Category Archives: Uncategorized

The Treasury official figures said putting the 50p tax rate down to 45p would entail a loss of £100m of tax revenue. Instead, as some of us forecast, it has led to a surge in additional tax. Self assessed income tax reached £22.5bn in 2008-9 when the top rate was 40%. In 2011-12 it was […]

London property prices are at new highs. UK share prices have been hitting new decade long highs. Property and unquoted shares around the country have risen in value considerably. It is curious therefore to see a further slump in Capital Gains Tax receipts in the latest January figures. January is the big month for the […]

The gripping drama being played out between Syriza and the rest of the Euro area is not just a struggle between creditors and debtors, or between countries who will play by the rules and one who thinks the rules are absurd. It is also an enthralling battle over the future of democratic parties in a […]

You do not make the poor rich by trying to make the rich poor. High tax societies do less well than sensible tax societies. Societies that welcome in rich people and companies and give them some freedom do better than societies that let jealousy rule. Cuba and Venezuela show what poverty socialism can breed. France […]

The UK debate has been depressing during and after the deep recession of the last decade. There has been much discussion of how to share the diminished income and output, with rather less talk of how more people can own more and participate more fully in the economic life of our country. Recently there has […]

Sensible people want to hear from their politicians during an election about the plans and intentions they have for the next five years, if chosen to govern. People are quite interested in examining the record of leading parties in power, so there does have to be some discussion of the past to help form impressions […]

Greece said she could not proceed with a new version of the loan agreement, but seems now to be negotiating over its terms. She has conceded she accepts 70% of the old conditions. Greece refused to sit down with the troika of the EU, the ECB and the IMF, but Greek officials have held exploratory […]

Those who want the UK to stay in the current EU at all costs argue either that there is no alternative, or argue that any kind of trade based relationship outside would be worse. They say we would have no influence over the rest of the EU from outside. They say we would have to […]

Yesterday I was particularly busy – speaking to a local business seminar in the morning, attending a lunch meeting, then dealing with constituents’ queries and on to the Wokingham Conservative AGM to speak. If people send in very long submissions, and include allegations about named individuals or companies, there will be a delay in posting. […]

A tired Mrs Merkel this week had to fly beyond the eastern borders of the Union she leads to deal with the revolt of Ukraine, and then fly back to the heart of her Europe to deal with the revolt of the Greeks. In a way they are the same problem. In Ukraine the people […]