Ipswich pensioner defies courts & unfair council tax.Tax the Rich! Not the Poor!
Barry Kade | 22.09.2004 19:19 | Social Struggles | Cambridge
Richard Cater walked out of Ipswich magistrate’s court in defiance last week and is refusing to pay the unjust council tax. Richard, who is an 87-year-old veteran of the Dunkirk battle in WWII said: "There are some very hard-up people who can't afford these amounts and if someone doesn't do something, it will get worse and worse. - I'm quite prepared to go to prison. I will not back down because I feel I am in the right."
http://www.easf.org.uk
http://www.easf.org.uk
All those who believe in a more just, fair and equal society should support Richard and all the many others who can’t afford to pay this unfair and regressive tax.
Richard is a member of PACTS - Protest Against Council Tax Suffolk and fellow campaigners from local pensioners groups were on hand to support his stand. Mr Cater was one of 1,700 people issued with summonses for not paying the council tax by Ipswich Borough Council. He said: "I am not doing this for me, I am doing it for everyone else who is also being unfairly charged." This year his council tax bill has risen to 4.6% and stands at a crippling £1,312. Many others are in the same boat.
Mr. Cater, who is a former army boxer, walked out after telling the Magistrate: "I am not going to stand here and be lectured like some errant schoolboy, which I am not. In that case I will bid you goodbye." There was a round of applause for his words and actions. Richard, insisting on taking a what he called a "moral stand" vowed to do all he could to prevent bailiffs gaining access to his home and said he was even prepared to go to jail.
PACTS and other local campaigning groups are planning a protest march in London on Saturday 2nd October. For more info see:
http://www.easf.org.uk/more.php?id=88
This is part of the 'Isitfair' campaign. http://http://www.isitfair.co.uk This is campaigning for the abolition of the present council tax system, to be replaced by a fair system based on an individual's ability to pay.
NO CUTS IN COUNCIL SERVICES EITHER!
The East Anglia Social Forum is here to provide a meeting ground for those opposing unfair taxes like the council tax, with those opposing cuts to council services.
Our pensioners are being robbed by both the council tax and the council cuts! Both these injustices must be opposed.
Other pensioners groups are campaigning against cutbacks to home helps and other vital public services. For instance, see the EASF report:
http://www.easf.org.uk/report.php?id=37
Establishment politicians, Tory, Labour and Lib Dem try to divide and rule, playing off increases in council tax against cuts in vital local services. Racists, opportunists and Fascists will try to scapegoat vulnerable minorities like Asylum Seekers or Travellers, or aid centres for battered women. But all this ignores how central governments over the years have starved local governments of cash.
And there are some people in modern Britain who are doing very well nicely at our expense…read on…
DON’T TAX THE POOR! – TAX THE RICH!!! REDISTRIBUTE THE WEALTH!
There have never been more millionaires in Britain than today. According to a report:
“The number of dollar millionaires in Britain rose by 28,000 to 383,000 last year on the back of rising stock markets and an improvement in global economic growth” (The Guardian, June 16, 2004).
The Local Rich List:
We can see this increasing private wealth locally in East Anglia. Ipswich businessman James Watts, whose family own Corporate Investments in the Suffolk town now has an estimated £43m. His is a mixture of inherited family wealth and investments in homeopathic medicine!
But Andrew Turner of Norwich who owns locally based Central Trust has done better, seeing his private wealth increase over the last year from £40m to £100m. We can also see Bernard Matthews has doing well, with his wealth now standing at a bootifull £168 million from exploitinglow paid workers in East Anglia.
GET ONE THOUSAND MILLION POUNDS RICHER IN ONE YEAR!
BUT the prize for richest parasite in East Anglia must go to Kirsten Rausing, the daughter of Tetra packaging giant Gad Rausing, who now shares a staggering £2,575 million with her brother!
This money has come from inheritance, bloodstock and investments and has increased by nearly £1,000 million over the past year!
And yet they still only pay the same proportion of income tax – 40% as someone who earns a (relatively)meagre £30,000! And all the thousands of £250k pa managers etc – all pay only 40%
Isn’t it time we talked about putting up tax on the richest – who can clearly afford it – instead of threatening our pensioners with either increased council tax or the cutbacks and privatisation of home helps? Or robbing our children of sports fields and leisure centers through cuts and sell offs?
