Southerners and Northerners are paying higher taxes, but only the Southerners are benefiting.

I really do not think it is a North/South divide issue it is a rich/poor divide.

This so true GrannyGravy - we have a lot of poor people in London.

Who do you think cleans the gleaming offices, works in shops & West End restaurants, cares for the vulnerable and other minimum-wage jobs, and pays very high accommodation costs.

Plenty of comfortably-off in the North.

Divide and Rule.

Urmstongran

Quite true GG13. They both get to eat (essential) but the rich do get to play with more toys. The poor do not own say, a boat, an SUV or a horse. They do however have recourse to ‘shank’s pony’.

Unfortunately Urmstongran that’s life.

There is no such thing as everyone earning equally. Which is where the State comes in to help those who need it.

Rising wages should help the lowest paid.

Remember the squeezed middle who do not earn enough to invest off shore but still get hit by higher rate tax (this includes train drivers, some teachers and many others)

Quite true GG13. They both get to eat (essential) but the rich do get to play with more toys. The poor do not own say, a boat, an SUV or a horse. They do however have recourse to ‘shank’s pony’.

I really do not think it is a North/South divide issue it is a rich/poor divide.

If you can afford to pay you should pay, if you cannot the state should be there offering a safety net.

I liken it to the weekly food shop, the percentage of income spent by someone on a low income will be much more than the percentage of a high income earner. Both have to eat.

Milest0ne

When is the country going to realise that the prime ministers
EATONOMICS only works for those blinkered individuals who attended Eaton.

That was a decent joke. Spoilt a bit because the word is Eton. Not Eaton.

See the post above about the poster’s self funding relative and the man who had seemingly spent his life on benefits in a council house. No difference in their treatment.

I disagree. The issue is available staff, the number of which won't increase even if people fund themselves.

PS. Private healthcare doesn't cut NHS waiting lists.

Surely everyone is kept in the same way unless they’re very rich and can afford a very superior home which doesn’t accept people paid for by the state, and I see no reason why they shouldn’t do that if they can afford it. Same as private medical treatment, which helps the NHS waiting lists.

Germanshepherdsmum

I’m not the first to say that many people have benefited hugely from house price inflation but have very little savings, and it’s not the people going into care who lose out by having to sell their house, which they are never going back to, but their heirs. Rich and poor will receive the same care, unless of course the rich elect to live in a really ritzy care home. So is this really an argument about inheritance?

Of course it is.

I live in a very wealthy town, but I'm as poor as a church mouse and don't even own a property. I still pay the same tax rates as my wealthier neighbours. That's my point. I'm fed up with tribal divisiveness and people from one "group" being set against people from another "group", based on age, location, ethnic background or whatever.

My area actually loses out on all sorts of grants for deprived areas, which is fine if averages are considered. However, it does mean that poorer people lose some of the facilities which would be available in poorer areas. I expect people know (or maybe they don't) that council tax isn't spent by the "home" councils - it's paid into a central pot and redistributed. My council pays in more than it receives from central government. I'm OK with that, but I do get miffed that people think everybody in wealthy areas is rich.

I can’t see why people who are well off should be kept in the manner to which they are accustomed. That is unfair.

I’m not the first to say that many people have benefited hugely from house price inflation but have very little savings, and it’s not the people going into care who lose out by having to sell their house, which they are never going back to, but their heirs. Rich and poor will receive the same care, unless of course the rich elect to live in a really ritzy care home. So is this really an argument about inheritance?

Whitewavemark2

growstuff

For once I agree with lemongrove (to an extent). It's not about a north/south divide. It's a about a rich/poor divide. It just so happens that most of the people with low value housing live in certain areas, mainly in the north.

Of course it is! But property wealth resides in the South, that is the point.

Poverty or relatively less wealthy exists throughout the country but you simply cant ignore the point that we are all paying the same % tax but the property owner in the south is paying less as
a % of her property than the property owner in the north.

I agree, but it's not just a north/south divide. It's a poverty/wealth divide.

varian

lemongrove

I couldn’t afford to live in several parts of the North and neither could I afford to live in several parts of the South.
Average prices mean nothing.

Average price, or any average properly calculated, is meaningful to those of us who are interested in facts .

Sure, but it's not helpful to individuals.

Casdon

Average house prices are key, surely. If 100 people need care in a poor area, and 100 people in a rich area, for example you would have 85 of them in the poor area spending all they have, compared with say 15 in a rich area. Of course it’s relative, but overall a far higher proportion in a poor area lose out.

Yes, but that's no help to you as an individual if you're poor in a rich area. It shouldn't be about which area you live in, but individual circumstances.

When is the country going to realise that the prime ministers
EATONOMICS only works for those blinkered individuals who attended Eaton.

Average house prices are key, surely. If 100 people need care in a poor area, and 100 people in a rich area, for example you would have 85 of them in the poor area spending all they have, compared with say 15 in a rich area. Of course it’s relative, but overall a far higher proportion in a poor area lose out.

If there were to be means testing instead do you think it would be fairer?

varian

The average property price in London region is £656k.

The average property price in Hatlepool is £146k

Five of the most affordable areas in Scotland have average house prices under £65k

No north/south divide?

These proposals would just affect England, I think varian

lemongrove

I couldn’t afford to live in several parts of the North and neither could I afford to live in several parts of the South.
Average prices mean nothing.

Average price, or any average properly calculated, is meaningful to those of us who are interested in facts .

Tory MPs understand the potential ramifications of what Johnson has done. All they have to hope is that any future government tweaks the bill.

growstuff

For once I agree with lemongrove (to an extent). It's not about a north/south divide. It's a about a rich/poor divide. It just so happens that most of the people with low value housing live in certain areas, mainly in the north.

Of course it is! But property wealth resides in the South, that is the point.

Poverty or relatively less wealthy exists throughout the country but you simply cant ignore the point that we are all paying the same % tax but the property owner in the south is paying less as
a % of her property than the property owner in the north.

For once I agree with lemongrove (to an extent). It's not about a north/south divide. It's a about a rich/poor divide. It just so happens that most of the people with low value housing live in certain areas, mainly in the north.

lemongrove?
Is being one of the poorest regions in Europe not a qualifier for being ‘a poor old place’ as you put it? Having some expensive houses does not detract from the reality of the relative wealth of a region.

Just what I knew already Casdon but my comments still stand....there are very expensive parts of the country in all regions, North Yorkshire and Cheshire just two places.
In Cornwall there are poorer places and some that you need upwards of half a million, and so on and so forth.
To fondly imagine that ‘The North’ is a poor old place is simply not true.