State says new tax system is stabilising

New Delhi, July 10:

After implementing the Goods and Services Tax, Jammu and Kashmir is now also planning to abolish toll tax.

It goes against the spirit of GST. Most traders have sought the abolition of toll tax. It also impacts consumers. We will try and take up it up in the next meeting of the Cabinet, said Ajay Nanda, Minister of State of Finance, Jammu and Kashmir.

A toll tax is levied on vehicles as well as goods including consumables entering and leaving the State.

This can be as low as 1 per loaf of bread, or as high as 4,000 per quintal of cigarettes. Similarly, the toll rates on vehicles also vary. The State earned over 3,000 crore from toll tax last fiscal, according to official data.

Toll, mandi charges and fee on vehicle entry into States are not subsumed in the GST and will continue to be charged by local bodies or state governments.

However, opposition parties as well as traders unions have sought that the toll be abolished as it will work as a tax on tax and will hike prices of goods coming into the State.

The removal of toll tax would also mean smoother movement of goods across the State borders.

GST was implemented in Jammu and Kashmir nearly a week after its July 1 launch across the rest of the country.

On July 6, President Pranab Mukherjee gave his assent to the Constitution (Application to Jammu and Kashmir) Amendment Order, 2017. Completing its roll out, the President on July 8 promulgated two Ordinances for extension of Central and Integrated GST to the State.

Nanda told BusinessLine that the businesses in the State are ready for GST and it has been fully implemented in the State.

Taxpayers had been asked to enrol for GST when the registration windows were opened by GST Network.

The new system will take some time to stabilise. We are monitoring the situation, he said, adding that supply of goods to the State is also now normalising.

Nanda said that there are no differences in the structure of the GST in Jammu and Kashmir and rest of the States.

It is the same tax. Some local exemptions will continue, he said.

Since Jammu and Kashmir enjoys a special status under Article 370 of the Indian Constitution, it had to amend its own Constitution for implementing GST.

The State has decided to allow taxpayers with an annual turnover of up to 50 lakh to opt for the composition scheme.

(This article was published on July 10, 2017)

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After GST launch, J&K plans to abolish toll tax to ease business - Hindu Business Line

Student funding is in a mess. Graduates now owe 100bn. More than three-quarters of them may never repay all their loan. In a report published last week, the Institute for Fiscal Studies warned not only that outstanding debt was growing, but the abolition of maintenance grants last year leaves poorer students owing 7,000 more than better-off ones. Higher interest rates, introduced to offset the cost of raising the earnings threshold in 2012, mean that the average debt after three years is now 50,000. One of the systems godfathers, the former Labour minister Andrew Adonis, said on these pages on Saturday that it was time to scrap it. Even Theresa Mays ally, Damian Green, says fees need a rethink. Loyalists, like David Willetts, architect of the 2012 system, argue that this is not a fiscal problem but a political one, fuelled by Jeremy Corbyns vote-winning pledge to abolish fees. But universities who have done very well out of the system are nervously watching Mr Corbyns success, and wondering what a post-Brexit future holds. Higher education, and the chances it creates for the brightest and best of the next generation, are too precious anational resource for this uncertainty.

Student fees were introduced nearly 20 years ago to boost university budgets without breaching the ferocious spending totals that the new chancellor, Gordon Brown, had committed to keep within. The level was whatnow appears a trifling 1,000; there wereno loans, but there were generous exemptions, so while a little over a third of the 300,000 students who went to university each year paid the full amount, 45% paid nothing at all. In 2006, Lord Adonis raised the level to 3,000 so that student numbers could be expanded without taxes needing to rise. All the same, this co-funding with the state cost Labour: the Liberal Democrats infamous pledge to abolish fees at the 2010 election had as dynamic an effect on the student vote in university towns like Cambridge, Leeds, Sheffield and Cardiff as Labours pledge did inplaces like Canterbury in 2017.

In coalition, the Lib Dems reluctantly conceded, amid noisy and occasionally violent protest, to raise fees to 9,000 a year. Teaching grants to universities were cut; for the first time student loans attracted above-inflation interest rates. The cap on student numbers was lifted. Universities responded as academics such as Stefan Collini eloquently protested by adopting business techniques, selling degrees rather than education. The average vice-chancellors salary is currently 277,834. Facilities are transformed. Its easier to get in to universityand student numbers paused, thenresumed their rise.

But, as the latest IFS report shows, some of the fiscal assumptions on which the new order was based are starting to look a bit flaky.Nor is it only the financial arrangements: the idea that fees would createa competitive market among universities that would drive up standards has proved to be a farce. Instead of a differential, virtually all universities immediately charged the full 9,000. There has been no move to introduce, say, two-year degrees to cut the cost to students: why would universities intentionally reduce their fee income? Lord Adonis now wants the competition regulator to investigate what he claims is a cartel. He believes the whole edifice has become unsustainable, creating apersonal and national debt mountain without improving outcomes.

Defenders of tuition fees including the Guardian have argued that there are hard-to-replicate benefits. They have funded a huge expansion of higher education. The so-called debt, only repayable once earnings exceed 21,000 and forgiven after 30 years, operates like a progressive graduate tax. High-earners pay more.

Yet that is not how it feels. Students and new graduates say their reward for doing everything the state encouraged has simply left them with a debt millstone. Post-2008, graduate salaries have stagnated and few earn enough to have a chance of getting on the housing ladder. Expanding student numbers has been a gift to the middle classes, still four times more likely to go to university than poorer contemporaries. No wonder Labours idea for a national education service from reception to graduation, free for everyone, got students queuing round the polling stations and won the backing of an unrepentant Blairite like Lord Adonis.

Yet just removing fees risks being an even bigger bung to the better off. Labour needs to spell out exactly how it would work, how it could be done without capping student numbers again, and how it would improve the student experience. Its not always better to chuck a system out and start over. But thismay be one of the times when it is.

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The Guardian view on abolishing student fees: easier to say than to do - The Guardian

Citizens Assembly also votes on pensions recommendations

The Citizens Assembly is to tell the Government to abolish mandatory retirement ages, eliminate the time gap between retirement and eligibility for the old age pension, and to link that pension to average earnings.

The recommendations follow a weekend of hearings at which the assembly discussed a wide range of issues to do with income, work, and pensions for older people.

Sixteen proposed recommendations were voted on and will form the basis for a detailed report to be sent to the Dil and Seanad.

On the question of abolishing mandatory retirement ages, 86% of the assembly members present said this practice should be outlawed, while 96% said the anomaly whereby people who are forced to retire at 65 but can not get the State pension until they are 66 should be removed.

A recommendation to seek the introduction of some form of mandatory pension scheme to supplement the state pension was backed by 87%, and 88% said the pension should be benchmarked to average earnings.

A large majority also voted to recommend the rationalisation of private pension schemes.

On general issues of care for older people, the majority voted to recommend the allocation of more resources, with the preference that funding be ringfenced and come from a compulsory social insurance payment.

They want that money spent primarily on improved home care services and supports, and want statutory regulation of the home care sector.

Assembly chairwoman Ms Justice Mary Laffoy said she aims to have the report written and ready for the Oireachtas by the end of September.

The recommendations were decided following presentations by experts in law, finance, social care, and human rights, but not all the ideas put forward made the final cut.

Earlier, the assembly heard from Micheal Collins, assistant professor of social policy at University College Dublin, who suggested a radical change in policy to end tax breaks for people who invest in private pensions.

He said State pensions were the most important source of income for retired people in Ireland, accounting for 53% of their income as compared to 32% from private and occupational pensions.

The policy of supporting private pension provision through tax breaks is skewed towards those on higher incomes, said Prof Collins.

It is worth considering whether society should more efficiently use its resources to provide an improved basic living standard for all pensions, one well above the minimum income standard, and discontinue subsidising private pensions savings.

Justin Moran of Age Action and Ita Mangan of Age and Opportunity argued strongly for the abolition of mandatory retirement ages, and UCD professor Liam Delaney warned that any move towards mandatory pension enrolment for workers should first examine the likely impact on wages, on administrative burdens for small businesses, and on other forms of financial provision that people made for their future such as investments. None of these impacts had off-the-shelf answers, he warned.

The assembly will next meet in September to discuss what Ireland should do about climate change.

Irish Examiner Ltd. All rights reserved

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Mandatory retirement age may be abolished | Irish Examiner - Irish Examiner

The 70 members also called for a statutory footing on older people accessing home care and for a compulsory scheme to supplement the State pension.

