Enemies of Reason Poundshop potshots at the media moral maze.

Snobbery and house buying

...and the Mail, obviously. Let's not leave the Mail out of all this.

The Government has announced measures to try and kick-start the housing market - a stamp duty holiday on properties less than £175,000. The Mail's predictable enough spin is...

Homeowners to get 12-month stamp duty holiday... but only for houses under £175,000

Only for houses under £175,000 - as if anything below that level is clearly for poor folks only. What about tax breaks for the rich? What about the poor rich people struggling to buy enormous houses? (Yes, you might argue, what about simply buying a smaller one, credit crunch, global recession and all that, but no... that would be silly).

I love this, though:

A stamp duty holiday was today announced to help struggling home buyers.
For a period of 12 months, properties worth up to £175,000 will be exempt from the unpopular tax.

Oh, the unpopular tax. As opposed to which popular ones, exactly? Which taxes do we all enjoy paying? The one that comes out of wages? The one that goes on everything we buy? Which ones? Look, I don't want to be cruel, but there are millions of people who'd love to be able to buy a £175,000 house - I know I would, for one. So don't fuck around pretending this is just for the poverty-stricken and is somehow ignoring the 'middle-classes' you love so much. That much money is a lot of money. There are thousands upon thousands of people who would love to be able to afford a house - I don't think just over a grand's worth of tax is really going to tip the balance one way or the other, to be blunt. But no, let's pretend we're all bloody millionaires...

Treasury experts said half of home transactions would be free of stamp duty as a result.

Half. See that? Half. Sure, that's the treasury saying that, but please don't try to make out that somehow this £175,000 doesn't represent the middle class, when clearly it does. We're not all wealthy. We may all aspire to be, but pretending that we're all going to benefit from David Cameron's £2million inheritance tax windfall is sheer bollocks - and pure social Veblenism.

Stamp duty rakes in £6.5 billion for the Treasury - with Londoners paying by far the biggest burden.

Because THEY EARN THE MOST MONEY. Is this hard to understand?

Currently, those buying properties between £125,000 and £250,000 pay one per cent in stamp duty. For homes more than £250,000, it leaps to three per cent of the entire purchase price.

*wipes away salt tears* Oh how very distressing for people who can afford a quarter of a million pounds. Oh, the poor dears. That must be so awful for them. Still, I imagine actually earning enough money to get that kind of mortgage might be able to ease the burden a bit. Of course there's another way to ensure that people paid less in stamp duty and could afford bigger homes - a massive house price crash. No...?

Homes worth more than £500,000 incur a four per cent rate.

Fuck me, are you still banging on about this? I know your readers would love to think they qualify for these terribly punitive taxes, but they fucking don't. Can we just inject some realism into this - please?

Oh hang on, here comes news brought to you by ctrl+C and ctrl+V. Do you think anyone read this?

For the last two months, speculation has been rife that the Chancellor will ease the tax burden on homebuyers in Britain.
As a result, thousands of buyers have put their plans on hold, hoping to avoid a big tax bill when they buy a home.
But the indicationsare [sic] that Gordon Brown's raft of measures to help homeowners today will not include any changes in the stamp duty regime.

And who's been doing this 'speculating'? The chancellor? Or pricks who work for newspapers? Who might it be...? Hmm... such a tricky one to work out. Well I suppose there's no change to the stamp duty regime as such, apart from the change to the stamp duty regime, obviously; apart from that, no, no change. Of course it's a bloody change! What else is it? Not a change, even though it is?

There's also some coverage of the fact that Labour is aiming to help people who are having trouble keeping up with mortgage repayments. Expecting sympathy from the commenters? Pfffft! Snorkel and flippers on for the comments, then:

Thanks to you, McBroom and your totally useless NuLiarbour, for getting everyday people in this mess.
Don't just sit there in despair, do something about this mess. Britain is sinking with your non-policies which you are suppose to help out with, but i guess you are all too busy with your noses in the trough.
Not only is Darling, your chancellor, peed off with the situation ALL of Britain people are.
I bet there are people who will still vote for NuLiarbour again, despite being let down by you.
- John L. Rodwell, Rye, U.K., 1/9/2008 13:52

Honestly, you could play Mail Comment Bingo with this lot.

Thank God, I might just vote Labour again. At last Brown is going to help those facing reposession.
- Kirsty, Cheshire, UK, 2/9/2008 2:34

Blimey. But:

This is unbelievable. People borrowed too much money, didn't save enough for a rainy day and along comes Gordon to buy their votes with money belonging to prudent people who can manage their finances. Back to the 70's.
Making repossessions more difficult will further dissuade Banks from lending to people, as they will have no way to get their money back.
Allowing councils to buy part shares of homes will give rise to frauds, friends of councillors getting special treatment, more civil servants whose pensions we have to pay to process the forms, and a larger bill to the taxpayer to borrow the money to make this happen. Money which our children will have to pay back years from now, not that Gordon cares because he is only interested in buying the result of the next election.
- Damian, London, 2/9/2008 1:40

Let them suffer! Cunt.

this is fundamentally wrong,whilst most people would sypathise with the predicament of home re-possession,the tax payer shouldn't have to carry the burden for people who borrowed more than the could afford,living beyond their means, what about those who have already suffered re-posession previously?why should the prudent be expected bail out the foolish ?
- Robert Morgan, Houghton-le-Spring,Tyne & Wear, 2/9/2008 5:22

Foolish? Why foolish? I suppose you were sitting there with your crystal ball predicting the global recession, high fuel prices and property slump, were you Robert?

None of the comments so far have said anything about the headline, namely NuLiarbour using TAXPAYERS money to bail out people who were to iresponsable and over extended themselves with huge mortgages. Disgraceful.
Time to emmigrate I think!
- BIG DAVE, ESSEX, 2/9/2008 6:27

Good. Fuck off.

WHY?
- Karen, London, UK, 2/9/2008 7:45

Yes, Karen, yes. You've summed everything up so wonderfully there.

so i as a tax payer will have my taxes spent on helping people who have been reckless in the amount they borrowed,i have no objection at all in the goverment helping first time buyers.I do object to them helping the people with taxpayers money who have been reckless with their borrowing.
- john butcher, milton keynes, 2/9/2008 8:00

"As a tax payer I object to the fire brigade saving people's lives when they have been reckless and caused a fire... let them burn to death and suffer."

The FSA advises that your investment can go up or down. With all the recent credit-fueled inflation of house prices, why should the taxpayer pick up the bill? Let market forces rule you commie-pinko NuLab govt!
- M. O., London, 2/9/2008 8:29

Magical.

i only hope that when the council buy up surplus unsold houses that they dont move scumbags into nice neighbourhoods
- eileen, liverpool, 2/9/2008 9:03

Heaven forbid the poor might live anywhere nice, Eileen!

The buy back scheme is designed to make more voters beholded to a left wing government.
- Robin, London, 2/9/2008 9:14

What?

Stamp Duty was always theft but this meddling is SO wrong. Taxpayers money must not be used to bail out idiot borrowers. Raise the interest rate to 7.5% and stop giving money to Africa etc...
- Epimethen, Surrey, 2/9/2008 9:46

I think that sums it up nicely. Easy from Surrey to say that kind of thing, I'd imagine, especially if you're not worrying about losing your house or desperately in need of the 'money to Africa etc' - but then that's this kind of attitude for you. Let others suffer; I need luxury. It's the protection of the rich by pretending it's about the majority of the population, which it isn't. It's something the Mail does very well, and it's certainly struck a chord with the compassionless cunts who are its hardcore commenters.

Be Sociable, Share!

• 

Related posts:

1. House prices falling? Good.