Isn’t it time we had a fair, redistrubutive, progressive tax system in this country? Another, fairer world IS possible!
TAX THE RICH - NOT THE WORKING PEOPLE, THE POOR AND THE PENSIONERS!
Richard is a member of PACTS - Protest Against Council Tax Suffolk and fellow campaigners from local pensioners groups were on hand to support his stand. Mr Cater was one of 1,700 people issued with summonses for not paying the council tax by Ipswich Borough Council. He said: "I am not doing this for me, I am doing it for everyone else who is also being unfairly charged." This year his council tax bill has risen to 4.6% and stands at a crippling £1,312. Many others are in the same boat.
Mr. Cater, who is a former army boxer, walked out after telling the Magistrate: "I am not going to stand here and be lectured like some errant schoolboy, which I am not. In that case I will bid you goodbye." There was a round of applause for his words and actions. Richard, insisting on taking a what he called a "moral stand" vowed to do all he could to prevent bailiffs gaining access to his home and said he was even prepared to go to jail.
PACTS and other local campaigning groups are planning a protest march in London on Saturday 2nd October. For more info see:
http://www.easf.org.uk/more.php?id=88 This is part of the 'Isitfair' campaign.
http://http://www.isitfair.co.uk This is campaigning for the abolition of the present council tax system, to be replaced by a fair system based on an individual's ability to pay. NO CUTS IN COUNCIL SERVICES EITHER!
The East Anglia Social Forum is here to provide a meeting ground for those opposing unfair taxes like the council tax, with those opposing cuts to council services.
Our pensioners are being robbed by both the council tax and the council cuts! Both these injustices must be opposed.
Other pensioners groups are campaigning against cutbacks to home helps and other vital public services. For instance, see the EASF report:
http://www.easf.org.uk/report.php?id=37 Establishment politicians, Tory, Labour and Lib Dem try to divide and rule, playing off increases in council tax against cuts in vital local services. Racists, opportunists and Fascists will try to scapegoat vulnerable minorities like Asylum Seekers or Travellers, or aid centres for battered women. But all this ignores how central governments over the years have starved local governments of cash.
And there are some people in modern Britain who are doing very well nicely at our expense…read on…
DON’T TAX THE POOR! – TAX THE RICH!!! REDISTRIBUTE THE WEALTH!
There have never been more millionaires in Britain than today. According to a report:
“The number of dollar millionaires in Britain rose by 28,000 to 383,000 last year on the back of rising stock markets and an improvement in global economic growth” (The Guardian, June 16, 2004).
The Local Rich List:
We can see this increasing private wealth locally in East Anglia. Ipswich businessman James Watts, whose family own Corporate Investments in the Suffolk town now has an estimated £43m. His is a mixture of inherited family wealth and investments in homeopathic medicine!
But Andrew Turner of Norwich who owns locally based Central Trust has done better, seeing his private wealth increase over the last year from £40m to £100m. We can also see Bernard Matthews has doing well, with his wealth now standing at a bootifull £168 million from exploitinglow paid workers in East Anglia.
GET ONE THOUSAND MILLION POUNDS RICHER IN ONE YEAR!
BUT the prize for richest parasite in East Anglia must go to Kirsten Rausing, the daughter of Tetra packaging giant Gad Rausing, who now shares a staggering £2,575 million with her brother!
This money has come from inheritance, bloodstock and investments and has increased by nearly £1,000 million over the past year!
And yet they still only pay the same proportion of income tax – 40% as someone who earns a (relatively)meagre £30,000! And all the thousands of £250k pa managers etc – all pay only 40%
Isn’t it time we talked about putting up tax on the richest – who can clearly afford it – instead of threatening our pensioners with either increased council tax or the cutbacks and privatisation of home helps? Or robbing our children of sports fields and leisure centers through cuts and sell offs?
Isn’t it time we had a fair, redistrubutive, progressive tax system in this country? Another, fairer world IS possible!
TAX THE RICH - NOT THE WORKING PEOPLE, THE POOR AND THE PENSIONERS!
Barry Kade
Comments
Display the following comment