Several ALTER members attended a seminar organised by the Coalition for Economic Justice last week, which aimed to explore common ground between campaigners on Money Reform and Land (Tax) Reform. A full report will shortly appear on the CEJ website.
Report on CEJ Conference on Money and Land Reform
A paper which largely draws on policy drafted by ALTER and approved by Party Conference in 2007 has been sent to HM Treasury's Commercial Property Tax Team, at their request. This followed a meeting in HM Treasury, attended by ALTER's Dr Tony Vickers, that was set up before the General Election by the cross-party Coalition for Economic Justice (CEJ). Subsequent to that meeting, CEJ wrote a pre-Budget submission to Chancellor George Osborne, copying the letter to Vince Cable.
The motion which ALTER had supported (although it was not our idea) on radical reform of the way that money is created "from thin air" by banks has not been accepted by the Party's Federal Conference Committee (FCC).
ALTER's Executive committee has met to decide on its Party Conference fringe event theme at Liverpool in September. Speakers will be asked to comment on a new chapter in the successful book (The Case for a New Peoples Budget) which ALTER published last year, by Brian Hodgkinson, probing the links between the global banking crisis and failure in land markets.
ALTER is confident of having a 'good' Party Conference this year, having noted that two policy motions on the agenda feature the role that resource taxes can play in helping to turn around the UK economy.