Corporate Spain: Talking about corrpuption . . . Here's a case study - Abengoa - as seen by the estimable Don Quijones. As with politics, this tells you a great deal about corporate Spain and its links with possibly the even more corrupt political nexus. Think secret (and illegal) party funding.
Another of Those Mere Accidents Involving a Raging Bull: See here. Carmen Navarro, the mayor of La Vilavella insisted the death was "a terrible accident and not the result of any failure in safety measures." Yes, of course it was. Totally unpredictable. Except when you realise it was the 6th such death this year.
Driving in Spain: Those pesky roundabouts/circles. El Tráfico has issued this clear advice. Essentially, it says you should be in the outer lane only if you're turning right or going straight ahead. This is quite definitely not what's taught to learners in my neck of the woods. These, under instruction, occupy this lane for whatever exit, even if they're making a U-turn. Possibly this is why El Tráfico felt it necessary to issue the advice. If you study this, you'll realise that - where there are 2 lanes going in and 2 lanes going out - there is no sense in not using the inner lane to go straight on. After all, everyone on your right is either leaving before you or, like you, going straight on. At least in theory. Further, the advice from El Tráfico also conflicts with the arrows on Pontevedra's roads. All that said, you'd be wise to recall that, if some fool not turning right or going straight on crosses your path - an everyday experience here - you'll be legally responsible for the crash. Very possibly this is why El Tráfico advises you not to take the risk. And that's why you should ponder it.
Yet More Lists from The Local:
Five reasons why the PSOE socialist party refuses to back Rajoy.
Ten Commandments for expats living in Spain. Possibly another repeat. I can't keep up.
Ten top tips for dating in Spain. Ditto. For the ladies only, I think.
Pontevedra: Anyone know why are there so many Irish tourists this year? Whatever, here's a site for those interested in coming here. Not that I really want you to. And especially not in the glorious tourist-free month of September. Like everywhere else, Pontevedra will inevitably be ruined by (British?) tourists but I'm hoping this will be after I've shuffled off this mortal coil. BTW . . . Don't bother going to the link if you can't read Spanish.
Finally . . . Miscellanea:
- Last night my sleeping brain invented the verb To jepscoe, as in The British have jepscoed it. Google throws up nothing. So, meanings are invited.
- Politics and Theism: An example of what this rich mix produces.
- By 10am yesterday morning, there was no sign at all of the Feira Franca revelry in town. The Spanish are even more efficient at dismantling parties than they are at mantling them.
- Advice: Don't buy gel superglue. Or at least not in a Carrefour supermarket. It's likely to be a hard blob when you finally get to it by cutting away the plastic packaging.
THE GALLERY
Plaza Teucro, midday Sunday, 4th September 2016. After 36 hours of Feira Franca revelling
A BREXIT ARTICLE, by an Outer.
We are getting out in
the nick of time.
The keepers of the
European Union’s dying project have gone beyond the denial phase of
mourning and are now utterly deranged. A historic bridge was crossed
last week when the European Commission, in the person of its
competition commissioner Margrethe Vestager, announced that Apple’s
tax arrangements with Ireland were illegal and, as a consequence, the
company would have to pay £11 billion pounds in back taxes to the
Irish government – which it does not want. Indeed, so adamant is
the Irish coalition government on this point that it is now appealing
against the EU ruling.
The question is not
whether huge multi-national corporations might avoid paying the same
rates of tax which smaller companies, with less mobile assets, are
required to pay. That is a legitimate moral and political debate but
it cannot be confused with the argument that concerns us here.
Whether you hate the power of corporate giants, or even global
capitalism itself, is neither here nor there.
What is shocking about
the EU fiat is that it overruled the taxation policy of an elected
government, and it did this not by enforcing existing law as
understood and agreed by member states, but by relabelling this
particular agreement so that it could be considered under a different
category. In other words, because the Commission cannot (yet) demand
that a national government change its internal tax rates, it decided
that Ireland’s arrangement with Apple was not a tax rate problem as
such, but a special concession to a particular company which
contravenes EU competition law.
This is a bit of
semantic jiggery-pokery which effectively finds a way to undermine
the right of individual member countries to determine their own
fiscal priorities and to do what they believe is best for their own
populations. What the Commission is trying to do is institute fiscal
union – enforced uniformity of taxation policy across the EU – by
the back door. It has been attempting for some time to browbeat
Ireland into raising its official level of corporation tax which is
lower than that of its EU partners, on the grounds that this is
“unfair” competition for business. It is not too far-fetched to
surmise that this latest EU stunt over Apple has been done in
impotent fury over Ireland’s refusal to conform on corporation tax.
