Ageing population puts pressure on exchequer

Further tax increases or spending cuts are likely to be needed after the current fiscal consolidation to help meet the budgetary costs of an ageing population, according to the first long-term Fiscal sustainability report from the Office of Budget Responsibility.

What can this mean for us? The Coalition for Economic Justice, to which the Campaign is affiliated, is at present engaged in an attempt to answer questions about LVT raised by the Treasury, following an earlier approach. But are the Treasury officials seriously interested? And even if they are, what about the politicians and their determination to resist vested interests? Ownership of Britain remains concentrated in a few hands – for example, most of the most valuable areas of central London are owned by the same aristocratic families as in 1700, who have somehow succeeded in escaping 100 years of inheritance tax. Other big landholders are some, though by no means all, of the Oxbridge colleges. Besides them are the banks and other lending bodies, who are in effect, for the duration of the loan, owners of the property on which they have given mortgages. And then there are the home owners, even though relatively few own their homes outright, who have come to believe that ever-rising house prices are a good thing.

That is a lot of vested interest to break through.