a landrights campaign for Britain
The Land Is Ours
a landrights campaign for Britain
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Braveheart by Shirly-Anne Hardy
We all arrive on this planet from some mysterious Beyond. Yet, on arrival, some find themselves having to pay others for living space. We pray, "Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven". What a mockery of Christianity!
Let us enquire: to whom did the first man to stake out a claim to land pay money for it...? Well then, what is he doing taking money for it from someone else? Isn't it obvious that the whole thing is just a game, and that the name of the game is power? - the power of the few over the mass of dispossessed.
The outcome of this game is inevitably an increasing number of those who, having no right of land on which to work their skills, become the 'unemployed'; looking to others for the opportunity to labour - and beating down wages against each other in that bitter, bogus struggle for work. But the existence of a cheap pool of 'unemployed' to call upon has ever been one of the winning aces of those who hold the cards of power.
Any attempt to deal with the land question, therefore, which fails to deal with DISPOSSESSION AS A WHOLE, is manifestly simply skating on the surface of things - betraying the real claims of the dispossessed, and turning a deaf ear to those growing hordes now clustering in our cities without a roof. In the words of Solzenitsyn:
'And while some danced happy and carefree with songs and music, others shed tears which no hand could wipe away... How did this happen? How could such a gulf have opened out? The words fade away and disappear like water - without taste, without colour, without a trace.'
Braveheart laid plainly before our eyes the corruptive influence upon a nation of landed powerTo restore to the dispossessed their minimal right of justice upon earth - to remove the monstrous power obtained by some over others through pre-empting earth's living space - we must remove in its entirety the bogus selling-price of land. That is, we must remove its capital value, this being the base upon which the right to monopolise land is founded. How shall this capital value be removed? There is ONE WAY AND ONE WAY ONLY, and that is : by society's collecting the full rental value of its land, site by site - or acreage by acreage - from every occupant every year. For it is this value (entirely community-created) which - left lying upon the land uncollected - then yields to the claim of ownership by the 'owner' of the land; and it is purely the on-going expectation of this privately collectible rent which builds onto land its false capital value, its lucrative selling price, which in turn makes an investment asset of land, encouraging monopoly.
What, then, are we doing with conferences on land reform that propose, for example, merely restrictions on the buying of land by foreigners? What can this possibly achieve except a larger field of expectations for our own grandees - while the poor wretched rent-payer remains trapped precisely as before? Or why focus reform on areas of land above an acre? Phew! - what price half an acre of prime city land? It is the entire bogus apparatus of our present land ownership system that needs to go.
Right now we are being re-awakened, by the film BRAVEHEART, to the courageous life of William Wallace - 'Guardian of Scotland' deservedly named. What we need is another film linking William Wallace's great endeavour with that of another William - William Ogilvie of Aberdeen, who 500 years later dedicated himself no less to the freeing of the Scots, by his radical writings on land reform. For did not Wallace himself give attention to this matter of rights to land, in a document which had bearing on the famous Declaration of Arbroath? The film certainly shows how detestable was, to Wallace - a man of the people - the mean dependence upon the landed power of his time of the mass of his fellow countrymen.
If we would but be humble enough to search our own history, instead of trying to pattern ourselves upon alien economic fashions, we would find in it all the inspiration that we need now. For William Ogilvie was but one of a string of Scots who grasped the fact that the faithful collection by a nation of its land rent will of itself effect a just and radical redistribution of the land, with - upon payment of that rent - full security of tenure to the occupant, and the abolition of the entire false system of taxation besides.
As Thomas Paine put it in his famous The Rights of Man: 'Whoever heard that the Creator opened an estate-office to issue title deeds?' But those bogus estate-offices will remain securely in business until the Scots themselves awaken and grasp the true thistle of Scotland's genius in land reform.
