Positive Action Group - Possan Jantys Jarrooagh

The recent move by Phil Gawne to abolish the Legislative Council received short shrift from a majority of his of his colleagues in Keys and was thrown out.

At least the proposal raised some fundamental arguments about the purpose and cost of LegCo and it is this latter aspect which we explore in more detail.

The basic salary, from April 2014, for a member of the Legislative Council is £38,771.00.

LegCo has responsibility for the consideration of draft primary legislation (Bills). It is an important role, reviewing and revising new legislation presented to it, generally from the Keys.

The proposed sewage charge has been comprehensively exposed as unfair in its across- the- board application to all properties from a bedsit to a mansion or hotel. It raises a wider, very worrying point about profound and retrograde changes to the whole basis of taxation and public service provision. A similar switch is happening over waste disposal charges, with Government spending being reduced, and the shortfall being passed on to households through Local Authority rates. There is a modicum of proportionality in the banding of properties, but it is still riddled with inequity.

Consider property A with four wage earners, property B with two, and property C with a single pensioner, all in the same property band. Those in A will produce twice as much waste as those in B, and four times as much as the person in C. At the same time the person in C will have to pay proportionally twice as much as each person in B, and four times as much as those in property A... .....regardless of ability to pay.