The publisher has asked ALTER to produce a suitable Press Release aimed at Lib Dem activists for their Chairman's book, of which you were notified on August 12th. Please download it and forward it on. ALTER will receive half of all profits from the book.
As the 'supply chain' for the book is now in place, please could readers place their orders for it now from tonyvickers@phonecoop.coop. Add £1 to the cover price for postage and packing. Cheques should be made payable to Modern Maps and sent to Tony Vickers, 62 Craven Road, Newbury, RG14 5NJ
Anyone undertaking to write a review of the book for any suitable publication should email the author and publisher immediately. Between us we will ensure that you receive a free copy for the purpose.
The official Launch date is 21st September. You are welcome to attend the author's talk about how he hopes his book will help focus modern politicians' minds on the problems which the Peoples Budget of 1909 failed to solve - because Parliament rejected Lloyd George's Land Tax. See http://www.1909.org.uk This will take place at 11 Mandeville Place, London W1U 3AJ at 2.30pm, as the first in the season's HGF Lunchtime Talks. If you are not a member of HGF but wish to attend, please contact HGF's Chairman David Triggs on 0775 361 8558 to let him know you plan to come.
Foreword by Chris Huhne MP
AS WE APPROACH the centenary of Lloyd George’s 1909 People’s
Budget, this book is a timely reminder of one of its key themes:
location matters. Despite living in a largely ‘virtual’ world of internet
and teleconferencing, the issue of ‘where’ matters as much as
ever and is still vital to politics, community and society. The land
question has not gone away just because we don’t rely on British
land for Britain’s food supply and industrial raw materials. Instead
land lies behind the crises in affordable housing and the lack of
public transport infrastructure.
Vickers combines spatial and political awareness with many years
of careful academic research to give us a very competent and readable
oversight of the issues surrounding land values and land value
taxation. Like growing numbers of people in progressive politics, I
have long believed that the behaviour of imperfect land markets
needs to be addressed by modern government. Neither the property
market nor the tax system are fit for purpose in the modern age
without a carefully constructed land value tax.
The reasons for this have been known to the initiated since Adam
Smith. They are too often ignored and indeed kept from the wider
public by vested interests. This book is a primer for anyone who
wants to help create a more equitable, efficient and sustainable
Britain.
There are few people in Britain today who have done more than
Tony Vickers to bring the land question back into public debate.
In the past decade, numerous studies by and for governments in
these islands have come and gone, some of which have acknowledged
the beneficial attributes of land value tax (LVT) but all of
which gather dust. Some have had too narrow a remit; others have
preached to the converted and used language that makes ‘real world’
politicians and commentators cringe. There is a danger in overstating
the case for LVT of which Vickers is aware.
I commend this book to any radical of whatever party who
supports a free market system but believes markets are there to
serve society and not be their master. As Mark Twain famously said
of land: ‘They don’t make it any more.’ That perception – give or
take a polder or two – is what makes land both unique and capable
of creating such roller coasters of wealth and poverty both within
generations and between them. It is up to governments to intervene
where markets fail. Without land value taxation, the land market in
Britain is bound to fail to deliver the homes and communities we
need. If the Government does not soon intervene to recycle Britain’s
land values, we may not run out of land but we will run out of time
to secure a fair, free and sustainable society.
CHRIS HUHNE MP
House of Commons, July 2007
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Posted by: hlanug ajnmh at September 18, 2007 10:57 PM