The majority of the Assembly recommended a compulsory social insurance payment or earmarked tax for all workers linked to labour market participation - similar to PRSI - to fund long-term social care for older people.

A total of 87pc recommended there should be an increase in public resources for the elderly; 99pc called on the Government to "expedite the current commitment to place home care for older people on a statutory footing"; and 87pc recommended the Government introduces a compulsory pension scheme to supplement the State pension.

Yesterday, Dr Micheal Collins, assistant professor of social policy at UCD, told the assembly it was possible to introduce a Fair Deal-type initiative top-up pension scheme to "claw back" up to 200-a-week from elderly property owners with assets of around 200,000.

A further 86pc voted against mandatory retirement based on age - meaning an older person could work as long as possible - and 87pc recommended the Government backdates the Homemaker's Scheme to 1973 to allow those who had spent years looking after children, the sick or disabled, in the home to claim a contributory pension.

The assembly voted 100pc that the Government should "urgently prioritise and implement" existing policies and strategies on older people, including for example the National Positive Ageing Strategy published in 2013; the National Carers' Strategy, and the National Dementia Strategy.

Justin Moran, head of advocacy and communications at Age Action, said: "When given the time to deliberate, the citizens showed the overwhelming consensus for a fair State pension system, the abolition of mandatory retirement and investment in home care."

The votes came a day after members stated they were displeased the Government hadn't implemented strategies and had instead left the issue with citizens to deal with. The recommendations, a combination of State and personal responsibility for the care, pensions, working life and retirement of the elderly, will be brought to the Oireachtas for consideration.

Assembly chair Justice Mary Laffoy said: "I would hope the Oireachtas pays close attention not just to the recommendations, but to the debate that informed them. These deliberations were at times vigorous, at other times challenging, but always interactive, inclusive and conducted in the spirit of collegiality."

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Raise retirement age and hike tax to fund elderly care: assembly - Independent.ie

Reforming the welfare system has been a key aim of British government since 2010.Richard Machinwrites that the concept makes no economic sense, it does not produce the outcomes the government is seeking, all while the UK is actually spending less on welfare than countries with comparable economies.

Back in 2010, the coalition governmentstatedthat welfare reform is essential to make the benefit system more affordable and to reduce poverty, worklessness, and fraud. The2017 manifestos of the main partiesoffered a genuine choice of whether to pursue or abandon this policy. For working-age benefit claimants, Labour and the Liberal Democrats proposed a series of sweeping reforms including the abolition of the bedroom tax and the sanctions regime. A lack of detail in the Conservative manifesto could be read as an intention to continue with the roll-out of the many changes that we have seen over the last seven years, although planned changes to benefits for pensioners have been abandoned under the confidence and supply agreement with the DUP.

In the aftermath of the election where does this leave us? For working-age claimants presumably we will see the minority government pursuing the welfare reform programme. Political opposition to austerity both in Westminster and with voters has gained some traction as a consequence of the election result, and there are strong arguments that welfare reform has failed to meet its intended aims and negatively impacted on claimants.

Welfare reform does not make economic sense

Research by Sheffield Hallam Universityfound thatthe post-2010 welfare reform policies will take 27 billion a year out of the economy, or 690 a year for every adult of working-age. The Institute for Fiscal Studiesestimatethat the cash freeze to most benefits, and cuts to child tax credit and universal credit, to be pursued in this parliament, will affect 3 million working households. The Cambridge University economist Ha Joon-Changarguesthat the mainstream political narrative that welfare spending is a drain and should be reduced is illogical. He asserts that a lot of welfare spending is investment and believes that appropriate funding in areas such as unemployment benefits can improve productivity and workforce capability.

When thinking about what an appropriate welfare state looks like in this parliament we would also do well to consider the findings of Professor John Hillsslatest book, which emphasises that we all rely on welfare at some point in our lives. A sensible debate about the affordability of welfare benefits should be framed with reference to accurate statistics about the recipients of welfare spending. The Institute for Fiscal Studiesreportthat 46.43% of total social security spending goes on benefits for older people, with only 12.82% on benefits for people on low incomes (for example housing benefit) and just 1.11% on benefits for unemployed people. The governments aim of producing a fairer and more affordable system is hamstrung by ignoring fiscal facts on one hand while perpetuating inaccuracies about the profile of benefit claimants on the other.

Professionals working in the advice sector have long advocated the principles of the multiplier effect. This argues that there are economic advantages to high levels of benefit take-up as claimants spend money on goods and services in the local community. Ambrose and Stone (2003) found that a multiplier effect of 1.7 exists, meaning each pound raised in benefit entitlements for claimants should be multiplied by 1.7 to give a much greater overall financial benefit to the economy.

My own experience of working in advice services demonstrated that where household incomes are protected through adequate levels of social security there are direct savings to the public purse: rent/council tax arrears are avoided, contact with overstretched public services is reduced and improved health outcomes reduce burdens on the NHS.

Welfare reform is regressive

There is clear evidence that welfare reform has a disproportionately negative impact on some groups in society and some areas of the UK. TheSheffield Hallam researchfound that those particularly hit by welfare reform are working-age tenants in the social rented sector, families with dependent children (particularly lone-parent families and families with large numbers of children) and areas with a high percentage of minority ethnic households. Geographically, the impact of welfare reform is stark with the greatest financial losses being imposed on the most deprived local authorities. As a general rule, older industrial areas and some London Boroughs are hardest hit, with southern local authorities the least affected.

The mainstream media often fails to report the true impact of welfare reform that this research highlights. A more accurate account of the human costs can be found inFor whose benefit? The everyday realities of welfare reformin which Ruth Patrick documents her research on the impact of sustained benefit reductions. Dominant themes include the stigma felt by benefit claimants, the negative impacts of a punitive sanctions regime, and living with persistent poverty.

Welfare reform does not produce the behaviour changes sought by the government

Although welfare reform is a values-laden policy underpinned by a strong, but flawed, ideology (only those who fail to do the right thing are affected) there is little evidence that the retrenchment of the welfare state has been accompanied by the change in claimant behaviour that politicians desire. The bedroom tax was supposed to provide an economic incentive to move to smaller accommodation. Theevaluationindicates that more than 7 in 10 claimants affected had never considered moving, with an estimate that no more than 8% of those affected having downsized within the social sector.

The Benefit Capplaces a limit on the total amount of certain working age benefits available to claimants. One of the governments main intentions was for this to improve work incentives. There is no common consensus on the extent to which this aim has been achieved: the Institute for Fiscal Studieshave suggestedthat the majority of those affected will not respond by moving into work, however, government ministers rarely waste an opportunity to tell us that low levels of unemployment are partly due to the benefit changes introduced.

The research of David Webster into sanctionsarguesthat Sanctions are not an evidence-based system designed to promote the employment, wellbeing and development of the labour force and that this regressive system results in lower productivity, pointless job applications, and poverty-related problems.

In the last days of the previous administration we saw the introduction of the2-child limitfor child tax credit and universal credit. Child Poverty Action Groupemphasisethe contradiction in a policy which supposedly provides parity between those in work and those out of work, when 70% of those claiming tax credits are already working.

Comparable countries spend more on their welfare systems than the UK

Given the huge variations in social security systems across countries, a true comparative exercise is somewhat problematic. However, we can again rely on the analysis ofHa-Joon Changwho debunks the myth that the UK has a large welfare state. Taking public social spending as a percentage of GDP, the UK is only slightly higher (21.5% of GDP) than the OECD average (21%):

Moving forward a key challenge for all political parties is to start a serious conversation about benefits for older people and how to create a sustainable system with an ageing population. At the other end of the age spectrum, much has been said about the increased engagement of younger people in the political process; ironically many commentators argue that it is this age group that will be hardest hit by a continuing programme of welfare reform.

Please read our comments policy before commenting.

Note: This article gives the views of theauthor, and not the position of EUROPP European Politics and Policy, nor of the London School of Economics.

_________________________________

About the author

Richard MachinStaffordshire University Richard Machinis Lecturer in Social Welfare Law, Policy and Advice Practice at Staffordshire University.

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Four reasons why welfare reform is a delusion - EUROPP - European Politics and Policy (blog)

NEW YORK, USA: On July 7, the group Faith Communities Concerned about the Humanitarian Consequences of Nuclear Weapons issued a joint statement in support of the historic adoption of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons at UN Headquarters on the same day.

