Why do you believe in this fantasy that a socialist run economy could keep wealthy people here to tax? It would be like France, lot of them would bugger off. Investment would tickle down and unemployment go up.

It's dreamland....and the only real people who would be hurt would be the poorest.

Edited by Stirlingsays (04 May 2017 1.56am)

'Who are you and how did you get in here? I'm a locksmith. And, I'm a locksmith.' (Leslie Nielsen)

She's not great at arithmetic is she.

We have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men. [Orwell]

I think that if you want to have capitalism and socialism in the same system is going to have to compromise - and you need to keep wealth, if not wealthy people, in the UK but also get them paying tax rather than avoiding it.

In reality, that probably means compromising. Either by slowly reducing the availability of avoidance methods, public service inclusion.

With companies rather than just cutting corporation tax, we should link it to incentives related cuts (such as a 5% reduction if no employees earn less than 25% above minimum wage) - But such a reduction would have to benefit corporations (i.e. they have to see a genuine reduction in corporation tax that makes it worthwhile engaging in such social programs).

Rather than just targeting people with wealth with prohibitive taxes, there is a need really to target including those with wealth into realisation of the benefit of contribution, rather than seeing themselves as being penalised for being wealthy.

We need to review the idea of taxation itself fully and how we generate it and how its spent - and everyone can benefit from it - And it not become a system that is only for the least, but contributes to everyone.

"One Nation Under God, has turned into One Nation Under the Influence of One Drug"
[Link]

Giving taxes to a government is like giving whisky to an alcoholic.

We have now sunk to a depth at which the restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men. [Orwell]

Of course. Everyone who works for the NHS is a saint with an impeccable work ethic.

It is precisely this mentality that is contributing to the NHS being a pile of s***e in a number of areas.

"That was fun and to round off the day, I am off to steal a charity collection box and then desecrate a place of worship.” - Smokey, The Selhurst Arms, 26/02/02

I can hardly believe you wrote that with a straight face. Your words immediately brought to mind John McEnroe's infamous words to an umpire.

A hospital loses someone's test results and their entire records, and you say that it was probably not down to carelessness but to not enough money being put into the system - and an overworked staff. I can tell you that the reception/admin desk on this occasion was staffed by three people, all with a screen in front of them and two of them doing nothing. What's more, the one who recalled my wasted visit advised that it was always a good idea to try and take the results oneself, to ensure they weren't lost!

I presume you will interpret my experience differently from me, to which I will just say that "there's none so blind as those who will not see".

By the way, I'm not necessarily saying that the NHS doesn't need more money - just that it should do far, far better with what it already has; and that at a clerical/administrative level its standards are woeful.