Taxpayer's Lament

Press, Volume C, Issue 29513, 13 May 1961, Page 3

Taxpayer's Lament

The Tax Gatherers. ByJames Coffield. Hutchinson. 155 pp.

This "startling expose” of the United Kingdom income tax system, “with all its anomalies, obscurities, inconsistencies and above all. injustices, will be a revelation to even the most cynical taxpayer.” says the ‘ dust jacket; “for the truth is far worse than our worst imaginings. “Britain is the most heavilytaxed nation in the world” [a claim recently disputed]; "that is common knowledge. But Mr Coffield reveals that our tax system has become inhuman, a monster that devours people . . .” The contents of the book, if they do not substantiate the claims of the blurb, certainly show the author as a zealot, it not a fanatic. For instance: “It is the politician who is finally responsible for the tax system. If people abscond rather than pay the taxes, a great deal of blame must be laid at his door.” And who elects the politician, if not the taxpayers? There are two main burdens of Mr Coffield's complaint: that the level of taxation in Britain is too high, and that the methods of assessment and collection are sometimes arbitrary and inequitable. The first complaint has been the subject

of exhaustive treatment by economists (for 150 years or more). Complaints against the British public service in general have been more effectively aired by other authors—notably C. Northcote Parkinson. The quiet satire of “Parkinson’s Law” has made more impact than Mr Coflield’s “startling expose" is likely to achieve.