Oral Answers to Questions — National Finance – in the House of Commons am 12:00 am ar 10 Tachwedd 1964.
Mr Marcus Lipton
, Lambeth Brixton
12:00,
10 Tachwedd 1964
asked the Chancellor of the exchequer how many one-man businesses declare a net income of less than £500 a year.
Mr Jack Diamond
, Gloucester
The latest available figures of assessments on trading profits and professional earnings are for 1961–62 and they relate, broadly speaking, to the earnings in 1960. The number of cases where the net true income assessed was less than £500 a year amounted to 851,900. The figures of net true income are after deduction of capital allowances. I would remind my hon. Friend that some of these assessments are on subsidiary earnings and some are for only part of a year, while they exclude all income of the taxpayer from any other source.
Mr Marcus Lipton
, Lambeth Brixton
Is there not something odd and, perhaps, even fishy about those figures? Do they not reveal that a substantial number of people are either understating their income or, alternatively, not deriving much benefit from the so-called affluence of thirteen years of Tory rule?
Mr Jack Diamond
, Gloucester
As to the first part of the question, it is not at all evident from the figures for the reasons which I have already given. The record of efficiency of tax inspectors in this country in assessing trading profits compares favourably with the record of other countries.
The chancellor of the exchequer is the government's chief financial minister and as such is responsible for raising government revenue through taxation or borrowing and for controlling overall government spending.
The chancellor's plans for the economy are delivered to the House of Commons every year in the Budget speech.
The chancellor is the most senior figure at the Treasury, even though the prime minister holds an additional title of 'First Lord of the Treasury'. He normally resides at Number 11 Downing Street.
The political party system in the English-speaking world evolved in the 17th century, during the fight over the ascension of James the Second to the Throne. James was a Catholic and a Stuart. Those who argued for Parliamentary supremacy were called Whigs, after a Scottish word whiggamore, meaning "horse-driver," applied to Protestant rebels. It was meant as an insult.
They were opposed by Tories, from the Irish word toraidhe (literally, "pursuer," but commonly applied to highwaymen and cow thieves). It was used — obviously derisively — to refer to those who supported the Crown.
By the mid 1700s, the words Tory and Whig were commonly used to describe two political groupings. Tories supported the Church of England, the Crown, and the country gentry, while Whigs supported the rights of religious dissent and the rising industrial bourgeoisie. In the 19th century, Whigs became Liberals; Tories became Conservatives.
