DEM not gonna CON dis NATION: Rolling UK politics in the short-lived post-Murdoch era

Well, in Islington, for instance, the council now has a limit of £88 per week for studio flats with shared facilities, £250 for one bedroom flats. Ergo get a one bedroom flat.

... the council are telling people to do that, sotto voce

They're now calling it a "strivers tax", wonder if that'll stick.

Try finding a £250/week 1BR flat in Islington that's fit for human habitation. Landlords who don't want to rent to social tenants just charge £300 and get a professional couple in.

1BR private rentals in my neighbourhood are £350-400 a week. Nobody should have to spend £15-20k annually on *just the rent*.

Try getting anything other than a cardboard box for £88/week in Islington!

I'm assuming rent control would finish off the UK economy?

home-owners and deadbeat landlords must be protected above all else.

Home-owners is a lot of people

Which is basically one of the reasons we're so fucked. Only way to get things going again is to let the house-price bubble explode, but that'll cover a lot of people in shit.

In the short term it's difficult to imagine how rent control wouldn't send house prices down and while part of me is all tiny violin about the buy-to-let landlords that will get caught out, at the same time when house prices go down they take the whole bloody economy down with them. Until we have an economy that is less dependent on the housing market then no government will dare to impose rent controls.

The other point is that buying a place in the sort of areas we're talking about is so expensive now that the rent to cover the average mortgage alone wouldn't be radically lower than it is now. So any rent controls that were to be imposed would be largely gestural.

In the longer term the rest of business in the UK would probably benefit from higher spending as a result of there being less money tied up in property but I'm really not sure any government will dare to let the air out of the balloon. It's partly why Labour barely bothered to build any council houses when they were in power.

I'm sure I read something recently about some multinational finding it difficult to persuade staff to work in London (sorry if this thread has gotten all Londoncentric) because the rents are too high - that's the sort of thing that might make politicians sit up and take notice not the bleatings of us strivers and non-strivers

Only way to get things going again is to let the house-price bubble explode, but that'll cover a lot of people in shit

This already happened

It's only partly happened, London is still largely unaffordable for a lot of people and the people who bought to let back in the bubble are still charging rent to cover bubblier mortgages.

I'm sure I read something recently about some multinational finding it difficult to persuade staff to work in London (sorry if this thread has gotten all Londoncentric) because the rents are too high - that's the sort of thing that might make politicians sit up and take notice not the bleatings of us strivers and non-strivers

It hasn't done much to change Tory immigration policy so I wouldn't hold my breath on that one.

The shit part did, the bubble exploding hasn't nearly happened yet. They've eased a bit, but they're still monstrously higher than historical rates, particularly when compared to average incomes xp

The other problem is there there just isn't much space in London, given the extent to which the population is growing. They can't build out because of the green belt, they won't build upward because of a wider aversion to high rises, especially for working class people. There's still a fair bit of undeveloped land in places like Newham and Barking but otherwise very little. So most of the housebuilding in London over the last 10-15 years has been yuppie flats on brownfield sites with massive expansion in commuter towns like Ashford on the side.

Not the graph I was thinking off, but still noticable http://blogs.thisismoney.co.uk/2010/04/house-prices-vs-average-earnings.html

there's always sidcup

Have to get my papers first

The new bunny-hutch flats are so cheaply/nastily built as well - £300k+ and you can still hear your upstairs neighbour sneeze.

Most people I know who are in a position to buy are combing auction sites and trying to design/build/renovate non-traditional buildings.

this is also a part of the problem - the new houses are so shit that what building is going on isn't really helping matters.

Stet - key sentence below that graph is "But then it may also be the case that average house prices do not return to four times the average wage, and that the long-term average is skewed by the 1980s and 1990s period of strict salary-multiple borrowing that will not return."

Great country this isn't it?

Throw in train fares of four or five grand a year for people who want to leave but still have to work here.

Also, that graph is more than two years old and house prices have fallen by another 10% in real terms since then (according to the Nationwide).

The new building of houses and flats proposed on my v. Bevanite inner-city estate is all private and 'affordable' housing, when there are 18,000 on Camden's social housing waiting list. These are the people the council has already accepted as in need of accommodation, who need 5+ years' 'connection' with the borough to qualify at all (and if you've lived in Camden for 10+ years, you get further priority). It would also be nice if there were restrictive covenants on who was allowed to buy ex-council flats - there are people living in my block who pay £500/week for a flat that costs a social tenant £500/month. Some of those charged £500/week are 'homeless' on the waiting list.

This area used to be full of dedicated housing for nurses, police and firemen - the nurses are still catered for, but police and fire accommodation has been decommissioned and/or absorbed by councils. There's an ex-police block on Amwell Street designed by same dude who did the Tardis, not kidding!