The treaty, a long-awaited step on the road to a world free from nuclear weapons, lays out detailed provisions calling for a comprehensive ban on the development, production, possession, stockpiling, testing, use or threat of use of nuclear arms.

Supported so far by more than 40 groups and individuals of Christian, Quaker, Buddhist, Muslim and Jewish affiliation, the statement reads, As people of faith we accept as our special responsibility the work of raising awareness of the risks and consequences of nuclear weapons for current and future generations, awakening public conscience to build a global popular constituency in support of the Treaty in order to achieve and sustain a world free from nuclear weapons.

The full text of the statement and list of endorsers can be found at: http://www.sgi.org/resources/ngo-resources/peace-disarmament/ptnw-joint-statement-july-2017.html

Kimiaki Kawai, SGI Director of Peace and Human Rights, comments, Like-minded groups and individuals of many faiths have come together to condemn nuclear weapons as incompatible with our shared human values. The continued existence of nuclear weapons hampers peoples ability to envisage a hopeful future and thus threatens human dignity.

This interfaith statement builds on previous statements issued by the same group during initial negotiations related to the ban treaty and efforts ongoing since 2014 to highlight the catastrophic humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons.

Another statement has been put out by the SGI in the name of Hirotsugu Terasaki, Director General of Peace and Global Issues. It states, The existence of nuclear weapons is the greatest threat to the right to life of both the individual and humankind as a whole. For this reason, their total elimination is a desire shared by all people. See: http://www.sgi.org/resources/ngo-resources/peace-disarmament/ptnw-statement-july-2017.html

During the recent negotiations on the text of the treaty, SGI representatives put forward proposals for including reference to international human rights law, in particular, the right to life, strengthening the reference to disarmament education and highlighting the role of women in promoting peace and security.

The Soka Gakkai International (SGI) is a community-based Buddhist association with 12 million members promoting peace, culture and education around the world.

2017 marks the 60th anniversary of the Declaration for the Abolition of Nuclear Weapons made by second Soka Gakkai president Josei Toda on September 8, 1957, and the start of the organizations efforts to raise awareness and call for a world free from nuclear weapons.

Photo caption: Interfaith vigil outside the UN in New York outside the ban treaty talks, July 5, 2017. Faith communities gathered every morning during the talks at 8:00 am at the Isaiah Wall, Ralph Bunch Park, First Avenue and 43rd Street.(Image by Clare Conboy for ICAN)

The organizations and/or individuals who submit materials for distribution by Religion News Service are solely responsible for the facts in and accuracy of their materials. Religion News Service will correct any errors brought to its attention.

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Faith groups welcome adoption of Nuclear Ban Treaty - Religion News Service

The City of Sydney council has decided not to impose library fines after a trial found the system less effective in ensuring the return of borrowed items. Photograph: Alamy stock photo

The City of Sydney council has abolished all library fines after an eight-month trial revealed they do not work as an incentive for people to return books.

Three times as many overdue items were returned to the councils libraries during the no-fine trial period, compared with the 12 months before the trial.

The lord mayor, Clover Moore, said fines often had a detrimental effect and frightened borrowers into never returning overdue items. This new approach encourages positive community responsibility and sharing, rather than penalising people, she said.

More than 60,000 items were returned between July last year and February, some of them decades old.

Many of the overdue items came from the self-help section, including books on decluttering and cleaning up. But two copies of Mark Chopper Reads 2001 book, Chopper 10 and a Half: The Popcorn Gangster, were still missing despite being 14 years overdue.

Under the new scheme, those with an overdue book will have their membership suspended and will be barred from borrowing until the item is returned.

Sophie Hicks Lloyd, a Sydney library member who used the new system to return books she had borrowed for her children, told Guardian Australia: I just got an email from them saying we had overdue books and that we could return them now with no fine, and that prompted me to act.

She said the abolition of fines would encourage her to use the library more frequently. Raising that level of trust between us and the library, or the local government, instills a sense of community. We go to the library about once every two months and I think this means we will go more often.

Im pretty sure most library members feel a sense of loyalty to their library and, deep down, we all want to return the books. A little friendly reminder from them is all it takes.

The City of Sydney runs nine libraries in inner Sydney, and has more than 415,000 items available for borrowing.

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City of Sydney scraps library fines after trial shows reminders work ... - The Guardian

The Quartier de la Dfense, Pariss major business district. Photograph: AntonioDSG/Getty Images/iStockphoto

France has stepped up its seduction of banks and other financial institutions considering a move out of London due to Brexit, as the government unveiled a raft of proposals aimed at making Paris more appealing.

A document presented by the French prime minister, douard Philippe, on Friday listed reforms he said could turn Paris into Europes leading financial centre after Brexit amid fierce competition from Dublin, Frankfurt and Luxembourg.

The proposals including the abolition of the highest bracket of a payroll tax levied on each salaried employee and the cancellation of plans to increase Frances 0.3% tax on financial transactions.

Bankers bonuses will no longer be considered when labour courts decide on unfair dismissal compensation under the proposals, easing the cost of labour disputes for French financial institutions.

The document also pledged to change the way EU financial regulations are absorbed into French law to make sure red tape is not more burdensome than in other countries.

Paris is competing against rival financial centres such as Frankfurt and Dublin for jobs that move out of London due to the fallout from Brexit.

One of its largest obstacles is the ease of doing business in English for international staff, a hurdle that the programme of reforms laid out on Friday will also address.

Philippe announced that the government has begun work on establishing an international tribunal in Paris that can handle cases in English, the lingua franca of the financial world.

There will also be three new international schools in the Paris area by 2022, in a move apparently aimed at banking staff concerned at moving their families to France.

The package of measures chime with promises by Frances new centrist president, Emmanuel Macron, to loosen the countrys labour laws and do away with red tape and high taxation.

The early days of the former investment bankers tenure have set a markedly different tone to his predecessor Franois Hollande, who once referred to the financial sector as the enemy.

Paris already has its eye on tens of thousands of bankers who could move away from London, if the UKs divorce from the EU proves to be the catalyst for an exodus.

Among the factors that could affect this is the potential loss of Britains passporting rights allowing international financial firms access to markets in the EU.

But Catherine McGuinness, policy chairman at the City of London Corporation, cast doubt on how much business rival financial centres could poach from the capital.

She said: London is the worlds leading financial centre thanks to the breadth and depth of the banking and other institutions clustered here, its competitive tax rates, stringent regulatory regimes and close proximity to other major financial centres.

Its growth has helped the rest of Europe prosper. Its understandable that European competitors will try to lure firms into moving jobs away from London.

However, we are confident that plans to lower corporation tax to 17% by 2020, a commitment to boost national infrastructure and developing trading relationships with new international partners in the coming years will ensure that London remains a world-leading financial hub.

The European Central Bank said last month that banks should speed up Brexit preparations, while the Bank of England wants to hear financial firms contingency plans by 14 July.

In the meantime, the UK is seeking a deal that would allow firms based in Britain to operate freely in the EU after Brexit, scheduled to take effect in March 2019.

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France steps up effort to woo London banks planning Brexit move - The Guardian

Who would want be a member of Generation Z? Having your every youthful screw-up tracked and recorded on social media, facing the robot job apocalypse and without a lollys chance in hell of ever owning a home in London even if medical advancements allow them to work until theyre 200. To top things off, theyre saddled with years of student debt after their three years learning about Whiteness and Privilege at university. As the Guardianputs it:

Studentsfrom the poorest 40% of families entering university in England for the first time this September will emerge with an average debt of around 57,000, according to a new analysis by a leading economic thinktank.

The Institute of Fiscal Studies said the abolition of the last maintenance grants in 2015 had disproportionately affected the poorest, while students from the richest 30% of households would run up lower average borrowings of 43,000.

Well, its not so clear cut, as Martin Lewis explains:

The real problem is the cost of housing, which puts a huge strain on peoples income throughout their 20s and 30s and without which student debt would be manageable.

Labour want to scrap tuition fees although, along with quite a few popular policies these days, this would largely benefit the middle class. The Manchester university academic Rob Ford has written about this, and why the policy would not be egalitarian.

Opponents of fees typically argue that universities are a means to provide youngsters of all backgrounds with an excellent education. Universities are the providers of higher education which is every citizens right, and which society as a whole benefits from and has a duty to fund.

But just as grammar schools were never engines of meritocracy, so British universities are not and have never been institutions engines of educational equality.

