Poor Ed... even Myleene is attacking him.

ballysmate

The 'Mansion tax' is ill conceived and unworkable. I read somewhere that if it was levied on properties worth £2m and above it would affect 108,000, mostly in the SE. The gain is calculated at £1.2 Billion.
Of those 108,000, how many do you think would appeal? 108,000 perhaps? It would take years to sort out.
Any such tax would appear to be primarily a tax payable in order that you could reside in the SE.

Of course you could take a lesson from Peter Mandelson and sell your house for, say, £1.999 million and chuck in the carpets and curtains for another million.

ugo.santalucia

MountainMonster wrote:

I understand why the housing system is the way it is now, especially when it comes to council tax, but jesus, they screw renters here. I've got no chance of getting a mortgage because i'm being bent over backwards on rent, and have no chance to save towards a deposit. This is about the only downside I've got with the UK.

Everyone wants to be seen addressing the problem, but nobody really wants to address the problem, as the majority of voters would lose out and a minority would gain... me and you who are not on the "property ladder" are a minority, I don't even count as I can't vote. I have learnt to suck it up on the matter... it is the way it is and if we want to buy a house, the only way is to move a couple of hundred miles away from here at the very least... which is something we are seriously considering.

I concur with Labour in that there are not enough taxes on properties and people enjoy playing monopoly... you go to France or Italy second properties are taxed heavily as they should... is Miliband the man who will deliver? I fear not

ballysmate

ugo.santalucia wrote:

MountainMonster wrote:

I understand why the housing system is the way it is now, especially when it comes to council tax, but jesus, they screw renters here. I've got no chance of getting a mortgage because i'm being bent over backwards on rent, and have no chance to save towards a deposit. This is about the only downside I've got with the UK.

Everyone wants to be seen addressing the problem, but nobody really wants to address the problem, as the majority of voters would lose out and a minority would gain... me and you who are not on the "property ladder" are a minority, I don't even count as I can't vote. I have learnt to suck it up on the matter... it is the way it is and if we want to buy a house, the only way is to move a couple of hundred miles away from here at the very least... which is something we are seriously considering.

I concur with Labour in that there are not enough taxes on properties and people enjoy playing monopoly... you go to France or Italy second properties are taxed heavily as they should... is Miliband the man who will deliver? I fear not

Wouldn't trust him to deliver my milk.

ballysmate

Milliband, the son of a Marxist, Ralph Milliband who went to great lengths to ensure that his sons paid as little inheritance tax on his property as possible.

http://www.fpp.co.uk/online/07/04/Mail_on_Miliband.html

It seems his conviction in taxing property only goes so far.


BTW He must have been some Marxist to leave £349k in 1994 eh?

ugo.santalucia

Ballysmate wrote:

Milliband, the son of a Marxist, Ralph Milliband who went to great lengths to ensure that his sons paid as little inheritance tax on his property as possible.

http://www.fpp.co.uk/online/07/04/Mail_on_Miliband.html

It seems his conviction in taxing property only goes so far.


BTW He must have been some Marxist to leave £349k in 1994 eh?

Socialists are not what they used to be... in Italy Massimo D'Alema was probably the first leader of the former communist party to have a yacht and sailing as a hobby... still, he was/is very popular among left wingers... people are not the same either

mamba80

Ballysmate wrote:

mamba80 wrote:

I found it rather sad that the Tories have gone to court to defend the removal of housing benefit from a woman with a panic room to protect her from a violent ex but it ok not to tax someone with an expensive house.

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2014 ... edroom-tax

See the last paragraph.

Provision was made by the government to cater for such circumstances. In this case, it would appear that it was the local authority that was refusing to assist this lady.

I did but I do not draw the conclusions you do, the council have covered the rent with an interim payment, as it says in the last paragraphs.
"The work and pensions secretary, Iain Duncan Smith, has refused to withdraw the demand despite losing an earlier attempt to have the test case dismissed.
The woman, who lives in a three-bedroom property with her 11-year-old son, has been the victim of rape, assault, harassment, stalking and threats to kill at the hands of her former partner. She is not being identified"

Like bankers bonuses case in the Euro courts, the Tories like to lose the moral high ground.

Why should this woman, who at first glance would appear to have been let down by the justice system, in that her former partner is still at liberty? have to recount her story to bunch of council employees? the Police do not lightly install panic rooms!
280 such women are in this situation but still the Tories want their pound of flesh - so a woman I know was punched repeatedly in face with a mobile phone, held under water in a bath and had a hot iron thrown at her, all this within a month of her mother dying, the police said NO EVIDENCE! her former partner grabbed her by the throat, she spat at him but SHE was arrested.... go figure!

ballysmate

Please bear with me, I am not trying to belittle this lady's position at all, I only know scant details.
You are right that the justice system seems to have failed her and she is deserving of our sympathy and best wishes.