So what, you may say,
if a global megalith like Apple is being stung for back taxes,
whether the charge is legitimate or not? But think about what is at
risk here. If a democratically elected government cannot determine
its own taxation policies, then it is scarcely a government at all –
and its democratic mandate is pretty much meaningless. What, after
all, determines how most people vote if not the proposals of the
various parties for how they intend to tax and spend? Parliaments,
prime ministers and secretaries of state become nothing more than
functionaries: the local managerial branches of a central authority
which holds all the real power. In effect, they are like colonial
outposts of an empire, administering the decisions which come down to
them from unelected policy-makers outside their borders.
Ireland has fought to
maintain its low corporation tax precisely because it wants to
compete for inward investment against larger, aggressively successful
countries. This strategy of cutting business taxes is one of the most
efficient ways a small economy can grow. In America, some of what had
been the poorest states of the union revolutionised their economic
status by drastically cutting their business taxes (which the
Constitution guarantees to be within their own control) thus drawing
in greater investment to provide jobs and prosperity. Indeed, the
only way to help the poor members of a federation like the US or the
EU is either by providing them with endless central funding – which
creates a kind of inter-state welfare dependency – or by permitting
them to adjust their tax policy to encourage investment and growth.
Without the power to
create a competitive tax regime, poor places are locked forever into
either poverty, or dependence on hand-outs from richer neighbours.
Which path would the EU Commission prefer? Actually, it seems to
prefer not to think about the problem at all. Nor does it seem
concerned that its precious “free movement of people” rule is
ensuring that the most talented and ambitious young people among the
poor populations of the EU are flocking to the richer countries whose
growing economies offer the opportunities that may never be available
at home – thanks to Brussels’ insistence that governments not
compete “unfairly” for business.
Meanwhile the UK, were
it not for the wisdom of its population in the referendum, might have
been in line for the same treatment as Ireland in the not-distant
future. This country has, after all, a notable history for making
radical fiscal decisions when it needs to save itself and serve the
interests of its own people. Over the coming months and years, we
will be re-discovering the joys of such independence, and that
liberation will be particularly striking if Brussels gets its way and
succeeds in shutting down the self-determination and accountability
of EU puppet governments. Well, goodbye to all that. The world is
soon to be open to us for bi-lateral trade agreements with our old
Commonwealth friends – with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm
Turnbull keen to be first to start talks – and with the Asian tiger
economies.
Ironically, the great
explosion of technological enterprise from which Ireland has hitherto
been in a position to benefit will now be quite likely to shop for a
new home – and the UK will be a perfect candidate with the same
advantages of transatlantic connections and English language that
Ireland had. But the kind of bilateral trade deals with us which
Ireland, as a small independent economy, might once have enjoyed will
not be possible so long as it remains an EU member.
There will be limitless
opportunities for an industrious, entrepreneurial country no longer
bound by the parochialism of the EU with its obtusely outdated
post-war view of economics. An infinitely adaptable tax structure and
a frankly competitive approach to encouraging investment – perhaps
with a serious cut in corporation tax and a further lowering of
National Insurance contributions for start-up businesses – could
allow partnerships to be formed with eager, equally adaptable,
emerging powers as well as the possibility of instantaneous response
to new technologies and markets. If ever there was a moment to throw
off hidebound assumptions and ideological restrictions, this is it.
Talk of adopting the
Norway (or the Swiss) model is absurdly self-limiting. Our
circumstances as a large, variegated and flourishing economy are
unique. Without the encumbrance of Brussels protectionism and
perverse anti-competitiveness, our new arrangements can be bespoke
and endlessly flexible – surely the keys to survival in a
globalised economy.
The dream of a European
union was seen from the outset as a way of undermining the nation
state with its dangerous tendency to evoke febrile nationalism. The
war crimes of the 20th century were to be repudiated forever by
deconstructing that demonic vision. Almost entirely forgotten has
been the lesson of an earlier century: that the concept of
self-governing nationhood, with a government accountable to its own
people and free to set its own economic goals, was one of the most
progressive ideas in human history.
It may be time for the
British to offer a new version of that model which was once their
gift to the world.
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