Saturday, 10 October 2009

TaxPayers' Alliance bulletin - 9th October 2009
 
Debate Heats Up on Public Sector Pay Freezes
 
This has been an historic week for announcements on public sector pay. After years of campaigning from the TPA, it would seem our politicians are beginning to wake up to the reality that too many public sector workers are overpaid and underproductive, and that our bloated civil service is financially unsustainable and morally indefencible. This week saw the Shadow Chancellor George Osborne pledge to freeze all pay for public sector workers earning over £18,000 a year, exempting serving army officers. The night before, realising how popular and necessary such a step is with beleaguered taxpayers, Alistair Darling called for a freeze for the 750,000 highest-paid public servants. These measures alone are not enough, and it is notable that neither party tackled the looming spectre of public sector pensions, but both announcements represent good progress for our campaign to bring restraint to public sector pay and perks, and stop our burgeoning political classes and bureacrats receiving renumeration that is far out of kilter with what's happening in the rest of the economy. We hope you will join us in holding our politicians to these promises - our economic future depends on it.  
 
Delivery for President Klaus!
 
Following the Irish 'yes' vote, the debate over our membership of the EU has reached fever pitch in recent weeks. The TPA took the opportunity to campaign against the great EU rip-off by proferring an oversize postcard addressed to President Kalus, asking him to hold out on ratifying the Lisbon Treaty until we have had our promised referendum. Our aim was to get as many signatures as possible, to let the Czech President know that he is not alone and that even if many of our political leaders won't back his brave resistance, the British people applaud his valiant efforts to protect national sovereignty and stop the encroachment of the EU into every area of our lives. Our postcard turned out to be a huge success: not only did we gather hundreds of signatures from business leaders, MPs, journalists, campaigners and taxpayers, it also made the evening news! It received coverage on BBC News at 6, Newsnight, Sky News, ITV Evening News and international news networks. Let's hope President Klaus was watching and stays strong in the face of the enormous pressure he is currently facing.
 
Causing a stir at the Conservative Party Conference
 
As you will have read in last week's bulletin, the TPA held several fringe meetings at this year's Conservative Party Conference, and we can report back that they were a raging success. Our four fringes were very well attended, with MPs, journalists, councillors and delegates in the audience at each event. Our best attended event was: How to Solve the Fiscal Crisis and Where to Cut Public Spending, where the ideas explored in our How to Save £50 billion paper, written in conjunction with the Institute of Directors were further expanded on, and a lively discussion ensued from our packed audience (picture right). Our events on climate change, civil liberties and the European Union also caused a huge stir and challenged all political parties to step up to the plate and start tackling the issues that matter to taxpayers. All our fringe events were held in the Freedom Zone, and the TPA would like to extend our warmest thanks to the Freedom Association for another well organised, professional venue. It's great to see centre right think tanks going from strength to strength every year.
 
Spreading the message the TPA way
 
At the TPA we are always trying to think up new ways to spread our low tax, greater accountability message and we have stumbled on a corker! We wanted to combine effective campaigning with practicality, and so came up with our I love low taxes / Stop the EU Rip-Off shopping bags. They were going like hot cakes whilst we were leafleting this week, and even enjoyed a star turn on the Guardian website . They are not only great for your weekly shop, but also come in handy whilst out and about signing up new members to our campaign. So if you're a supporter and would like one to take out leafleting, please emailkatherine.andrew@taxpayersalliance.com - bags cost £2 which is payable by cheque or PayPal.
 
Taxpayer funded lobbying - they're still at it

Conference season is a time for debate and discussion. Groups want to have their say and lay out their stall. Which is fine, as long as that stall isn't at the taxpayers' expense. Yet last years conference's were so overwhelmed by quangos and public bodies that it was easy to forgot that any other type of organisation existed. Taxpayers' money was being spent by bodies trying to win the support of politicians, or guarantee themselves future funding.

TPA research successfully revealed that RDAs alone had spent over £250,000 in their efforts to lobby politicians at last year's Conference, and recently we also published just how many public affairs companies, think tanks and third sector organisations also take our money in our Taxpayer Funded Lobbying and Political Campaigning paper. In Januray of this year Sir Gus O'Donnell (Cabinet Secretary and the country's most senior civil servant) responded to our revelations by making it very clear to all departments that public bodies, particularly quangos, needed to have very good reasons for spending money at any of this years' Party Conferences. But some still persist, and we want to expose them. As well as numerous think tanks taking quango bucks to hold fringe events, bodies that splashed out on conference stalls include Tameside Metropolitan Council, the Audit Commission, the FSA, Network Rail, Leeds City Region and the Standards Board for England. To read more on this, see Mark Wallace's blogs Busted! andBusted! Part 2.

BBC Appeal

Are you disputing your council tax band? Or, have you successfully disputed it and are now subsquently on a lower band and paying less? If so, a new BBC current affairs programme would like to hear from you. Please contact Tom on 07706743020 or tom.billington@bbc.co.uk. 

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Posted by Britannia Radio at 10:04