We must be prepared today not only to remake our own history, but to remake it aright. Nothing - bar the shining integrity of Wallace - was, in the whole of BRAVEHEART, laid more plainly before our eyes, than the corruptive influence upon a nation, of landed power, and that no people can ever be truly free until that corruptive power is completely wiped out. Just as then - so now.
Every activity of mankind on this planet pays a tax to the landowner.
Everything we buy or use during our lives in a country like England costs us more than it should because of this tax to the landowner. A person living in a bed-sit in Camden Town may not realise it but a large component of his rent goes - not to the owner of the building he is in - but to the hereditary owner of the land the building is on. Somebody built it - or paid somebody to do so - but nobody built the land under it. No man has ever made land.
But city people are utterly indifferent as to who owns the land of their country. They just don't think it concerns them. It should.
We are all being taxed, all our lives, by a tiny handful of people who own the land.
'And how did you come by it?' asked the tramp, who was being ordered out of a field by a landowner. 'I inherited it from my ancestors my good man.' 'And how did they come by it?' 'They fought for it!' 'Right!' said the tramp. And he took off his coat.A few - a very few - countries have achieved some measure of land reform. Denmark passed a law in 1880 taking the land from the landlords and giving it to the farmers who farmed it. Which is why Danish products compete so successfully with English ones. Ireland, the country I live in, achieved land reform partly by buying out the English landlords in the nineteenth century and then completely by compulsory purchasing the land after Independence. Irish farmers now own the land they farm and are the better for it. Many a government in Third World countries has tried to get land reform but in every case has been put out of office by a military coup. The Officer Corps comes from the landowning class.
England, alas, is still a conquered country. After 1066 William the Conqueror dished out every acre of the land out to his fellow bandits, and the pattern of land ownership established then has never been broken. It is time it is.
land reform could be achieved ... by a graduated tax on land.The only possible way in which land reform could be achieved with complete fairness and with lasting results, would be to impose a graduated tax on land. That is a tax that would increase in severity the more land was owned by an individual. For example - a person who owned ten acres of grade A agricultural land might pay nothing, a person who owned a hundred acres might pay ten pounds an acre, a person who owned a thousand acres might pay one hundred pounds an acre. Thus the latter would find it essential to put at least some of his land on the market - the price of land woul d plummet and you or I might be able to buy some. The result of such a tax would be that land would become far more evenly spread among the population - and it might stay that way. The tax could be very gently applied at first and then racked up as necessary to keep an even flow of land onto the market. If more land was put on the market than the market could absorb then the government would step in and buy land, very cheaply, to make into wilderness areas and nature reserves, but most of the land put on the market would no doubt be bought up by private individuals. And the latter would not buy more than their fair share - they wouldn't want to pay punitive tax on it.
The big landowners would not like it? The big landowners would have to put up with it. The Saxon peasants did not like it when William the Conqueror's lackeys came and stole their land away from them after 1066.
Most city people don't want land anyway? No - well they wouldn't have to have it. Only people who wanted land - and therefore would be most likely to look after it - would bother to buy it.
One good point about such a tax is that it would tax the people who have more than their fair share of our country and the taxes would go to help those with less than their fair share. Another advantage would be that it would lead to a gradual movement out of the swollen conurbations into the countryside again, as more and more people moved out to claim what is, after all, their birthright: their fair share of their country.
Surely we should work towards a world in which nobody has too much but everybody has enough?
An Open Letter to Tony Blair by Ronald Banks
Dear Tony Blair
So! You think you can win the next General Election. But what makes you think you can deal with the economic problems which beset the nation at this moment, and which will not go away?
Massive social spending that necessitates higher taxes which hurt production, spending cuts which harm the worst off in society, or a combination of both, all of which produce a vicious circle not capable of resolution?
Economists have given you a limited toolbag. There is no perception within the economic discipline of how to solve the western world's problems. It needs a giant shift of imagination for new avenues to be opened up to expand the economic discipline.
