Massive reserves of LRV discovered in the UK
Following her acclaimed analysis of the Emergency Budget, Dodgy Dossier’s resident economist Charlotte-Anne Schreiber was yesterday invited to a Press Conference at which it was announced that a source of public revenue far greater than that contributed by the North Sea oil and gas finds had been discovered. What is more, it is environmentally friendly and can be easily collected.
“The source is just below the surface and easy to collect. No danger of spillage or pollution,” claims spokesman.
The UK woke up this morning to the news that huge reserves of LRV (above) had been discovered and that taxes on wages, production, goods and services could be reduced to almost zero as a result.
Bill Bond, Junior Minister for the new government department of Tax Reduction said, “For years we have had to burden the people with a multitude of complicated taxes that were expensive to collect the left the door open to widespread fraud and avoidance. LRV will not only put an end to all that but also it will mean an automatic wage rise for the whole population, cheaper goods and services and a stimulus to new businesses. It almost sounds too good to be true – but the plain and simple fact is that LRV can yield millions of pounds and mean we can improve our infrastructure, pay off our debts quickly, reduce unemployment, lower the cost of houses and get the country moving again. Britain will be the powerhouse of Europe.”
Reporters received the news with incredulity and were curious to know how this source of income had not been discovered before.
Location kept secret for fear of revolution
Bond disclosed, “The source was in fact discovered well over 100 years ago but the exact location and detailed maps were lost, or perhaps deliberately hidden by politicians representing members of the House of Lords who had a vested interest in keeping the source a secret. If the vast store of value had been exposed, it would have seen their unearned increment removed, their vast estates broken up and power and control abolished. There had been several attempts to uncover LRV in the past – the budgets of 1909 and 1931 for example, but after the Second World War the trail went cold.”
A representative from Private Property Magazine demanded to know what the discovery would mean in practice. Bond replied by saying, “To begin with it will reduce the value of one of the primary factors of production, thus creating job opportunities and an incentive for new business start-ups. New houses will be built more cheaply and it means that income tax, corporation tax and capital gains tax can all be substantially reduced, if not eventually abolished altogether. Wages and profits will rise, and the need for state benefits phased out as people regain their independence. We can at last throw off the crippling burden of taxation.”
Bond continued, “And the beauty is that LRV can be collected with very little investment or bureaucracy. It will reshape the community and pave the way for social justice. At long last we can live within our means without getting into debt or borrowing huge sums at high interest rates. LRV is a winner all round! What is more the source of LRV cannot be hidden or moved off shore. It will put an end to off shore accounting fiddles and the tax avoidance industry.”
“But let me emphasise,” continued Bond “that collecting LRV via a levy will not take anything from anybody they have created. All infrastructure improvements provide facilities for the population but they also increase the value of land. This provides the opportunity for landlords to indulge in speculation, hold land out of use, charge more for land or increase rents. So in effect at present the people pay twice over. This robbery has got to stop.”
The editor of the monthly journal Taxation is Theft asked why the levy could not be passed on in higher prices like every other tax.
Bond replied that the landlord is already charging the maximum he can get. But the failsafe mechanism is that marginal land will be zero-rated. “So if the landlord does try to pass on the levy it will be self defeating. The tenant can threaten to move to another site leaving the land unoccupied but still subject to the levy. Even if the tenant agrees to accept the charge it will increase the value of the holding and the owner will therefore be liable to an increase in the levy.”
A breach in human rights?
This was too much for the Chairman of the Country Landowners Club who shouted that he was appalled by the prospect and that collecting LRV breached human rights. He would appeal to every court in the land to prevent the infringement of his god-given right to exclude the levy from private property – property that had been inherited and passed down from generation to generation since the Norman Conquest.
Bond replied in words that we are unable to print for fear of contravening the obscenity laws, but in translation he said that for hundreds of years the people had been duped into thinking that rent, taxation, poor housing and poverty were their birthright rather than free access to the four elements necessary to human life and production. “Now the people know why society has been divided into the ‘haves and have nots’ and we can truly begin to build a society based on fairness and justice where work is rewarded without the people having their pockets picked by both the landlord and tax collector.”
He went on to emphasise that collecting the LRV levy was not a penalty. “This will be a system based on benefits received. There will be exceptions and exemptions in the early stages,” he said “but these will be quickly resolved. The whole population will be better off as a result of this find, and I am sure it will be welcomed by the millions of our citizens on low pay, the unemployed and all those 5.8 million people living below the poverty line. At last they can share in the free fund of nature, secure in the knowledge that prosperity will be based on effort without of taxation.”
LRV disclosed
It was not until the press conference was due to end that a reporter from Liberty & Land raised an important question. “Mr Bond,” he asked, “this has all been very interesting but what exactly is LRV?”
“That is easy to explain,” said Bond. “LRV stands for Land Rental Value – the annual rent of a plot of land exclusive of all buildings and improvements. It arises naturally when people form a community and certain sites become more convenient for business, shopping and housing than others. Clearly this value is created by the community and has nothing to do with any action taken by a landowner. Collecting LRV simply returns to the community the value that the community creates in land value. Nothing could be fairer; nothing could be simpler.”
Journalists rushed from the room eager to file their report and get the news onto the streets. Nevertheless I am pleased to report that The Dodgy Dossier has beaten the hack pack and is the first to release the story!
Charlotte-Ann Schreiber