PEOPLE gather round and join my campaign. Today
I launch a nationwide campaign to eliminate double taxation.
First on the list is motor tax. Why do we have
to pay for the upkeep of the State’s roads when we already fork out through
general taxation? I blame the bankers and other assorted villains. Then we have
hospital charges. For those of us who are not farmers, or don’t qualify for a
medical card on income, we must pay through the nose for every visit to
hospital. This is outrageous.
We already pay for the health services through
our income tax and Vat, and a whole range of other taxes. Education is another
major bugbear. Why should parents have to cough up for books, and uniforms and
all else involved in sending children out to an education to which they are
constitutionally entitled? Then there’s housing. Our taxes pay to ensure that
those who can’t afford to buy their own homes are housed. Yet local authority
tenants pay a rent. Surely this is double taxation, as we have recently come to
know it?
The system of double taxation is outrageous.
People should be out on the streets. Where’s Richard Boyd Barrett when you need
him most? Dickie, grab a placard there, horse, and let’s go to work. You and
me, we could start a new revolution. Would anybody take such a campaign
seriously? So why then has it become a mantra that we are already paying for
water, that any plan to impose a direct charge on consumers is an attempt at
double taxation? Like much else around the whole Irish Water scandal, that
notion does not stand up to scrutiny, but has managed to worm itself into the
received wisdom of a nation. The incompetence and cynicism of the Government in
relation to water charges has been well aired in these pages and elsewhere. But
the political forces of the alleged left which are driving the opposition are
also up to their necks in cynicism.
For most establishment politicians, the sole
concern around the long-term health of a nation as expressed through its water
infrastructure boils down to a single issue: Will it cost me my seat? Or, for
those in the upper echelons in the government parties, will it cost us power?
Few if any of them could care less about the dilapidation of the nation’s water
infrastructure. They will be insulated with fat pensions if and when the water
coming out of taps turns brown in the major conurbations. But that does not
infer that the political forces driving the protests have any more noble intentions.
Groups like the Anti-Austerity Alliance see water, not, as they claim, as a
“human right”, but merely a political tool. They’ve got lucky. Justifiable
anger has erupted at both the cynicism and incompetence that characterised the
setting up of Irish Water, and the fact that some in society — but nowhere near
as many as claim to be strapped — simply cannot pay another charge. The AAA
doesn’t have to worry about how to pay for water because it has no interest in,
or real prospect of, occupying high office. But at least it has been
consistent. Sinn Féin is a complete joke on this matter.
Two months ago, the party would not commit to
making the abolition of charges a red line issue if it was entering government
after the next election. Neither would its leading lights advocate non payment.
Then they got spooked by the AAA’s Paul Murphy in the Dublin South West
by-election. The people don’t like our policies? We’ll change them. Suddenly,
water charges are a red line issue.
Another epiphany was experienced in the Shinner
hierarchy in the wake of last week’s mass protests. Gerry Adams and Mary Lou
McDonald searched their respective souls and came to the conclusion that they
couldn’t, in good conscience, pay the charges. The president and vice president
of what, according to last week’s opinion poll in the Sunday Independent, is
the largest party in the State, are committed to breaking the law. For what?
Protecting the most vulnerable? In solidarity with the poorest? Yeah, right.
Base, cynical populism and nothing more is driving their agenda, and it appears
to be working. The cynicism of the so-called left is most evident in the
alternative solutions being proposed to drag the water infrastructure into the
21st century. The answer is to simply tax that tiny cohort who are apparently
invisible, and actually in denial of their true status — the rich. The rich are
so small that any populist worth his or her salt can discount them in the
knowledge that it won’t cost votes. So let the rich pay for the nation’s water.
According to the Department of Finance, the 6% of income earners pulling in
more than €100,000 per annum will account for 44% of all taxes paid in 2015. At
that rate, it would probably be advisable not to increase income tax for the
rich. Instead, the most touted solution is a wealth tax, usually expressed as a
tax on assets worth over €1m.
I have no problem with such a tax. There would
be dangers of flight attaching, but perhaps that risk might be worth the
pursuit of a socially just tarrif. Explain to those from abroad who invest in
our open economy that this tax is an indication of how we put people before
profit. What would such a tax say about this country? Not that we deem it
necessary to better the lives of the 130,000 children living in poverty. Not
that we believe such a tax is just in pursuit of housing the growing army of
homeless. Not that it is needed to alleviate the severe education disadvantage
blighting the most deprived corners of the State.
No, we should, with a straight face, explain to
outsiders that in a political culture where the overwhelming philosophy is
populism, we must impose a wealth tax to ensure that all citizens continue to
use a precious resource as if it were free. If the country simply can’t stomach
water charges, a socialist party might propose funding the infrastructure in a
realistic and equitable manner. How about means-testing child benefit, and
using the savings to pay for water? Or maybe imposing higher charges on
university students, who are overwhelmingly drawn from better off sections of
society, and who benefit disproportionately at the taxpayer’s expense? Any
takers? Naw. That kind of redistribution would be anathema to populism, and it
might make some people sit up and wonder whether the principle of water charges
is really unfair.
The suspicion is that despite the most cynical
efforts of groups like the AAA, the majority of people accept that some charge
on water is necessary, with due consideration for those least equipped to pay.
That middle ground has now been lost through gross incompetence and cynicism.
But don’t kid yourself that there’s any principle involved in opposing the
charge. There is justifiable anger. There is a bonfire of all this government’s
empty rhetoric about doing things differently.
But double taxation? Give us a break.
The alleged left which are driving the
opposition are up to their necks in cynicism
By Michael Clifford
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