The local authority has made interim payments to cover the £11.65 deduction in housing benefit. I assume that this is out of the £345m that the government have made available. She has therefore not been affected financially by the reduction in benefit. The provision put in place seems to have worked.
Is her complaint that she had to disclose her situation to a council official in order to get the payment? If so, it seems bizarre to further risk her anonymity by bringing a court case. Is the local authority threatening to withdraw support? If so, why?
As I said at the outset, I am perhaps not as familiar with this case as you and would welcome clarification.


Back to the mansion tax. I find it strange that someone living in an identical property in London to my modest abode in the West Midlands has to pay a tax premium for the privilege.

pblakeney

Ballysmate wrote:

Back to the mansion tax. I find it strange that someone living in an identical property in London to my modest abode in the West Midlands has to pay a tax premium for the privilege.

That is the price to be paid for the privilege of staying in London.
Along with rent/mortgage, congestion, congestion charging, pollution, overpriced PT season tickets, overpriced parking......
We have had this debate before. Some people love it but I simply do not see the attraction.

mr_goo

I think that the proposed 'Mansion Tax' is a policy formulated up by the wealthy Labour elite to appease the back benchers. Very much like the Fox Hunting ban policy. It is just another class attack on the South of England, who are perceived to be ALL wealthy.
For example take Sandbanks in Poole, Dorset. A millionaires playground. I bet if someone said they came from Poole your immediate image will be they live in a house like this:



and not this:



Its all in ones' perception. My mates up in the north who earn the same as me, have no idea what it is like to spend a high % of their income just to put a very modest roof over ones head. As you can see from my avatar, I live in the New Forest in the county of Hampshire. In general a Tory heartland (think that will change next May). However the district has the highest proportion of child poverty in the whole county, which includes Portsmouth, Southampton, Basingstoke etc etc.

RideOnTime

Think they could improve the aesthetic if they kept their wheelie bins round the front.

bdu98252

Monkeypump wrote:

DeVlaeminck wrote:

So what would you rather - a system where the wealth continues to polarise in the hands of the few while many work long hours but still have to make do with substandard health and education or make hard choices about whether they can afford a decent holiday this year? Yes some people do very well out of our society why shouldn't they put back a disproportionate amount?

The disgrace is that wealth is distributed in such a way that the rich have enough money to avoid tax and still end p paying that much - not that they are asked to pay it.

Well, why should they?

To request them to put back a disproportionate is a fine statement that means little. Currently 2500 people paying the overall quantity of tax as 8 million would be regarded as disproportionate to anyone with a basic grasp of maths. Whilst I may not be in the 2500 people I have referred to I do understand human nature and historical evidence confirming that when you aim to be disproportionate people view this as unfair and therefore do not respond favourably. In the bulk of cases this results in the person either choosing to earn less money or taking their existing wealth elsewhere. If people care to give an example of a disproportionate system working then feel free but I am not aware of any system in the capitalist world demonstrating success.

So the question is if you want to pursue a policy of pissing off the 2500 people at the top then who are you going to come to to make up the loss. Would that be the 50k to 150k earners such as myself who guess what currently think 40% is already a disproportionate amount. If the aim is to make us all poor then the Mansion tax sets the right tone.

ballysmate

That's the socialists' way. Equality - make everyone equally poor.

DeVlaeminck

First off the questions of practicality and morality are different. I fully accept that beyond a certain point or in certain ways taxing the rich may be counter productive - that does not make it wrong morally though.

As for a disproportionate system working - wtf - are there any taxation systems which are not progressive to some extent - it's simply a question of how progressive you make them.

So that's my starting point - where the rich can be pursued for what I consider a "fair" share of tax and that is not going to be counter productive to the society as a whole then that should be done. WIth the mansion tax at first sight it will be hard for them to move their mansions elsewhere - I would suggest that is why this tax has been suggested rather than a straightforwards tax on income.

bdu98252

Put some numbers for your version of fair as I would looking at the numbers conclude that they are already contributing significantly and hence in my eyes fair.

ugo.santalucia

You've got to tax properties and not the council tax, which is a tax on services associated to the property... a property needs to be taxed according to its market value... you can weave the first home, but second properties need to be taxed... holiday properties in particular need to be taxed at a special rate, as they are only a luxury...

Mansion, non mansion... it's all bollox... tax as a proportion of the market value in the specific area... obviously a flat in Earls court will be taxed less than a palace in Wales, even if the market value is technically higher... it's about adjusting for the average value in the area... the old lady living in the mansion with the state pension will have to relocate... it's the last of our society's problem, to be honest... do you really feel for impoverished aristocrats?

bdu98252

ugo.santalucia wrote:

You've got to tax properties and not the council tax, which is a tax on services associated to the property... a property needs to be taxed according to its market value... you can weave the first home, but second properties need to be taxed... holiday properties in particular need to be taxed at a special rate, as they are only a luxury...