University intakes have risen hugely over time, but there is one constant: inequality in access and uptake. Higher shares of the wealthy, the middle class, those whose parents went to university and so on achieve the grades needed to go, and higher shares of these groups actually go.

The universities themselves have a steep status hierarchy, and the more privileged the institution is, the more privileged its intake of students tends to be. Again, there is plenty of evidence and research to support these points. And again they are logicalwealthier and more middle class families provide all sorts of resources that encourage children into university, while one of the main points of private schools is to buy access to elite universities via lavish spending per pupil.

Universities are therefore not, in reality, egalitarian or democratising institutions on the whole. While they are theoretically open to all (as grammars were), they recruit disproportionately from the advantaged, because the advantaged get the better grades and are more likely to apply. Therefore nowas everthey provide the privileged with a powerful resource to reinforce their advantages, at state expense. Again, the evidence on these points doesnt seem to have much effect on proponents of fee abolition.

(It should also be pointed out that school leavers from more privileged backgrounds have, on average, higher IQs, and that the longer we have social mobility the larger this gap will become but thats another issue.)

In fact there is the argument that universities are regressive because they are a very costly signal, a case made by the American economist Bryan Caplan; its one of many reasons that we should reconsider the expansion of university places.

Its partly because universities are so elitist that they have, paradoxically, become more radically left-wing and more intolerant of heretical views. In the US, for example, the more expensive a college, and the richer the students parents, the more likely they are to block a speaker.

Witness the author Charles Murrays recent ordeal at the hands of students from the unbelievably privileged Middleberry College, spoilt bastards who in any sort of just world would have been shipped off to Aden for two years of unforgiving military service, or maybe sent to work in Roman salt mines.

Political correctness is fashionable, a positional good, and it is understandable that high-status people should therefore compete to become more politically correct than rivals. This is one possible explanation for the US campus safe spaces movement, which is a well-trodden path among commentators, and unfortunately comes with the same problem that Political Correctness did in the late 80s and 90s; the people who endlessly complain about it become almost as tiresome as the people doing it. Moaning about SJWs is the 21st century equivalent to those old Mail headlines about PC Gone Mad.

But its hard to watch things like the Evergreen controversy without concluding that competitive university politics is creating a form of religious madness,like the dancing plagues that struck Europe in the late medieval period. These usually took place during times of great social stress, and also involved disproportionate numbers of unmarried women.

Likewise with the safe space movement, which tends to be female (just as its mirror image, the Alt-Right, is male) and is possibly aggravated by the gender imbalance in higher education, especially the humanities; one other result of which is that, unhappily, there arent enough marriageable men. (Many males are also dropping out of the mating game and devoting themselves to World of Warcraft or following Milo or whatever weird activities young people get up to these days.)

University is leaving large numbers of people saddled with debts, less happy, less open-minded, less likely to find a mate or to have children. Perhaps worst of all it has created an army of angry, middle-class graduates with no real purpose, and who are turning against the very system that sustains them. Jeremy Corbyn is currently 45 per cent in the polls, and won 49 per cent of people with university education in the election, a 17 point lead over the Tories and thats for all ages. Among older people, for whom university-attendance was limited, the political-cultural gap between graduates and non-graduates is small, which suggests that its is not just a function of being highly-educated that moves people to the left, but rather that in the past two or three decades merely attending university is associated with becoming more left-wing.

This might not be a problem, except many leave to find that those elite jobs they assumed were theirs do not exist. According to Theodore Dalrymple at any rate, the expansion of university places in Guatemala actually led to that countrys civil war.I doubt well get that far, but Tom Butler-Bowdonsaccount on Joseph Schumpeter in his recent bookrings true:

Surprisingly, it is the workers who articulate a hatred for capitalism, as Marx hoped, but the middle-class intellectuals who come to consider it morally noxious. This is partly an effect of the universalization of education, which produces far too many educated people for the amount of challenging mental work to be done. Failing to see their potential realized, they turn against the system.

The real worry is that, for all that the word is wildly overused, it comes down to a sense ofprivilege, a feeling that can become extremely dangerous when coupled with disappointment.

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Young people check their privilege and feel deeply disappointed - Spectator.co.uk (blog)

LEXINGTON, Ky. (July 7, 2017) "If I was going to lie to you, I'd already be elected."

If you ever attended a Gatewood Galbraith campaign event, it was likely you heard just those words from the perennial candidate.

A Kentucky politician, activist, author and public figure, Galbraith had a one-of-a-kind and frequently frank delivery unlike any of his competitors.

A current University of Kentucky Libraries Special Collections Research Center (SCRC) exhibit, Gatewood Galbraith: The Last Free Man in America, explores the life and work of this Kentucky icon whose outsized life had an impact not only on the state, but also the country.

Gatewood, as he was simply known throughout the Commonwealth, was a vocal advocate for ending the prohibition of cannabis, which resulted in close friendships with country singer Willie Nelson, politician Ralph Nader and actor Woody Harrelson, as well as a national reputation. Galbraith defended Rev. Mary L. Thomas in 2001 in the first felony medical marijuana case, where Judge John D. Minton Jr. granted a stay in the case after its denial by the Kentucky Court of Appeals.

In addition to his advocacy and activism for cannabis law reform, Galbraith also believed in expanding gun rights, freezing college tuition, restoring hemp as an agricultural crop, stricter environmental protections, internet access for all counties, abolition of the income tax for those who earned $50,000 or less, job development and the prohibition of mountaintop removal mining in the Commonwealth. He strongly believed Kentucky needed to fight the Synthetic Subversion and return to the state'sfocus on agriculture rather than its agreements with wealthy corporations.

The monumental task to capture, preserve and tell the story of Gatewood Galbraith was given to the SCRC staff by the Galbraith family not long after his death in 2012.

Then-Associate Dean Deirdre Scaggs (now interim dean of UK Libraries) approached the family to see if they had any interest in sharing his papers with the public. Because he had achieved somewhat of a celebrity status, the family was very careful in considering what they wanted to do with his collection and spent time with Scaggs deciding how they wanted to ensure his legacy.

It was a comfort to the family to know that the representation of Gatewoods life would be properly preserved, organized and made available at the UK Libraries SCRC, Scaggs said. Knowing that in addition to the papers being used for research and for education, we would ensure that Gatewoods history would be there for generations of the Galbraith family yet to be born was really important.

In addition, it seemed ideal for UK to preserve his papers as Galbraith was a graduate of UK, earning both his bachelors and law degrees at the school.

Scaggs is honored the Galbraith family chose to work with UK and is thrilled with what the collection means for its users.

There is a great deal of value in Gatewoods papers. He was an authentic public servant, an advocate for personal liberty, passionate and active in many political issues and various groups. He had strong views on the legalization of marijuana, gun rights, constitutional freedoms and agriculture, Scaggs said. In UK Libraries SCRC it is critical that we preserve the range of political viewpoints to provide the opportunity for civil discourse and unbiased research.

The Gatewood Galbraith papers consist of 28 boxes of materials. To help introduce this collection to the public, Matthew Strandmark, education archivist at the SCRC, approached library science graduate student and research room assistant Natalie Bishop with the idea to curate an exhibit using the papers.

Bishop admits she was excited about the opportunity for more reasons than one. I have a print of Gatewood hanging in my living room, so he meant something to me personally going into this exhibit.

At the beginning of the spring 2017 semester, Bishop began sifting through the Galbraith papers. Shedidnt make any final decisions about the exhibit until April.

I wanted to make sure that I took my time when selecting items and prints to use, but I also loved reading the newspaper and magazine articles about Gatewood included in the collection, she said.

Located on the first and second floors at M.I. King Library Building, the resulting free public exhibit featuresphotographs, campaign posters, newspaper clippings, memorabilia and some personal items, including one that was a trademark of his Galbraith's own style.

My favorite item on display is Gatewoods signature wide-brimmed fedora hat. To me, Gatewoods fedora signified his strong sense of self. He could give a Huey Long-style stump speech, and in the same weekend, go on tour with Willie Nelson, all while sporting his signature headpiece and a tie. Gatewood was unapologetically Gatewood, and his fedora symbolized that.

What does Bishop want visitors to take away from this glimpse into the life of Gatewood Galbraith?

I hope visitors are reminded of the impact that Gatewood had on our Commonwealth as a political and community leader, and realize they too can become active in similar spheres.

The Galbraithexhibit will run through July 28.