HBos house price index since 1983, for comparison. This is as of today (next release tomorrow):
http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8209/8250274444_c2b73c960f_b.jpg

(I think there's a recalculation in there, checking if this is adjusted for it).

What does that measure, Stet? House prices fell about 20% at the start of the 90s, but that hardly shows any decline there.

It's their monthly index of house prices - methodology is here (Word doc) http://www.lloydsbankinggroup.com/media/word/HPI/Methodologyfromweb130809.doc

This rather good blog post talks about this very subject:
http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/blog/land-value-tax-mansion-tax/

property tax enshrined across the water, fairly insignificant amount (all going to bondholders anyway) but a good foot in the door.

Agree that housing bubble still hasn't burst, and won't be allowed to burst- far too many landlords, far too much equity tied up in mortgages. A reset would be economically useful (necessary?) but also chaotic- politically complete suicide, obviously.

rent in dublin is fucking crazy compared to actual prices -properties selling for 130k that fetch 1000 per month- but lenders can't lend and the rental market is becoming overheated as a direct result. Govt are frozen, can't touch property out of terror.

who the fuck is luke bozier.

crikey
http://lukebozier.co.uk/

^^^ Probably nobody on this thread is still at work but seriously NSFW

interesting to see the arguments from the right: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/07/its-not-wrong-to-avoid-tax

{re: tax avoidance)

do any of these points stand up?

As the president of the CBI remarked of the agitation over taxes, "If you want different results, you have to have a different set of rules."

Well, I agree with this. I don't think it makes sense to expect companies not to avoid tax where they can. The tax system and the resources allocated to policing the system are where campaigning should be targeted.

iirc it's illegal for companies to contribute to nation-states if they can avoid it; obv answer is target company directors for death

Just about everything in that piece is either disingenuous or logically suspect, apart from the truth that countries compete with tax regimes. But that fact is the *reason* you have to focus on the moral angle of company tax.

If a company justifies not paying tax because it has no obligation to pay any more than the bare minimum required by law in a country and in fact has a duty to pay only that, what is to stop that same reasoning applying to which country it pays them in?

Tighten the rules in the UK, and they'll just move the majority of operations to eg Ireland, in ways that are hard to prevent while still enjoying a common market. And if they do that the same "moral" rules of "we're just paying the least tax as is our duty" will apply.

No, it has to be a moral issue. It has to be wrong for companies to enjoy all the benefits and advantages of operating in societies and countries built with tax money and then not pay their own share.

i've argued before for some form of corporate democracy. if Left-leaning parties (okay there are no Left-leaning parties in the UK but bear with me) want to tackle the worst excesses of Capital without frightening the grasping wanker section of the electorate then rather than think about redistribution (which tbh feels like a busted flush and isn't really socialist in itself) we shd look at enforcing public accountability for public companies, including meaningful representation of local stakeholders in boardrooms.

i don't believe that morality has a place in politics - as far as i can, all there is is power - but yr quite right stet in saying that "companies have a duty to make maximum profit at any cost" is the most pernicious element of business practice that exists

bozier is a bullshitter, that ain't a nine incher

hmmn well bagshawe knows a surgeon or two....

not sure that the constant threat 'we'll just fuckoff to somewhere that won't tax us' is ever to be taken at 100% face value- these firms aren't all teetering on the brink of revolt afaict, just making poker faces.

EU probably due a major push on corporation tax harmonisation in any case, the cases in france of google and apple seem like decent sized steps towards.....something.

Multinationals is hard, but it's really not all that complicated to work a system where the transfer of profits across international boundaries is easily identifiable and hit hard, were the will and resources there.

Not sure about 'a moral issue'. I mean, sure, make the argument, but be aware that companies will (at best) do the bare minimum legally. If that allows them leeway that is undesirable, then the main fault is legal.

good work labour party black ops.

Anecdotal, but most of the international rich folks I know in London are all about the social opportunities of the city and wouldn't trade that for a slightly better tax outcome in someplace like Dublin, Monaco or Zurich. They set up drop-box international offices in tax havens to avoid having to live in them.

Incidentally, at a West London party last month with people from the above subset, I was told about a certain 2009 wedding and how a certain politician known to bride and groom exhibited a fondness for Colombian exports at the reception...

lol

'an entirely unidentifiable member of a category of persons known for doing coke, does coke'

You can't take that Shirley Williams anywhere

anyway, comparing to places like dublin and zurich (monaco isn't really the same sort of thing) with marginally lower tax rates (and probably lower market access etc) isn't really that illuminating, but compared to paris with a similar size / social cachet and ~HNW~ types already fleeing....

Paris, that I could see, but their tax rates are higher.

It was also agreed at this party that said politician was the kind of person who'd call women 'fillies' un-ironically, and lacked any discernible personal charisma when encountered at neighbourhood dinner parties in the recent past.

i went to the groucho club last week. it was rubbish.