It looks like the broadband tax, a levy on phone lines to pay for rural broadband, is going ahead.
Can we trust it? I'm not so sure. The Government's record on taxation isn't a brilliant one, and I'm worried that the phone line levy's going to hang around for a very long time.
It wouldn't be the first time. Road tax was changed in 1910 to finance the UK's road system, but these days it's just another tax - so I'm forced to shell out nearly £300 a year, or one-third of my car's value, to drive on roads so pockmarked they can make your teeth vibrate their way out of your ears.
National Insurance was introduced to insure each of us against illness and unemployment and to pay for our pensions, but it doesn't: it's just another tax. And then there's income tax.
Income tax was introduced in 1798 to fund the war against Napoleon, and as you might have noticed he's been dead for quite a while now.
Technically, income tax is still a temporary tax - the government has to renew it every year in a Finance Act - and we've got rid of it on numerous occasions, only to bring it back again when the government of the day runs out of money to pay for wars or wallpaper.
Taxed for ever?
So is the broadband tax really what the government says it is, or will the homeowners of 2525 still be paying for it the way we're still paying for the Napoleonic wars?
We suspect the latter, partly because of the way the tax has been designed. It isn't a levy on super-fast broadband connections, whose owners arguably won't miss 50p a month to help pay for rural broadband; it's a tax on landlines, levied on the suppliers, which mean every pensioner with a phone will pay it while laptop-lugging, mobile broadband-using executives won't - and if the government gets the wording wrong and concentrates only on copper, people with the fastest fibre-optic connections won't pay it either.
Surely an iPhone tax, or a router tax, or a Twitter tax, would be fairer?
We're already hearing the sound of goalposts moving: depending on what you read the tax is either to pay for 2012 (broadband for everyone), 2017 ("next generation" broadband for 90% of the population) or 2032 (another war against France, just for a laugh).
Last but not least, governments aren't in the business of abolishing taxes.
When was the last time the Chancellor of the Exchequer stood up on Budget day and announced that there were too many taxes and he was getting shot of a whole bunch of them?
That's not how governments work, and while it's all very well for the Tories to moan about this latest tax it's awfully optimistic to expect them to actually dump it if they get into power.
Ladies and gentlemen, the phone tax is coming - and once it's here, it's going to be awfully hard to get rid of it.
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Your comments (6) Click to add a new comment
watcherzero
September 25th
6. The tax is so that people in the middle of nowhere with no landlines can get broadband via wireless, problem is since its a tax on landlines they themselves wont contribute once they have it.
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lovlid
September 24th
5. @ optimaximal.
"You would want a Frenchman on your side in a fight because the French are one of the best countries in the world when it comes to war, despite their cowardly reputation. According to historian Niall Ferguson, of the 125 major European wars fought since 1495, France has taken part in 50, which is more than Austria (47) and England (43). Out of 168 battles fought since 387 BC, France has won 109, lost 49 and drawn 10."
Source, Stephen Fry on the excellent Qi.
To get back on topic, sod the tax. Make the ISPs pay, a better service brings in more customers, surely?
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psyfur
September 24th
4. Excellent article Gary! I love paying extra tax so ISP's can make more money.
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rissky
September 24th
3. so, basically we've all got to shell out so that a few bumpkins can have superfast broadband... well i'm sorry, but i live (for my sins) in Hull, and i can't get anything even approaching 'superfast' broadband from our one entrenched network provider (not a monopoly, apparantly - but that's another rant for another day), and mobile is a joke - like being on 13k dial up - but i accept it's a price i have to pay to live here - farmers et al need to accept the same thing - live in the countryside with all the benefits that entails, **** internet access is a price you have to pay. Don't like it? Move. Or pay for access. simples.
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optimaximal
September 24th
2. 'War against France isn't viable - they don't fight, just surrender!
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ripsnorter
September 24th
1. @Gary Marshall - another excellent article, that man! Of course it's a tax that will stay, they all seem to one way or another. Given the present state of public finances the government needs every penny it can get to give to bankers, or something. I think there should be a tax on obesity. Ugly and stupid people should also pay more. Only this way will everyone living in the countryside finally be able to access huge amounts of porn really quickly (Just so I have this right: we pay higher taxes so the ISPs can earn more money?) and the French get the hiding they truly deserve.
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