Louis Gatewood Galbraith grew up in Carlisle, Kentucky. An outspoken and quick-witted activist and politician, Galbraiths interest in politics started as a young boy after he heard a speech by Gov. Bert Combs. Always running with limited fundraising and on the outskirts of mainstream politics, Galbraith ran for Kentuckys agriculture commissioner post in 1983; Kentuckys attorney general position in 2003; Congress in 2000 and 2002; and governor five times: in 1991, 1995, 1999, 2007 and 2011. At different points, he ran as a candidate for the Democratic Party, Reform Party and as an Independent. Galbraith never won more than 15 percent of the vote in any party primary.

Galbraith continued his work as an attorney during his many campaigns. He famously quipped, Losing statewide elections doesnt pay worth a damn.

Although known widely for his humor, quips and legal knowledge, Galbraiths friends, family and associates described him as a genuine, loving and good person, who cared about his community and the well-being of his neighbors.

In addition to the Gatewood Galbraith papers, the Louie B. Nunn Center for Oral History is home to 16 interviews with family and colleagues in its Gatewood Galbraith Oral History project, which researchers can also use to learn more about the famousKentuckian.

The SCRC atUK Librariesis home toa collection of rare books, Kentuckiana, theArchives, theNunn Center, theKing Library Press, theWendell H. Ford Public Policy Research Center, theBert T. Combs Appalachian Collection, theJohn G. Heyburn InitiativeandExploreUK. The mission of the center is to locate and preserve materials documenting the social, cultural, economic and political history of the Commonwealth of Kentucky.

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Explore the Life and Times of Gatewood 'The Last Free Man in America' - UKNow (press release)

Jn Baldvin Hannibalsson

The neoliberal era started in the eighties as a revolt against the welfare state. It was a reassertion of the fundamentalist belief in market infallibility. It turned out to be a repeat version of history: Essentially it leads to casino capitalism, in the thrall of high finance, just as in the stock exchange crash in 1929. Austerity-like policies to deal with the consequences deepened the crisis, then as now, and ended in a decade-long Great Depression.

The bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers in 2008 signified the end of that neoliberal era. Once more, this version of unregulated capitalism crashed. It ended in the biggest rescue operation by the state in history. Stimulus packages by the state and quantitative leasing (printing money) by central banks on a massive scale rescued us from a new Great Depression.

Instead, we are now experiencing the Great Recession. What is the difference? A massive bail-out of the financial system by tax-payers. Once again, unregulated capitalism had to be saved from the capitalists by the state. This has revealed neoliberalism to be what it is: pseudo-science in the service of the super-rich. Just like Soviet communism it is a fundamentalist dogma, which has utterly failed the test of implementation. And in so far as it is in the service of privileged elites and rejects the role of the democratic state in taking care of the public interest it is in essence anti-democratic.

Underlying the demise of neoliberalism is a financial system out of control. In the years 1980-2014 the financial system grew six times faster than the real economy. The fundamentalist belief driving it is that the sole duty of corporate CEOs is to maximize short-term profits, share prices and dividends. Those perverse incentives are used to justify executive salaries more than 300 times higher than those of average workers; and obscene bonuses.

This is many times more than in any other sectors, although managing money creates no comparable value. As such, this financial system has turned out to be the main conduit for moving streams of income and wealth from the productive sectors of society to the financial elite: from the 99% to the 1%. The share of labor in global GDP has fallen by hundreds of billions annually, while the share of income/wealth enriching the 1% has increased dramatically.

Small and medium-sized companies (SMEs) account for 67% of job creation in our societies, but receive only a fraction of total bank lending. In their single-minded pursuit of short-term profit the banks concentrate their lending on stock exchange speculation and real estate, increasing the nominal value of existing assets creating bubbles and busts and further enriching the rich.

This is why inequality has reached exorbitant levels in our societies. The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer by the day. This is why long-term unemployment is built into the system. This is why poverty is increasing amidst plenty. This is why social cohesion is dwindling and polarisation growing. Since our leaders seem to be offering no convincing solutions, feelings of disappointment, resentment, anger and distrust are rising. Our democracy is under siege by the plutocratic elite.

This unsustainable financial system is footloose and fickle and prone to panic at the slightest sign of trouble, leaving behind scorched earth: collapsed currencies, bankrupted banks, sovereign defaults and mountains of debt to be paid by others. There is a complete disconnect between freedom and responsibility. After the crash of 2008 the system has been rebuilt on the same model. That means that we are stuck in a prolonged recession, even awaiting a new crisis. The people out there, who are suffering the consequences, are waiting for trustworthy solutions radical reform.

What is our social democratic response to this existentialist crisis of unregulated capitalism? The basic elements of the Nordic model took shape as a response to the great socio-economic upheavals of the interwar period of the last century. In the West we observed the market failure of unregulated capitalism and the Great Depression. In the East we observed the Soviet experiment with communism: a centralized command economy run by a police state, which enforced the abolition of human rights, democracy and the rule of law.

We rejected both. We decided that we would follow the third way. We recognized the usefulness of a competitive market system, where applicable, to allocate resources and create wealth. But we put markets under strict democratic control to avoid market distortions (monopolies, booms and busts and extreme concentration of wealth). We insisted on public provision of education, healthcare and general utilities (energy, water, public transport, etc).

The means are familiar. Social insurance (sickness, accident, old age, and unemployment insurance), free access to quality healthcare and education, paid for by progressive taxation; active labour market policy to get rid of unemployment; and provide affordable housing for all. We emphasize equality of the sexes and strong support for families with children. These are redistributive policies aimed at increasing equality and social mobility as a matter of human rights not as charity.

The result is a society where equality of income and wealth is greater than elsewhere. This means that individual freedom is not a privilege of the few, but a matter of emancipation for the many. Social mobility the ability to advance in society, if you work hard and play by the rules is de facto greater in the Nordic countries than elsewhere. The Nordic model has by now replaced the United States of America as the land of opportunity.

This is the only socio-economic model, emerging in the last century, that has withstood the test of time in the era of globalization in the 21st century.

The neoliberal creed is that the welfare state, with its high progressive taxes and strong public sector, is uncompetitive. State intervention hampers growth and innovation and results in stagnation. The bottom line: owing to its lack of dynamism, the welfare state is said to be unsustainable in the long run. And the proliferation of state bureaucracy is even said to threaten individual freedom and ultimately end in a totalitarian state (Hayek).

Now we know better. The facts speak for themselves. No matter what criteria we apply, the Nordic model is invariably at the top of the league.

This applies no less to economic performance than other criteria: Economic growth, research and developement, technological innovation, productivity per hour of work, job creation, participation in the labour market, (especially women), equality of the sexes, level of education, social mobility, absence of poverty, health and longevity, quality of infrastructure, access to unspoilt nature, the overall quality of life. Less inequality than in most places. And a vibrant democracy. What more do you want?

What tasks lie ahead? An all-out effort against the financial elite to restrain the forces of inequality and to reclaim the power of democracy. An unyielding solidarity with Europes youth, who have been left to fend for themselves in the queues of the unemployed, bereft of hope. And take up the fight for the preservation of the environment and our common future on this planet.

There are three major challenges that lie ahead in the immediate and near future:

The prospect of massive and systemic unemployment through automation calls for radical thinking about the distribution of income and the responsibilities of the democratic state in such a society. On the agenda should be proposals for a minimum basic income for all. This is a gigantic task that calls for well-designed redistributive policies in the spirit of social democracy, utterly beyond the capacity of unregulated capitalism to solve.

These three major problems, as well as relevant solutions, are inter-related.. A precondition for success in meeting them is a political alliance between social democrats, trade unions, environmentalists and the radical left among Europes neglected youth. The road signs are already there.

Remember the motto of Tage Erlander, the long-time leader of Swedens social democrats, and arguably the greatest reformer of the last century. He said:The market is a useful servant, but an intolerable master.And the spiritual leader of the Catholic faith, Pope Francis, agreed, when he said:

The worship of the golden calf of old has found a new and heartless image in the cult of money and the dictatorship of financial markets, which are faceless and lacking any humane goal. Money has to serve, not rule.

This is an edited version of a speech given at the celebratory 120th anniversary of the Lithuanian Social-Demcorati Party in Vilnius.

Read more from the original source:

What Can We Learn From The Nordic Model? - Social Europe

The most important thing about the debate over Labours tuition fee pledge is that most of the arguments, on both sides, dont add up.

I want to first address the arguments against the pledgethat dont work.