Take the 'feel good' factor. This is predicated upon some kind of inflation - not too much (or else there is too much public concern) - but e nough to produce constantly rising house prices. This also produces what is known as the 'wealth effect', a phenomenon which in 1988 created a bank and building society second loan explosion of £24bn over a 12-month period. This far outdistanced the £5.7bn give-away which the Chancellor Lawson created in the budget that spring. Supply problems followed which meant a massive increase in spending on foreign goods, leading to deficits in foreign trade. Home grown supply was unable to cope.
The 'feel good' factor is always a precursor of the 'feel bad' factor, which entails the 'cure' to restore the 'feel good' factor - high interest rates, higher taxes and expenditure cuts which hurt the most vulnerable in society.
The proposition is that you call for a "no tax" strategy for which the economic basis is the concept of public and private value.If governments are really serious about keeping inflation under control, which the Tories have done 'successfully' during the recession years, then what we are experiencing today is the likely on-going 'feel good' factor with only a little improvement. This is it! The new 'feel good' factor, unless inflation is allowed to rise again.
The proposition is that you call for a 'no tax' strategy for which the economic basis is the c oncept of public and private value.
Expectations need to be changed. Unrealistic expectations, whether in personal finances, health and education, have to be tackled by all political parties - unless new economic policies can be introduced which cut through these limitations. Certainly, feelings of relative security in the job market are not going to be there. They are never there for the employees in the Pacific Basin, the most dynamic economies in the world at the present time. Jobs for life may be the old fashioned objective of the trades union movement, but modern economies will not be predicated on such a notion.
The new economic paradigm which I am urging you to consider encompasses a revitalised public revenue programme - collecting revenue while at the same time cutting taxes. A contradiction? Not if we return to classical economics or, more properly, neo-classical economics, where land and its rent assume their proper place in the debate about public finance.
The proposition is that you call for a 'No Tax' strategy! There are some taxes which need to be kept - not for revenue purposes (although the revenue collected will be substantial) but mainly of reasons of health and energy conservation. Toba cco and alcohol taxes would stay, with a tax of some sort to promote energy conservation (including the present tax on motor fuel). Although these taxes are for specific, non-financial reason, the revenue will be considerable.
The economic basis for the 'no tax' strategy is the concept of public and private value. Failure to distinguish between these two concepts has kept economics in a parlous situation for 100 years or more. The merging of the two 'values' has seriously hindered a more just system of public revenue collection. Value is currently taxed from whatever source it comes. This means that private endeavour is taxed and therefore discouraged, while windfall profits from the value of public works are taxed only on the same basis as value from private endeavour, if at all.
This latter point needs elaboration. the fact that taxes on private endeavour discourage production, employment and saving is axiomatic. However, there is a value, a public value, which lends itself as a suitable and fair source to finance public expenditure. The Labour Party has had many attempts to implement such a policy. They tried in the early twenties and again in 1931. Herbert Morrison also tried in 1939, specifically for London. The policy attempt was a good one, and comes close to what I am suggesting.
After the second World War, Labour lost its way in this area a nd introduced several policies which had the opposite effect of what was intended.
Our proposals deal with a number of aspirations which the Labour Party has had for most of its existence. These include: a just land policy for all citizens; sweeping away unjustified profits from speculative deals on land; a banking system which funds and finances productive investment and not speculative land deals; a tax policy which leaves earned income free of taxation and raises public revenue from income derived from public investment. All of this leads to a positive impact on the economy, especially on jobs and productivity and the ability of the public purse to provide for the needs of the most vulnerable in society.
...a policy which will redress injustice and revitalise the economy to everyone's benefit.Conservatives call themselves the 'tax cutting' party, with very little evidence to show that to be true. The Labour Party can call itself the 'no tax' party - a powerful counter to the Tory case. Of course, the case needs to be carefully presented and obvious Tory objections catered for. This we can do with you and your team.
