Tax Breaks For Black Pills

Well, bit of a black pill yesterday. We had the story that the Brexit Party will be offering tax breaks to wealthy people who use private health care. The private healthcare issue did pop up in the Farage Question Time special from the other night, though I don't recall him specifically mentioning tax breaks. Perhaps I missed it. Either way, it's a terrible policy. Both optically, and in practice.

You're attacking Labour seats in the north. This isn't going to woo those people. In fact, it'll probably scare many off. When I first saw the headline my initial thought was "Wow, are they actually deliberately trying to throw this election??".

As for the actual practicality of the policy there are so many potential issues. A tax break is essentially a subsidy. So you'll have a situation where the government is essentially subsidising private healthcare. The complete opposite of the entire point of private provision. On top of this it's yet more paperwork and policing for the government. All the effort that'll go into deciding what does and doesn't qualify for the tax break. The action needed to make sure it isn't abused, etc.

Of course, we already have lots of wealthy and not so wealthy people using private healthcare. So after such a policy was introduced they'd all suddenly be eligible for the tax break presumably. It's totally mad.

You'll probably end up with millionaires getting tax breaks because their wives have had boob jobs.

An extreme example maybe xD, but again what would count? Do you count mental health treatment too? "She needed the boob job, she had low self-esteem!"

Localpol.

Anyway, let's move on to local politics, which kind of ties in.

The policies of the Brexit Party, including the one above (assuming it becomes official policy), are putting me off a bit. I've mentioned on here before that I'm against proportional representation. The Brexit Party also have a policy to bring in a written constitution. Which I'm not too keen on. Personally I like our organic, evolving constitution. Plus who would even write such a new constitution? What would be in it? And why would you vote for a constitution you haven't even seen yet?

Can you imagine our current era of politicians writing a constitution???! Look at the wrangling over leaving the EU. Lawyers arguing over angels on pinheads. Often totally missing the realpolitik. If leaving a "trading block" takes decades then writing a constitution will no doubt take them several centuries.

So, given my apprehensions I'm now even less sure where my vote is going.

I've been saying on this blog that the Conservatives can't win in this seat (Middlesbrough central). However, I'm now seriously considering voting that way. The Conservative candidate Ruth Betson has started stepping up her campaigning. She even said she'd move to Middlesbrough if she won the seat (!)

The Independent candidate Antony High is continuing to come on leaps and bounds though, and at the moment it's looking like a race between him and the Labour incumbent Andy McDonald. From a tactical point of view it perhaps makes sense to vote for him to block Labour, but; the Brexit issue. To be fair he did actually say on Facebook recently that he voted to leave and has said he'd respect the result. However, yesterday he posted stating that the Brexit Party were;

"Seemingly campaigning on a “Brexit means Brexit at any cost” campaign but, do our local issues not matter to the Brexit Party, or their candidates?"

Complaining about "Brexit at any cost" sounds like a bit of a remainerism.

So at the moment it's probably a choice between the Brexit Party and the Conservatives for me.