The first, and most frequently deployed, is about people who dont go to university subsidisingthose who do. The difficulty here is that they are already under the current system. After 30 years, the debt is written off by the Treasury, a bill paid out of, you guessed it, general taxation.

(Though because our tax system is already fairly progressive, this bill is again, predominantly paid by higher-earning graduates as well.)

This is more acute if people do work that is socially important but low-paying. A social worker, even one who makes the highest pay grade, is not going to pay off their tuition fees. A teacher who stays in the classroom is not going to pay off their tuition fees. The bulk of people who work as artists or designers are not going to pay off their tuition fees.

So you cant really defend tuition fees using that argument. That Labours plan to pay for abolition of which, more below is levied on the highest earners makes the argument even more redundant.

The second argument is that a tuition fee cut is regressive that is, it hands a great deal of money to above average-earners at the expense of lower earners. It is true that the policy was the single most expensive item in Labours manifesto, at 11.2bn a year. But as Ive written before, what people miss about tuition fees is that they are a form of taxation: they are levied on graduates, not students, through PAYE or through your tax return. They dont behave like any other type of fee or loan you might take out and should be seen as a tax.

That matters a great deal because taxation has to be seen in the round, not simply in isolation. The question over whether any tax cut is regressive is only partially about who the cut benefits.

Taken in isolation, decisions on tax made since 2010 have been highly progressive, increasing the share of public spending borne by the richest. But taken in concert with what is done with that revenue, changes to tax-and-spend have been highly regressive. The gains to the lowest earners from increases in the threshold the amount you have to earn before levying taxation have been more than wiped out by cuts in working-age benefits and the knock-on effects of cuts in services.

Labours tuition fee cut is paid for by increasing taxes on capital gains that is profit made selling an investment and people earning more than 80,000. So it is basically, for the most part, a tax cut for people earning 21,000 to 45,000 paid for by people earning more than 80,000. The overall package distributes from the highest earners to people earning above average so it is downward redistribution, albeit not to the very poorest.

You can argue of course that this is not a particularly good use of 11.2bn. But the difficulty here is that for this argument to work, you have to believe that Labour would have been able to go into the 2017 election without promising to abolish fees and instead planning to spend the 11bn on, say, wraparound childcare or housebuilding, and would still have received the boost in 18-24 turnout that helped the party gain Warwick and Leamington, Canterbury, Cardiff North and Bristol North West, among other seats. This doesnt seem particularly likely.

That doesnt change the fact that while Labour is getting a lot of bang for its buck electorally speaking, it is not getting a lot of value policy-wise for its 11.2bn. Why not? Because the cost per graduate is actually quite small.

The cost for Plan 1 graduates that is, graduates who went to university on the 3,000 fee starts at 2 a month for people earning 17,776 or more a year, which gradually increases as you earn more. Earners at 80,000, when Labour's planned tax hike would kick in, pay469 a month.

For Plan 2 graduates, the cost of repayment starts at 4 a month when you start earning more than 21,500 a year, and again, increases as you earn more. Earners at 80,000 pay443.

These are not life-altering sums. If you are seeking to meaningfully alter the take-home pay of a graduate tax, reducing income tax by a penny or value added tax, or for that matter duty on petrol has a far more significant effect. Just ask people earning above 80,000, who would lose significantly more than they'd gain under Labour's plans.

(This is probably why tuition fees mostly exercise the parents of people paying them and students who have yet to pay them, rather than tax-paying graduates. Its striking that Labours turnout boost came among 18-24s and they flipped parents from Tory to Labour. Actually, if you are a taxpaying graduate, Labour policies on housing and the taxable threshold do have a meaningful effect on your quality of life. Tuition fees, not so much.)

This is even more stark when you remember the cost of tuition fee abolition to the Exchequer, which comes in at a heady 11.2bn a year. There are lots of things you can do that actually would improve the pay packets of graduates not least build a lot more housing with 11.2bn, but not much that any individual graduate can do with 2 a month.

But regardless, it comes back to the earlier question: could Labour have got the results it did while pledging the tax rises that paid for that 11.2bn a year tuition fee cut but spending them elsewhere? I dont buy it myself. Abolishing tuition fees is to Labour as redistribution to the affluent elderly is to the Conservatives counterproductive as far as their policy aims go, but essential to their election-winning coalition.

Go here to see the original:

Abolishing tuition fees is a wasteful electoral bung but it works - New Statesman

Jean-Franois Tremblay

Tuesday, July 4, 2017 22:28

UPDATE Tuesday, July 4, 2017 22:31

Look at this article

SAGUENAY | reorganization of units in mental health at the hospital of Chicoutimi is cringe unions, who complain of cuts to jobs and fear for the care of patients.

Nineteen vacant positions of nurses and auxiliaries will not be renewed. The other four positions occupied by nursing assistants are also abolished. In contrast, five part-time positions will be posted.

For the posts of assistants, the Centre intgr universitaire de sant et de services sociaux (CIUSSS) of the SaguenayLac-Saint-Jean has argued that he will attempt to retain the expertise of staff in the department by displaying other items. In the last year, 36 of the 56 mental health beds have been occupied. The directorate is preparing a medical team for 46 beds, as early as mid-September.

In the department of rehabilitation in mental health for adults, it removes the end of the week, two of the seven days work of a special education teacher who prepares patients to return home. There will only be one person full-time. However, the CIUSSS has added five days of social work.

The unions find it hard to accept that mental health is being hit again.

The respondent policy to the Alliances professional and technical staff of the health (APTS), Lynn Brie, said that this is a customer easy to touch, because it is vulnerable. Staff will make follow-up less intensive and will have to make choices about the care they receive.

The case of fugues in a hospital environment who have already made the headlines concerns the representatives of the staff.

The loss of hours in rehabilitation, to be effective on September 17. For the positions of auxiliary nurses, their abolition is expected somewhere in the fall.

Ms. Brie adds that it is no longer able to hear the speech that the cutbacks in health spending do not affect patient care.

The regional president of the Fdration interprofessionnelle de la sant du Qubec (FIQ), Martine Side, went a step further by arguing that it is necessary to take the time to work with this customer, but that it takes the world to do it.

See the original post here:

Abolition of posts in mental health at the hospital of Chicoutimi - The Sherbrooke Times

Sir Stephen Bubb, former chief executive of the charity leaders network Acevo, has a long track record of advocacy for charities to play a bigger part in the provision of public services.

Although its never good to rush these things, its taken us almost one and a half millennia to work out exactly what charities are for. And we still arent sure.

We are a sector that delivers, campaigns, balances both, concluded Sir Stephen Bubb, who was thinking great thoughts about the future of charities after he surveyed their history in a lecture on 3 July at Oxford University. But, he conceded, their role in relation to government was still not settled.

Bubb, until recently leader of charity chief executives body Acevo, is essaying a way forward for the voluntary sector in his new capacity at the Charity Futures programme he has established. His lecture was an attempt to encapsulate the sectors story so far.

Starting in the year 597, when St Augustine founded The Kings School in Canterbury still a charity today Bubb demonstrated that charities have always delivered public services and campaigned for change.

Critics of charities latter-day engagement in the justice and penal systems should note that they were running prisons from the 12th century, he said. Critics of their political campaigning should note their decisive part in great social reform movements like the abolition of slavery.

Some of the best modern charities managed to combine both roles, he argued, citing the way the former Royal National Institute for Deaf People, now Action on Hearing Loss, had in the late 1990s campaigned forcefully and successfully for the provision of digital hearing aids on the NHS while continuing to work in partnership with state services.

While this showed it was a false dilemma to suggest that charities needed to choose between providing services and lobbying to change them, Bubb admitted that the sector had never fully recovered its sure-footedness in the former arena since the birth of the welfare state 70 years ago.

Charities have always delivered public services and campaigned for change

That singular advance of the state in service provision had given rise to the idea of subsidiarity that charities should do only those things the state did not, and where they developed innovative and proven ways of delivering services, those should become state services.

Bubb has a long track record of advocacy for charities to play a bigger part in the provision of public services. So his case against subsidiarity and for a return to what he called our good old English fashion, quoting the Duke of Wellington on the 19th century voluntary sectors clear dual role of service delivery and robust campaigning, needs to be seen in that light.

But other voices are also urging charities to make more of what they do and to be more confident of the effect they have.

In a survey by FTI Consulting for Pro Bono Economics, which enlists volunteer economists to work with charities, 81% of 1,100 members of the public said they would prioritise donations to charities that could demonstrate their economic impact.

