Guest blog piece by Revd Paul Nicolson of Taxpayers Against Poverty
Dear all,
Taxpayers
Against Poverty hopes to bring together people of good will of all
faiths and of none who are motivated to work with and for the UK's
poorest citizens.
My
own motivation is both humanitarian and faith based. Since the poll tax
in the 1990s I have been moved by the distress among the benefit
claimants I have met, who have been forced into debt by draconian laws
enforcing council tax, rent and fines against very inadequate incomes in
work and unemployment. The fines have been for poverty related offences
like fare and TV license evasion and shop lifting.
In
fact the first case I supported in the Magistrates court was while I
was a student at Theological College in Oxford in 1965 - she was a
cleaner on benefit who had been caught shop lifting; there was no fine
or costs but a conditional discharge from the Magistrates. She fainted
hit her head on the dock and was taken to hospital.
Currently
the ever more draconian laws enforce unmanageable council tax, rent and
fines arrears against very inadequate and diminishing incomes.
I will leave it to the following letter published in the Church Times last Friday to spell out the motivation inspired by my Christian faith.
Letter in the Church Times.
From the Revd Paul Nicolson
Sir,
- It is encouraging to read about the unopposed support for the motion
at the General Synod affirming the theological imperative of serving the
common good (General Synod, 18 July);
but there is within that commitment a theological imperative to make a
priority of working with and for our poorest fellow citizens in the
villages, towns, and cities of the UK.
That
requires congregations actively to study and understand the structures
of local and national government which impose the increasingly heavy
economic burdens of inadequate incomes and unaffordable housing on
already impoverished people - burdens that create innocent suffering
among a substantial minority of the UK population.
A
Synod motion affirming the common good which does not also explicitly
affirm the reform of the UK economy to ensure that there is an
affordable, decent home to rent or buy, and an adequate minimum income
available for every citizen, is too vague to be a fully representative
statement of the good news of Jesus Christ. He chose to die among the
rejected and impoverished, to endorse his short life of teaching that
they come first.
PAUL NICOLSON
Taxpayers Against Poverty
93 Campbell Road, London N17 0BF
Taxpayers Against Poverty
93 Campbell Road,
Tottenham,
London N17 0BF
0208 3765455
07961 177889
also at www.z2k.org
also at www.prohousingalliance.com
Please sign our petition celbrating Martin Luther King
Parliament
is asked to debate the speech made by Martin Luther King 50 Years ago
in Washington USA on the 28 August 1963 and to note that it can be
applied to circumstances in Britain in August 2013. He said “I have a
dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true
meaning of its creed: We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all
men are created equal.”