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But how much actually finds its way to helping the poor as opposed to buying new Mercedes for the dictator? Are any audits ever carried out? Would it be better to provide actual goods (tractors, irrigation pipes etc.) rather than cash?Keir Starmer cuts aid to fund increase in defence spending
The PM will head to Washington a day after announcing military budgets would rise to 2.5% of national income by 2027.
Whilst I support increasing defence spending, I'm rather concerned about cutting the aid budget, as those countries that rely on us for aid will turn to China, where money often comes with unsavoury strings attached.
I suspect the main reason is that wealth taxes are very hard to implement, have unwanted side-effects, and end up not raising as much money as is desired.
Billionaires don't do pointing, they'll just salt the money away somewhere else. Either way, you won't get it!
I don't think any of it goes (directly at least) for a new Mercedes for the dictator. Most of it is value for credits for British products - British consultants and advisers, British training, British higher education places, British goods, British armaments etc Lots of gush (as opposed to trickle) down to British employment.
The issuwith taxing the wealthy is they move to another country where they pay less tax and Britain gets nothing at all. Better to tax them less but at least get something from them. Whilst that might not sit well with some people that is reality.
Land Value Tax can’t easily be avoided but is conveniently always left out of the discussion
Yes I remember Dave Wetzel of the erstwhile GLC promoting this. That's a few years ago now.
That's good if it's true, but do you have any examples of this?
I've not seen any evidence to point to substantial evidence of significant levels of corruption. I'm sure that there will be at a low level, simply due to the level of corruption in the countries that these programmes are operating in, hwoever it seems that the Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office has active programmes of countermeasures in place to minimise such issues.
Perhaps, though it is important to remember the impact of Purchasing Power Parity, a given amount of cash will get you more assets in a developing country than it would in the UK.
The term that you're looking for is "Soft Power" it's a well known geopolitical concept.
Ideally a land value tax should entirely replace stamp duty.
They move their money to another country. They don’t actually move themselves because, ultimately, they don’t actually want to live where their money lives.
I thought the original idea was that Land Value tax should be hypothecated to public transport investment, the argument being that house prices are enhanced by the presence of a rail or light rail route alongside - essentially taxing the "windfall" profit which landowners receive from improved accessibility and development potential.
On tonight's Peston (ITV), Rebecca Long Bailey MP argued for a wealth tax to fund the increased defence spending, echoing Caroline Lucas on Newsnight yesterday. RL-B has recently served a 6-month suspension from the party over the continuation of the two child benefit cap. It seems that Labour has no intention of reforming Britain's regressive tax system.
Unlike physical objects and actual projects, the biggest problem with "soft power" projects is that they are difficult to quantify, which makes it difficult to judge whether the project is a success or a failure, or whether it is complete corruption and fraud.
Rebecca Long Bailey was shadow business secretary in the Corbyn shadow cabinet and came second behind Sir Kier Starmer in the 2020 leadership election, where she was widely regarded as the "continuity Corbyn" candidate.
Focusing on easy to measure metrics is what has led to a lot of stagnation in businesses over the last 40 years. Let's not make the same errors in running our country. If developing nations can't get money from us, they will turn to China, which often attaches much more sinister strings to its funds.
I'm going to require you to provide some substantial evidence to back up these claims, as you seem to be asserting that the majority of aid is wasted.
Could you clarify what you mean by that?
You will note my location, I’m well aware of the tax rules. It is very easy to manipulate your situation so that you don’t meet any of the tests- or at worst only meet the 90 day test- yet still spend 180 days a year in the UK.
And that’s why Keir threw her out of the party.
Long Bailey has not been thrown out. What actually happened has already been explained here:
semantics - she was lobbed out of the party for a bit for breaching a three line whip
It isn't semantics, there is an important difference between suspension and expulsion.
She was (temporarily) thrown out.
I’d say the last ten years more shows what happens when any dissent within a political party is not tolerated. The Tories are in such a mess because Johnson defenestrated all the sensible moderate One Nation Tories and replaced them with headbangers.
Blair inherited a party which had been systematically stripped of extreme elements by Kinnock and Smith, and even then he had to deal with people like Galloway. Starmer inherited a party which had most recently actually been led by problematic elements. While some of them like Corbyn have been around forever without causing much damage, their period of leadership led to the recruitment of a whole new generation of problems.
I think Blair was a politician first and lawyer second (in approach priorities, behaviour etc, not careerwise) whereas Starmer still acts like a lawyer and is not a natural leader.