Pro Bono said the finding showed the critical importance of being able to show and quanitify value in the post-truth era.

Julia Grant, chief executive of Pro Bono, said that by their own admission, many charities would struggle to demonstrate their impact on society in terms of hard evidence, but building the capacity to prove the importance of their work is crucial to their future stability and sustainability.

It goes almost without saying that Bubb was already on the case in his lecture. Charities spent 1,578 every second improving lives and supporting communities, he calculated. And that included animal charities rescuing 800 stray cats every week.

Talk to us on Twitter via @Gdnvoluntary and join our community for your free fortnightly Guardian Voluntary Sector newsletter, with analysis and opinion sent direct to you on the first and third Thursday of the month.

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Charities can deliver services and campaign robustly - The Guardian

PCB, KCB write to Centre for more than Rs 200 cr arrears

The cantonment boards in Pune have written to the Central Government, asking it to dispense with their pending service charges amounting to more than a hundred crores for each board. The Boards have been raising their voices against the abolition of vehicle entry tax (VET) and local body tax (LBT), after the recent introduction of the Goods and Services Tax across the country.

But now, they have also sought their rightful compensation for service charges as well. An official with the Pune Cantonment Board (PCB) said, The board is not ready to face such a huge amount of loss. More than Rs 200 crore is still pending. Now, we have written to the Centre about this. We are waiting for the money to reach us. There is a clear distinction between the municipal corporations and the cantonment boards in the country. The funds allotted to us are far lesser than our municipal counterparts, yet we are expected to work with equal amount of efficiency.

The chief executive officer of Khadki Cantonment Board (KCB) also acknowledged the cash crunch, saying, The matter is now pending at a much higher level in the central government. This is not a local matter anymore. Cantonment boards across the nation have been collectively writing for adequate compensation. More than Rs 90 crore is pending and we will have to wait for further instructions.

PCB and KCB will now be staring at an approximate loss of Rs 100 crore annually after the abolition of taxes, which the officials claim will affect the revenue drastically.

Go here to read the rest:

Cantt boards demand pending service charges - Pune Mirror

Academics at the University of Oxford look set to challenge once again rules that force them to quit work at the age of 68 after a professor became the latest scholar to overturn enforced retirement.

In the latest clash over a policy introduced to help intergenerational fairness, a leading former judge ruled in an internal appealthat Oxford should reinstate Peter Edwards, professor of inorganic chemistry, after it discriminated [against him] on the grounds of age by seeking his retirement.

In an unusual move, Sir Mark Waller asked for his normally confidential judgment to be made public with the university also releasing a second judgment from September 2014, in which retired High Court judge Dame Janet Smith criticised the treatment of another professor under the compulsory retirement policy as fundamentally unacceptable and amounting to unfair dismissal.

Under the rules, academics are currently required to retire at the age of 67, although they can apply for a two-year extension. The age limit is set to rise shortly to 68 after a university review.

Efforts to overturn Oxfords Employer-Justified Retirement Age (EJRA), introduced in 2011 after the national abolition of the default retirement age, have so far failed. The university congregation backed the policy for the sixth time last month in a postal vote triggered by campaigners, withabout two-thirds of voters (1,142) supporting the rule and nearly one-third (538) opposing it.

However, campaigners believe that the release of the two appeal judgments could be a turning point.

David Palfreyman, director of the Oxford Centre for Higher Education Policy Studies, who is opposed to the EJRA, said that the universitys congregation has never yet been fully informed on all this when trying to make a proper decision.

The universitys pathetic hiding of the Smith judgment for so long hardly demonstrates that congregation has, so far, been properly informed, said Mr Palfreyman, bursar of New College, Oxford.

In his judgment, Sir Mark who served as the Intelligence Services Commissioner between 2011 and 2017 criticises the failure to show Dame Janets findings to the congregation before it voted on the issue, stressing the need for a balanced debate based on the facts. He also says, however, that a vote did not necessarily make the EJRA process lawful, although it could be an important material factor if it were challenged.

Paul Ewart, professor of physics at Oxfords Clarendon Laboratory, said that Sir Marks judgment was an important victory for the campaign.

Another eminent judge has confirmed Dame Janets judgment that the universitys EJRA was not objectively justified and therefore unfair, and rebuked council for withholding the original judgment from congregation before it voted to retain it, he said.

In public debates at the university over the past few months, the issue of compulsory retirement has been described as a battle between old, white menhanging limpet-like to space and resource and talented young scholarstrying to get their first stable job.

Defenders of the EJRA, which is also in effect at the universities of Cambridge and St Andrews, claim that low turnover of staff at these institutions means fewer opportunities for younger scholars particularly female and ethnic minority staff as academics are happy to stay put well into their seventies.

A University of Oxford spokesman played down the significance of the two internal appeal decisions, saying that they both relate to the EJRA system in place before September 2015 when major revisions were made to procedures in light of Dame Janets recommendations, including a one-year increase in the retirement age.

Neither decision challenges the validity of a university EJRA as a means of promoting intergenerational fairness and maintaining opportunities for career progression, he said.This fundamental principle has been overwhelmingly endorsed by congregation, which has now voted six times in the last three months to support the revised EJRA.

jack.grove@timeshighereducation.com

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Oxford tribunal rules against compulsory retirement rule - Times Higher Education (THE)

MUMBAI: Abolition of octroi could result in saving of more than Rs 2,000 crore and cut down freight time for trucks and commercial vehicles by at least 25%.

As many as 22 states have abolished their check posts since July 1 with the advent of GST. Tax rate on transport services has been increased to 5% from 4.5%, which will be borne by the buyer or seller of the goods whoever is availing the freight services; the latter can then lower final tax liability by claiming input credit.

Also, a GST notification exempting registration of some of the associated entities would save transporters from a lot of paper work.

On an average we spent three hours waiting at the check posts and there was a lot of harassment. In addition, if there are any minor issues with the documents, there was delay of another 3 to 4 hours. And irrespective of whether the documents are in order or not, there was always some bribe to be paid to officials, Said Anil Vijan of G Shantilal Transport Company who operates a fleet of 80 trucks in the southern states.

According to him, covering the distance from Mumbai to Bengaluru, along with loading/unloading of cargo, should not take more than 18 to 20 hours, but all trucks had to wait for 6-10 hours extra at two check posts on the route.

Surjeet Singh Chawla of Chawla Road Lines who operates a fleet of 35 trucks on Mumbai-Kolkata route had to deal with five check posts. We expect to save one day now.

Excerpt from:

Octroi abolition may save Rs 2000 crore, cut freight time after GST rollout - Economic Times

ANALYSIS/OPINION:

Happy Independence Day a holiday we owe to the visionary signers of the Declaration of Independence back in 1776. From the youngest to the oldest - Edward Rutledge was only 26 years old at the time and Ben Franklin was 70 - the signers were people who took the long view. They thought in terms of the distant future; in terms of years and generations, not news cycles. Because of their long view, their leadership was transformative.

We would do well to learn from their example.

The remarkable 18th century individuals who gave America freedom were, like other great leaders who took the long view, people who never lost sight of their primary ideals and principles. Although they were never rigid compromise is always needed for effective democratic leadership they avoided distraction and petty entanglements. There would be no American democracy without them.

Models of people with long views are found in other times and places, as well. Perhaps the best known 20th century transformative leader is South Africas Nelson Mandela. His long view sustained him through 27 years of imprisonment until his vision for the country was actualized by the abolition of apartheid, and his election as president. Mandela stepped down from the presidency after one term, an act that led to praise from Americans on both the right and left sides of the political spectrum. President Obama and Charles Krauthammer both compared Mandela to George Washington for stepping away from power. Krauthammer wrote, Thats George Washington. That does not happen often in Africa or anywhere. He never took the power to his head. He never was intoxicated by it. And the example he set is extremely unusual and probably the most lasting to his country.

People who take the long view are not distracted by ego, power, or petty conflict. We need more leaders like that.

If you want to refresh yourself about the meaning of Independence Day and the value of long-view leadership, read Natan Sharanskys Fear No Evil and The Case For Democracy: The Power of Freedom To Overcome Tyranny and Terror. The first is a memoir of oppression in the Soviet Union, where Sharansky spent 9 years in prisons and gulag. The second book explains the beliefs that sustained him then, and which have motivated him since, in his work as an Israeli political leader.

Any discussion of contemporary leaders with a long view must include Aung San Suu Kyi, who became Myanmars leader in 2015, after 15 years of house arrest under her countrys military dictatorship.