Mansion, non mansion... it's all bollox... tax as a proportion of the market value in the specific area... obviously a flat in Earls court will be taxed less than a palace in Wales, even if the market value is technically higher... it's about adjusting for the average value in the area... the old lady living in the mansion with the state pension will have to relocate... it's the last of our society's problem, to be honest... do you really feel for impoverished aristocrats?

This does not make a lot of sense as we don't treat say investments in the same manner. Why should a house be different to a stock or share. In the case of the stock or share you simply tax when the profit is realised and houses are the same with the exception that you get your first house free. I am happy to go with your plan if we national value houses annually and then any paper profit we charge a percentage on say 45% with no first home discount. Ah but this might affect everyone and hence why this would not be seen as reasonable. What is in fact reasonable is to tax people with assets until they have to sell them because waiting till they die and you get the tax through inheritance would be too much for the working man to bear. This is OK because they have something of value. Think of where this slippery slope leads. Today's rich is tomorrows poor from a policy perspective.

pblakeney

ugo.santalucia wrote:

... the old lady living in the mansion with the state pension will have to relocate... it's the last of our society's problem, to be honest... do you really feel for impoverished aristocrats?

For someone now relying solely on a State pension?
Of course.
Just because someone's family once had money doesn't mean the current heir should be punished. Especially if all taxes have been paid. It is a family home. If you do not understand the hold that can have then there is no point debating further. The State will no doubt collect on her demise anyway.

ugo.santalucia

bdu98252 wrote:

This does not make a lot of sense as we don't treat say investments in the same manner. Why should a house be different to a stock or share.

Because there is a problem with house prices in this country, while there isn't a problem of people saving too much or investing too much, the opposite is actually true... with household debt through the roof to buy more and more expensive properties... that's why properties should be treated differently from investment...
Housing is a basic human right, having bonds or shares isn't... hanse something must be done to redistribute housing somehow...

ugo.santalucia

PBlakeney wrote:

ugo.santalucia wrote:

... the old lady living in the mansion with the state pension will have to relocate... it's the last of our society's problem, to be honest... do you really feel for impoverished aristocrats?

For someone now relying solely on a State pension?
Of course.
Just because someone's family once had money doesn't mean the current heir should be punished. Especially if all taxes have been paid. It is a family home. If you do not understand the hold that can have then there is no point debating further. The State will no doubt collect on her demise anyway.

We are talking about hypothetical cases, probably less than a thousand of them in the country. My plan would be to have Taxation proportional to the value of the house in its context... for instance if London average wage is 50% more than Leeds, then property values must be adjusted accordingly (at least for the property one lives in)... so someone in Leeds with a 200 K property will pay as much tax as someone in London with a 300 K property... fair and square.

The old lady with a million pound house who can't pay the tax will be helped by her local council to sell the property and relocate somewhere in the borough she can afford... I'm sure a scheme like that wouldn't be impossible to apply

pblakeney

ugo.santalucia wrote:

We are talking about hypothetical cases, probably less than a thousand of them in the country. My plan would be to have Taxation proportional to the value of the house in its context... for instance if London average wage is 50% more than Leeds, then property values must be adjusted accordingly (at least for the property one lives in)... so someone in Leeds with a 200 K property will pay as much tax as someone in London with a 300 K property... fair and square.

The old lady with a million pound house who can't pay the tax will be helped by her local council to sell the property and relocate somewhere in the borough she can afford... I'm sure a scheme like that wouldn't be impossible to apply

Hypothetically, that old lady would have no income other than the State pension. How would that fit in with the average wage calculations?
Or is London to be for workers only?

ugo.santalucia

PBlakeney wrote:

Hypothetically, that old lady would have no income other than the State pension. How would that fit in with the average wage calculations?
Or is London to be for workers only?

I don't know... but not taxing properties to defend some tiny minority of individuals with small income and big properties seem a bit nonsensical... there has to be a way out and properties need to be taxed... it's the only way to reverse this monopoly game that has been going on for far too long, with pretty terrible consequences.

DeVlaeminck

bdu98252 wrote:

Put some numbers for your version of fair as I would looking at the numbers conclude that they are already contributing significantly and hence in my eyes fair.

Well I don't think the current percentage targets for stuff like income tax are a million miles out - the problem is in getting the very wealthy to pay that because of avoidance - this is why taxes like the mansion tax are mentioned - it's hard to hide a house in a tax haven. I'm sure given a choice Miliband would swop the mansion tax for the end of tax avoidance.