In the late 1960s and 1970s, when the Liberals were hawking their local tax strategy, which they called Site Value Rating (a poor substitute for the grand strategy we are urging), the Conservative counter-attack included the claim that the "Liberals were taking the ground from under peoples' feet". This was a recognition that under our proposals the price of land would be reduced, possibly close to zero.
In all taxation changes, as is obvious, there are winners and losers. And, of course, there will be some heavy criticism from the big losers, who will include not only big landlords but the institutions which finance them. None of these institutions can expect to retain the privileges which they enjoy at the expense of the rest of the community, but all of them would benefit from the cuts in taxation.
We have mentioned these negative aspects from the very start because they have to be taken seriously. However, they do not constitute a reason for not introducing a policy which will redress injustice and revitalise the economy to everyone's benefit.
On the immediate credit side, these proposals will be to the immediate benefit of a number of 'constituencies', sufficiently numerous to win any election.
This is the plan. After valuation of all land in the United Kingdom, its annual 'rent' will be published to allow for appeals and any inconsistencies to be redressed. This annual rent will represent the amount of public revenue available to the public purse for the first year of operation. This will also be the figure (estimated to be at least 20% of the GNP) for cutting taxes. The Government must not cheat! The amount of land rent collected must be balanced by an equivalent tax cut.
The type of tax cut will vary with the Government's priorities in economic policy. For higher employment, the tax cut will be targeted at employer's national insurance contributions, maybe corporation tax, and any existing tax which is perceived to discourage employment.
For increased investment and research, the target will be corporation tax. (These tax cuts will, of course, have a positive impact on other parts of the economy.) To increase spending in the shops, the targets will be VAT and cuts in income taxes.
What should be deduced from the above is the kind of 'constituency' which would benefit immediately without any need to take account of balances between tax cuts and land rent due to be paid.
Most property owners would find the payment of land rent would be less than the benefits they receive from the tax cuts
The poor, the homeless and the unemployed, all classes with very little or no interest in landed property, would gain from the tax cuts. No negative effects! Most property owners would find the payment of land rent would be less than the benefits they receive from the tax cuts. This would be the case for most of middle England, a primar y Labour Party target for winning the General Election.
Most property owners would find the payment of land rent would be less than the benefits they receive from the tax cuts.Those who make a profit solely out of land, renting out residential or commercial property, would probably lose, although this is not certain, since the tax cuts would also apply to these classes. The mechanism for evaluating this balance between land rent due and tax cuts is to capitalise the tax cuts and compare this figure with the reduction in the value of the taxpayer's property. Most home owners will be better off because so much more public value will be collected to compensate. Home owners will also recognise that housing for their children and grandchildren will be easier under this scheme.
The valuation process itself is a simple matter. Hector Wilks handled two valuations in Whitstable, Kent, in 1963 and 1973. The whole country could be covered within a year, with a further six months for appeals.
One of the really exciting features of this policy is the basis for our optimism for the future: taxation reduces land rent to a considerable extent. The higher the taxation, the lower the land rent. Just consider the effect on the economy of the first year's tax cuts and the collection of land rent for public revenue. The impetus to the economy would be immense: from increased employment, increased productivity, higher spending and greater confidence and security. From all these factors, land rents would rise again! A further valuation would give a new figure for land rent collection and, therefore, a new figure for more tax cuts.
The ultimate result would be effectively to abolish taxation, with the exception of those health and energy taxes mentioned above. The title of the above policy: 'Land Rent as Public revenue'.
It will take a huge imaginative shift (and a lot of courage) for a political party to espouse this proposition. But there is a big prize there for the taking. The British economy, along with others in the western world, is close to economic collapse. The huge demands for funding the ever-growing social and health needs in the future is becoming intolerable. Your own policy ideas are just tinkering at the edges - a more efficient and humane version of Conservative Party policies.
You want a 'Big Idea' to ensure victory at the next General Election - here it is!
Yours sincerely Ronald Banks
(This article first published in 'Land and Liberty' January 1996)
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