None of these people is perfect. They were and are human, flawed individuals like the rest of us. What makes them extraordinary, and defines them as models of leadership is their ability to maintain focus on their values with patience and peacefulness.

Great leaders indeed, great human beings avoid distraction and petty conflict.

On this Independence Day holiday lets be thankful for Americas founders and their long view. Let us resolve to seek and support leaders like them.

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Independence Day: A gift of long-view leadership - Washington Times

The African National Congress, both as a liberation project and governing party, faces daunting challenges.

Changes in the strategic environment deamand a rethinking and deliberate balancing. The strategic rebalancing needs to give way to a dialogue over ideas to manage the multiple dilemmas that blight our national life, a stagnant (now recessionary) economy dominated by racialised cartels, and emboldened reactionary forces buoyed by electoral fortunes.

However, a culture of pornographic and unproductive factionalism has become all-consuming within the ruling party, forestalling an imminently cardinal engagement within the organisation, and is devouring the body politic of the sole instrument of African peoples emancipation.

At the heart of the internecine antagonism between the myriad factions is control over state institutions. The state is seen, by the contending factions, not as a site of production of history but rather as a site of accumulation.

The abolition of the colonial-apartheid system of governance and its attended institutions did not resolve the conflict between the social democratic idea, as expressed in the National Democratic Revolution, and the reality of largely racialised social divisions. A great deal of work remains to be done. There still remains an urgent need to achieve an estate of equal citizenship for the historically marginalised black, particularly African people, not just in theory but as a matter of socio-economic fact. Today this process of social democratisation, though advanced, largely because of deliberate policies of the African National Congress, remains incomplete.

We have no need for a litany of statics for the purposes of this intervention. The plain fact is that black Africans are vastly and proportionally over-represented among those who suffer the maladies and afflictions of social marginality in South Africa, however measured. African communities are among the most miserable, violent, and despairing places in this land of fabulous wealth. The prisons are overflowing with young African black men, rates of infection with HIV and other chronic diseases are unacceptably and terrifyingly high in African poor communities, African communities experience lower life expectancies, higher infant mortality rates, lower levels of academic achievement, higher poverty rates, and greater unemployment.

Thus, it is mind-boggling that in the midst of an acute socio-economic emergency, the party of that imminent son of our revolution, OR Tambo, should be bound hand and foot by unproductive factional intrigues. The factional fractures have become unbridgeable ideological chasms.

On the one hand, a faction much maligned by the white-owned media and the chattering classes, distinguished by its callous incompetence and a lackadaisical attitude towards public finances, has sloppily and belatedly donned itself with revolutionary garments.

On the other hand, we have a faction of cynical snake-oil salesmen who are wont on insisting that the National Democratic Revolution as a governing ethos can have no other function than to serve and safeguard the interests and economic-cultural domination of white monopoly capital, which they insist, astonishingly, is a figment of our imagination.

The net effect of these factional contrivances has been the incremental socio-cultural civic ex-communication of the oldest liberation movement on the African continent. There has been a marked demoralisation on the constituent elements of the National Democratic Revolution as expressed in the worrisome results of the 2016 local government elections.

As we deliberate in the policy conference, we must reassert the ethos of service to our disinherited popular masses. We must reject cults of personalities and unproductive factionalism that are leading our revolution adrift. We must categorically and boldly assert that white monopoly capital is the enemy of a sovereign people, and adopt policies that unflinchingly challenge power of the finance-industrial-resource white complex. Equally we must send an unequivocal message to the contemptuous philistine section that we lost our best sons and daughters in the struggle for to liberate this country. We will therefore not mortgage the inheritance of our forebears for defiled pieces of silver.

The primary role of the African National Congress, as the steward of civic cohesion, insurer of geopolitical integrity, guarantor of social progress, and a depository of historic experience, is to direct societys gaze to the effective truth of national redemption, commonly known as the National Democratic Revolution. This task must be undertaken with revolutionary moral clarity and energy. DM

Andile Lungisa is former deputy president of the ANC, Eastern Cape.

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Factions and the Crisis of Power - Daily Maverick

As you approach the Scottish Parliament from the Royal Mile, a modest curve juts out from the obnoxious angles. This camber, the Canongate Wall, is studded with 26 slates of Scottish stone each bearing a quotation from the Bible and scriveners of more questionable repute. Among them is the instruction to work as if you live in the early days of a better nation, etched on Iona marble and attributed to the novelist Alasdair Gray. The words are totemic for Scottish nationalists, a rallying cry heard often during the 2014 referendum. And why not? They bear the promise of national rebirth, of hope in even the darkest days.

Inside, where the SNP can not only work but legislate for a better nation, inertia reigns. MSPs have only just returned to law-making after a year without passing any bills except the budget; Ministers were otherwise engaged, seeking to parlay Englands Leave vote into support for Scottish independence. That didnt go entirely to plan and after a punishing reversal in the General Election, Nicola Sturgeon has graciously allowed that she might wait a while longer before pushing a second referendum. On Tuesday, after ten years of SNP government, the First Minister declared: We look forward to getting on with the job in the best interests of all the people of Scotland. On Thursday, Holyrood went into recess for the summer.

It is just as well. The Presiding Officers gavel fell on a parliament at its lowest ebb since reconvening in 1999. Scottish education is in crisis, embarked on yet another bout of tinkering masquerading as reform as surveys show literacy and numeracy rates across all levels, genders, and incomes stalling or tumbling. The Scottish Government is now abolishing the surveys, the third such metric they have withdrawn from because its findings were unpalatable. Schools are now light 4000 teachers, colleges 150,000 places and youngsters from deprived backgrounds are four times less likely to reach university. Since 2010, spending on education has been cut by more than 1bn.

Cancer referral waiting times are being met by only two of 15 health boards and accident & emergency departments continue to miss the four-hour wait target. Little wonder, since the Scottish Government has U-turned on a promise to cut junior doctors hours and left 3,000 nursing posts unfilled. A usually sober think tank warns Scotland could tip into recession any day now; a troubled IT scheme has delayed CAP payments to farmers for the second year in a row; and for reasons which even SNP MSPs struggle to understand, the government reintroduced the banned practice of tail-docking puppy dogs.

This is what politics looks like when everything must revolve around the constitution or go spin. And even that they can no longer do properly, forced to publish their second referendum consultation quietly on the last day of parliament, so unhinged were the public responses. A clanjamfrie of prejudice and paranoia, demands ranged from stripping English-born voters of the franchise to safeguarding against MI5 rigging the vote again.

Scottish politics has been poisoned by nationalism but, worse, it has been enervated by it. In the early days of our better nation, cynicism abounded about devolution. Holyrood was a diddy parliament with diddy powers and diddy politicians.Eventually MSPs decided that the country would only take them seriously if they took themselves seriously, and they embarked on a restless legislative agenda of land reform, repeal of Clause 28, free personal care, a new teacher pay agreement, abolition of tuition fees, and a ban on smoking in public places. There was still cynicism and resistance, scandals and rows but Scotlands parliament had finally grown up.

What changed, and there is no way to dress this up or wish it away, was the election of an SNP government in 2007. For the first four years, their lack of a majority and Alex Salmonds political nous, saw Holyrood rumble along much as usual, if in a less radical direction, with extra police, a council tax freeze, and cuts to business rates. But the SNPs surprise majority in 2011 made independence a live issue and, as soon became clear, the only issue. Other legislation did not stop, even if it slowed, but all became secondary to preparing for, holding, and campaigning in the independence referendum. At the same time, the single-mindedness that unites the SNP made for a parliament that was boorish and Politburish. Opponents were branded anti-Scottish and routinely accused of talking down Scotland; comically unrebellious backbenchers and Nationalist-dominated committees nodded along to most of the executives wishes.

The wages of Scotlands ten-year romance with the politics of identity are all around. Holyrood is now a proper parliament with proper powers and even the odd proper politician but it has a diddy government. For a nationalist party, the SNP is remarkably unambitious for the country it professes to love. Alasdair Grays injunction actually a paraphrase of Canadian poet Dennis Lee does not require the better nation to be near or even plausible; it merely tells us to strive in pursuit of improvement. The Nationalists seem to strive only in pursuit of independence and where independence looks impossible they seem not to strive at all.

Devolution has stopped working and will not restart until the SNP settles for a better nation on the way to an ideal one.

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Scotland needed government. It got nationalism instead - Spectator.co.uk (blog)