Ugo also has a point about second homes and empty property - why should London property prices be inflated by speculators often not even from this country - the same apples to a lesser degree in holiday areas and so forth. As for the old lady in the 2 million pound house - well she has the option to sell it and likely make a huge profit on what she paid for it - that really is a first world problem.

pblakeney

ugo.santalucia wrote:

I don't know... but not taxing properties to defend some tiny minority of individuals with small income and big properties seem a bit nonsensical... there has to be a way out and properties need to be taxed... it's the only way to reverse this monopoly game that has been going on for far too long, with pretty terrible consequences.

I agree the monopoly game is crazy and needs sorted out but I disagree that taxes can, or should, be the solution.
I doubt I can come up with an ideal solution that no one else has come up with, possibly high VAT on luxury goods, although that won't solve the price of houses. Then again, why not put bands on Stamp Duty? A £2 million house pays 25% stamp duty? That hits those with the cash instead of the misfortune of living in what has become a desirable area.

DeVlaeminck wrote:

As for the old lady in the 2 million pound house - well she has the option to sell it and likely make a huge profit on what she paid for it - that really is a first world problem.

I pity people who make all their decisions based purely on a financial basis. As I said earlier, it is her family home, not a financial investment.

ugo.santalucia

PBlakeney wrote:

I agree the monopoly game is crazy and needs sorted out but I disagree that taxes can, or should, be the solution.
I doubt I can come up with an ideal solution that no one else has come up with, possibly high VAT on luxury goods, although that won't solve the price of houses.

What, like Range Rovers, Jaguar, McLaren and other luxury items made in the UK?
If you want to tackle the property bubble, you need to tax properties, not cigars... but this is a nation of people in debt to buy properties, so how can that be popular?
Properties will always be a problem, until a big depression hits the country again for a decade, like back in the 70s

pblakeney

ugo.santalucia wrote:

PBlakeney wrote:

I agree the monopoly game is crazy and needs sorted out but I disagree that taxes can, or should, be the solution.
I doubt I can come up with an ideal solution that no one else has come up with, possibly high VAT on luxury goods, although that won't solve the price of houses.

What, like Range Rovers, Jaguar, McLaren and other luxury items made in the UK?
If you want to tackle the property bubble, you need to tax properties, not cigars... but this is a nation of people in debt to buy properties, so how can that be popular?
Properties will always be a problem, until a big depression hits the country again for a decade, like back in the 70s

All fair points. Except that in the 70s, home ownership was nowhere like it is now. Thanks Maggie.
I doubt there will be a fix as it would be catastrophic for those in the SE, and that hits the decision makers.
There is another solution. Like me, decide not to take that London job and avoid the debt caused by over priced housing in the first place.

DeVlaeminck

PBlakeney wrote:

DeVlaeminck wrote:

As for the old lady in the 2 million pound house - well she has the option to sell it and likely make a huge profit on what she paid for it - that really is a first world problem.

I pity people who make all their decisions based purely on a financial basis. As I said earlier, it is her family home, not a financial investment.

Politics is about making choices and sometimes there will be losers - of course nobody wants to see an old lady having to move out of her family home but nor do I want to see our health service go down the pan or people work themselves to death because they can't afford to retire.

There is growing inequality in the country and with the globalisation of the economy and as it becomes easier to avoid paying taxes any progressive taxation system is going to have to look at policies like this.

tangled_metal

What would happen if a home owner set up an offshore holding company and transferred the house to the holding company? I know ppl with places in Portugal who put the house into a couple of holding companies for tax reasons. Relatively easy to sort out and I'm guessing that would mean the mansion tax is avoided. I know it has worked in Portugal. Anyone with a house affected probably has access to accountants, financial advisors or lawyers. You think they'll not find a way around the tax? Take a look at the owners of the truly expensive houses or mansions, how many on paper are owned by an offshore holding company?

pblakeney

Tangled Metal wrote:

Take a look at the owners of the truly expensive houses or mansions, how many on paper are owned by an offshore holding company?

How many are owned by British tax payers?

tangled_metal

PBlakeney wrote:

Tangled Metal wrote:

Take a look at the owners of the truly expensive houses or mansions, how many on paper are owned by an offshore holding company?

How many are owned by British tax payers?

How many mansions over £2million in value will result in those using or living in them paying the tax? That is irrespective of nationality. Probably not those most able to pay up without noticing it.
With the increases in tax allowances, if they end up increasing it to take minimum wage earners out of paying tax, and the wealthiest avoiding a lot of their moral tax liability it could end up with the burden on those in between. Isn't that the squeezed middle of class. Perhaps in the SE there's some who'll be in the lower end of the mansion tax bracket.

pblakeney

Tangled Metal wrote:

How many mansions over £2million in value will result in those using or living in them paying the tax? That is irrespective of nationality. Probably not those most able to pay up without noticing it.

Let me rephrase the question.
Is it true that the majority of expensive properties in London are currently being bought up by wealthy foreigners as second homes/investments?
i.e., not British tax payers.