may seem a lot in Edinburgh but it isn't a lot in Reading,’ he tells Rachel Sylvester of the Times, after yesterday’s announcement from Alistair Darling that this will be the threshold of a 45p tax band from 2011. ‘I fear that Gordon has just given a huge Christmas gift to the Tories. We are, to quote Lyndon Johnson, in danger of losing the South for a generation.’
What utter rot. And I say that with complete confidence, despite not having the foggiest idea of the average wedge in either the Scottish capital or the fine Berkshire town that secure namechecks here.
Only 2% of UK earners pull down six figure salaries, and the numbers on £150,000 and up will inevitably be smaller still. Sorry, Charles or Peter or Stephen or Alan or whoever, but £150,000 is a lot, anywhere in Britain.
And while I am always a sucker for the nifty use of historical analogy – it demonstrates a bit of book learnin’, if nothing else – the LBJ reference doesn’t work for me either.
Johnson uttered his famous words after signing the Civil Rights Act in 1964. Morally, the president was doing the right thing. But even by the yardstick of crude partisan advantage, it is not immediately clear that he was getting a bad deal.
While any number of redneck bigots switched to Wallace, the measure was ultimately rewarded by its effect in securing the allegiance of blacks and liberals to the Democrats.
Similarly, while it is not clear to me that a symbolic 45p tax rate will cost New Labour particularly dear in Reading, it is bound to play well in the heartlands. It might just win back the north for a generation, too.
But the inevitable question that must be answered after yesterday is whether or not the pre-budget report marks a return to social democracy. Benedict Brogan in the Daily Mail is in no doubt that it does; his front page story this morning runs under the huge headline ‘The Day New Labour Died’.
Similarly, Polly Toynbee is plainly ecstatic: ‘[H]istory will judge yesterday was the turning point when Labour unfurled its old battle banner for social justice,’ she exults in the Guardian. 'At last the party of social justice has woken up.'
I fear both Brogan and Toynbee are rushing to judgement. While we have been given an outline the kind of Keynesian budget required for recessionary times, it is notably not accompanied by any reversion to social democracy in the post-war consensus sense.
I haven’t waded through the small print yet, but as far as I can make out, there are no measures aimed specifically at job creation, very little that will boost the welfare state, nothing that will directly benefit organised labour, and not even a hint of an expanded role for social ownership. Multinationals, meanwhile, will be laughing at the exemption of foreign dividends from taxation.
Ultimately, the package cannot be divorced from the context of the recent bank bail-out, for which it is designed to pay. Whatever the technicalities, it lacks any moral dimension; whatever the window dressing, the interests of capital remain foremost in the government’s thinking.
Whether one considers the return of social democracy a good thing or not, there isn’t much cause to get excited, because that is not what we are seeing here.
Posted at 13:52, 25 November 2008
Comments (12)
Well, there's nothing about increasing benefit rates and that suggestion would certainly bring about mass apoplexy for the NL darlings. And the TUC recently called upon Purnell to increase the rate of JSA. Also, increasing the personal allowance. People will spend the money therefore reflate the economy.
And why oh why, Darling, do we have to wait until 2011 to tax the 1% of top earners? And by then there could be a Tory government. There is the political impetus to tax these top earners yet NL, as ever, haven’t got the guts to see this progressive measure through.
Come on, £ 150,000 isn't much.
Remember that's just three grand a week - that wouldn't keep me in faberge eggs, Damian Hirsts and Champers - let alone account for any luxury items.
Reading is in Berkshire.
"While any number of redneck bigots switched to Wallace, the measure was ultimately rewarded by its effect in securing the allegiance of blacks and liberals to the Democrats".
Nonsense. The allegiance of blacks and liberals had been secure since the time of Roosevelt so there was no compensatory reward.
So it is, Sue. Duh me.
It is also worth looking at the distribution of the £150000 and above wage earners.
Very few of them live in the current labour seats in the South of England - looking for example at the two labour seats in Swindon, neither of them are conspicuosly populated by rich people - otherwise the poshest restauarant in town wouldn't be Pizza Express, and the most fashionable clothes shop wouldn't be Next.
So in terms of immediate electoral considerations, there are few votes to be lost.
"There's more to social democracy than a 45p tax band " No there isn't! No to bourgeois reformist social fascism! Simultaneous worldwide workers revolution now, or nothing! Take no prisoners!
So raising the tax equates to desegregation? The rich will have to mingle with the lesser orders, possibly because they will no longer afford the private school fees for little Johnny or Jill?
you almost get the impression that the SLIGHTEST radical move by New Labour is leaped upon, by the likes of Toynbee & Co, as concrete proof that New Labour are not merely a bunch of shallow and grubby politicians intent on holding on to power as long as possible, rather that social democracy is just waiting to be ignited.....
talk about clutching at straws
I always wonder how the cheerleaders for these fairly minimal and miserable tinkering manage to balance it all in their minds?
taken against New Labour's headlong embraced of that Tory ideological underpinning which allows them to introduce ID cards, draconian laws, destroying Social Housing, etc without batting an eyelid
I always wonder how the cheerleaders for these fairly minimal and miserable tinkering manage to balance it all in their minds?
The same way we all do: by ignoring the evidence that contradicts what we believe.
Of course there's more to social democracy.
Social democracy has much more to offer: drugs, debauchery, genocide, speeding tickets and Communism lite.
ONLY IN BERKSHIRE...
"Labour’s backbench spokesman on shooting and fishing (WHAT?), Martin Salter MP, has shot his first brace of pheasants...
The READING (West) MP has long supported shooting and its social and economic benefits (EH?), but this was the first time he’d been game shooting himself. Mr Salter shot two pheasants while out ‘rough shooting’ with TV chef Mike Robinson in Berkshire. The total bag for the day was eight birds." ~ Politics.co.uk (11 Nov 2008)
Just hope (the Magpie like) Hazel Blears doesn't "pop" her lovely head up above the Reading brush!
Or maybe not...