I’ve often encountered this nasty, almost mythical creature being wheeled out over the years.  He seems to be one of those people who never wants to spend any money on anything, intent on hoarding it all to himself.  He manages to get on TV and in the papers all the time spreading his mean-spirited nonsense.  I’ve had enough of listening to the opinions of “the taxpayer” – he just seems like a Grade-A wanker.

When investigating this enigma, I discovered that he has formed some sort of unholy alliance, intent of defending his ill gotten gains.  One of his representatives made it onto Channel 4 News this week as Robert Oxley denounced the governments plans to feed children in school as a “gimmick.”  The argument is so old in Scotland, it’s barely worth mentioning what a great idea it is to provide healthy, free meals to our school children. It’s not often you’ll find us agreeing with the Lib Dems but removing the stigma associated with free dinners and improving our children’s nutrition is a no-brainer. So what would Robert rather be spending his “hard earned cash” on?  Booze obviously.

Please Mr Taxpayer…can I have some more? Robert Oxley defends not feeding weans on C4.

The Taxpayers Alliance are the epitome of the kind of self-entitled arseholes who think their incredible wealth gives them a right to dictate what’s fair.  They spent vast amounts of their “hard earned cash” on campaigns to reduce the tax on drink and posh houses.  Of course, their  photo ops tend to focus on a guy in a cap squeezing his dozen apples into a cider press or some glum looking young couple standing outside a pokey flat but it’s pretty clear where their priorities lie.

The Taxpayer’s map of “Britain.” Coming 2014.

The single biggest thing “the taxpayer” doesn’t like is Stamp Duty, the tax on property purchases over £125000.  Fair’s fair, it’s an incredibly poorly constructed system which sees people pay 1-6% of the value of the properties in tax.  If a house costs just £1 above the threshold, you pay the set percentage on the whole amount, not just the part over the threshold.  In reality this means people simply buy the house for less and slip the owner a few bob under the table but “rich folk will break the law” isn’t really grounds for abolishing all the laws.  What the Alliance seem most concerned about is those who pay over 3% in stamp duty.  They even have a handy map of “the country” (minus Scotland and Northern Ireland…bye then!) which allows us to see the areas “hardest hit” by having hunners of super rich folks buying houses.  The biggest heat spot on the map, Kettering, has a staggering 135 people who fell “victim” to a Stamp Duty rate above 3% in the last year.  Excuse me while I fail to give a fuck that 135 people in Kettering bought houses worth in excess of half a million bucks.

I am of course far, far more concerned with the biggest drain on our national resources, those bloody Argentineans! Since Britain loves international finance institutions and Argentina is…part of the world, the Argentine government occasional gets some finance from said institutions. The Alliance are not amused.  We’re sure this is entirely an economic consideration as has nothing whatsoever to do with a jingoistic hangover from the 1980s.  I wonder if they thought spending a fucking fortune on a war over some wee islands miles away was a “gimmick.”  I suspect otherwise.

Hating the Argies is one cause that’s worth spending money on

When he’s not getting you to sign his petition against cider tax, the taxpayer also finds time to operate the DWP Twitter account.  The civil service which proports to be apolitical and unbiased obviously all went for a fly fag, allowing our man to share the following belter…

We might also ask if the taxpayer can afford not to house people?  Or if he can afford to pay someone to sit on Twitter spouting Tory propaganda at us?  The Queen? MPs? Why is “the taxpayer” hounding the poorest and defending the 135 half-millionaries in Kettering instead?

It’s a shame it’s come to this. Perhaps our media has colluded in painting this guy as something he’s not.  We never hear about what the taxpayer does want us to invest in and his representatives always seem to be rich, posh, Tories claiming not to have any money to do nice things.  In case you hadn’t noticed, the gender pronouns are no accident, he’s almost always male.

We all pay tax, lots of tax. I personally believe investing in the provision of universal services like housing or feeding our kids is a pretty expedient use of my hard earned cash in the long run.  We have to break the myth about who these people really are what they want – they’re not “the taxpayer”, they’re just a bunch of Tory wankers.

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