\n Polanksi: Criticisms of calls for a wealth tax are ‘absurd’ – as he says it’s about ‘fairness’\n <\/p>\n
Zack Polanski has defended his calls for a wealth tax, and said the criticism that the richest in society will leave is “absurd” because “most of the time you can’t just pick up an asset and move”.<\/p>\n
The Green Party leader is leading a protest outside of parliament, calling on the chancellor to introduce wealth taxes in the budget tomorrow.<\/p>\n
Polanski wants to see a 1% tax on assets over \u00a310m and a 2% tax on those worth \u00a31bn or more. He has also called for capital gains tax to be brought in line with income tax.<\/p>\n
This would ensure “we are taxing unearned wealth as much as we’re taxing earned income”, he tells Sky News.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“It’s all about fairness.”<\/p>\n
Asked whether it is unrealistic to expect the wealthiest to stay in the UK or to not use the best accountants to avoid a wealth tax, Polanski hits back.<\/p>\n
He says: “First of all, let’s make sure that we’re investing in HMRC, so people aren’t able to escape paying tax. That’s ultimately about fairness.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Everyone, particularly the poorest people are made to pay their tax, and they’re not going to get away with it. So why should the super rich get away with it?\u00a0<\/p>\n
“But also we’re talking about assets here, and most of the time you can’t just pick up an asset and move.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“The Duke of Westminster owns half of Mayfair. You can’t just pick that up and move away with it.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“So, ultimately it’s about making sure that we’re targeting the assets.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“I also think it’s a fundamental misunderstanding of wealth.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“If you’re very wealthy and you’re being asked to pay 1% or 2% of your wealth, the idea you’re just going to get up and leave the country because you don’t want to pay what is a relatively small proportion of your wealth just seems a little bit absurd.”<\/p>\n
Polanski tells our presenter Sophy Ridge that he welcomes suggestions that the chancellor may introduce a so-called “mansion tax” in the budget tomorrow, changing council tax for the highest-valued properties.<\/p>\n
“Obviously this would depend on the details that come out tomorrow, but absolutely, in principle, it’s totally something I’d support,” he says.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Polanksi: Criticisms of calls for a wealth tax are ‘absurd’ – as he says it’s about ‘fairness’ Zack…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":312510,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[4,450,451,3,452,453],"class_list":{"0":"post-312509","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-breaking-news","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-breakingnews","10":"tag-headlines","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-top-stories","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312509","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=312509"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/312509\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/312510"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=312509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=312509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=312509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}