Sir Philip Green to be targeted

Posted on

The Guardian reports:

Sir Philip Green, the retail billionaire and efficiency adviser to the government, is to become the target of a nationwide campaign by protesters opposed to government cuts and alleged tax avoidance.

High street stores belonging to the businessman's group, including Topshop, Dorothy Perkins and Miss Selfridge, will be among those that protesters focus on in the run-up to Christmas.

Plans to disrupt Arcadia Group stores were devised by UK Uncut, a fast-expanding group of activists who have closed down more than 30 Vodafone shops in the past six weeks by mobilising through social networks.

I note my work is referred to a couple of times in the story. I have no problem with that. Nor do I have problems with these protests: anger about the tax gap and tax avoidance is wholly appropriate at this moment. As I said at a TUC rally in October:

We would get back £20 billion a year [by tackling the Tax Gap].

And that’s the annual investment that we need now if we want turn this economy round to create the jobs we so badly need — and which would create the wealth and generate the tax — all the tax — we need to clear the deficit.

Which is exactly why we don’t need cuts.

But the ConDems won’t do this.

I’ll tell you why.

They would rather the tax cheats of this country have this money than the pensioners of this country have this money,

Better that the cheats have it they say than the children of this country get the education they need.

And the better the accountants, the lawyers and the bankers have this money they say than the sick, the unemployed, the disabled, the public servants and the defenders of this country have it.

That’s their choice.

It’s the wrong choice.

You know that.

I know that.

Together we must fight them.

We must fight for fair taxation.

We must fight for the jobs of those who will collect tax.

And we must fight so that the honest people of this country can have the money that the ConDems will give to the cheats.

That’s the fight we have on our hands

And friends that the fight we must win.

If UK Uncut won’t to take this forward, and they do so peaceably, that’s fine by me.


Thanks for reading this post.
You can share this post on social media of your choice by clicking these icons:

You can subscribe to this blog's daily email here.

And if you would like to support this blog you can, here: