CHARGING FOR WATER AND SEWERAGE SERVICES

Since the establishment of the Northern Ireland Executive, systems for charging for
water and sewerage services supplied to domestic consumers and for agricultural
irrigation and other commercial purposes, have been prepared but not yet implemented. In
the Republic of Ireland, domestic consumers have also been receiving their water without
direct out-of-pocket payment, but rumours have been going the rounds that the Dublin
government is deliberating on bringing in charges to help in financing the latest IMF
requirements on servicing its loans to the Republic.

This Issue follows No. 206 and adds argument and illustration to the case for LVT - the measure which we have described as being not merely an alternative means of raising the public revenue, but also the key policy without which society's economic problems have no prospect of just and permanent resolution.

With a series of electoral contests due to be held from May 2014 through to the second half of 2015, this Issue argues strongly for LVT - the measure which is so much more than an alternative means of raising the public revenue, being also the key policy without which society's economic problems have no prospect of just and permanent resolution.

The particular issue of planning and environmental management raised by this winter's floods is not a specific matter of revenue collection, yet the techniques employed for the assessment of land/site/location values can be readily adapted equitably to accommodate flood control situations. Another subject on which the Land Value Taxation Campaign does not take a formal stance is the constitution. Scotland is being given the opportunity to vote for or against continued membership of the United Kingdom. What, though, does independence mean? It certainly does nothing to free Scots from landlordism. Scots will still pay the same landlord what amounts to a ransom for a little space in what they are to call their homeland, and Scottish businesses must do likewise.

A private member's bill to do no more than seek to commission a programme of research into LVT as the new source of local government revenue in England, was introduced in 2012, but was consistently unfortunate enough never to get its second reading debate in the House of Commons. Bad luck, or was it conveniently sidelined by, or at least with the connivance of, the top brass in the main parties, so that it died the death within the parliamentary session?

Houses cannot be built without land. Broadly speaking, the same sort of house would cost the same whether built in an urban 'hot spot' or in one of the remoter rural parishes. The cost of land makes the difference. One might expect Government to do everything possible to see land costs held down in the 'hot spot' areas, yet the evidence supports the view that policies are having exactly the opposite effects. The Opposition appears not to have noticed this. Is this the same connivance of the big parties' top brass that, intentionally or otherwise, will not even look at the role of land in the economy?