A caring society shouldn't rely on charity

While granting that it's a serious matter for charities, the furore over Chancellor George Osborne's decision to hack back tax relief on charitable giving supplies a certain amount of amusement from watching the Tories and their Lib Dem cronies tie themselves up in fiscal knots.

Under the rules which he's overturning, higher-rate taxpayers can donate unlimited amounts to charity - even abroad - and offset it against their tax bill to chop down the amount of tax they pay, even as far as zero.

And if you examine the number of charitable trusts that exclusively benefit the families which set up the trusts under one guise or another, or the institutions which help to mantain their class advantages, one can see just how this apparently charitable concession has been used by the super-rich to evade tax entirely and even increase their hold on society.

The Charities Commission and the trusts themselves may furiously deny this, but it's plain to see if you look closely.

Nevertheless, the Chancellor has clamped down on this concession to maximise his taxation income.

Cutting back on such "charitable" giving also served to reclaim the reins of power over which areas benefited from cash which would otherwise be within his government's gift.

But in true Osborne fashion he really didn't consider the consequences of his actions and the reaction that they would provoke from charities on the one hand and his own political colleagues on the other.

The big institutions such as universities, which claim charitable status, are up in arms, as you might expect, especially the privileged and high-status ones which rake in a good income from the apparent generosity of their pampered and privileged alumni.

Oxford University, for example, raised over £1.25 billion over the past eight years from a mixture of huge donations by individuals, foundations and companies.

According to the BBC, Oxford and Cambridge universities accounted for 44.2 per cent of philanthropic funds secured by British universities last year.

It's worth noting that, according to a study by the Sutton Trust in 2010, students from private schools are still 55 times more likely to get a place at Oxford or Cambridge University than state school students who receive free school meals.

Charity, for the posh and powerful, still begins at home and Osborne seems to have forgotten that judging by the howls from his alma mater.

But for once, Osborne, more power to your incompetent elbow and long may you upset your Bullingdon mates with your mistakes. And rest assured, it certainly was a cock-up and not a sudden rush of egalitarian blood to the head.

Because it's left his mate, boss and Bullingdon crony David Cameron with a serious egg-on-the-face problem so difficult that he had to flee the country on an international tour in order to keep his head down.

However, present or not, the Prime Minister's "Big Society" looks like it's under attack, not only from the left, which realises that formalising Lady Bountiful as an alternative to the welfare state is a cheapskate gimmick, but also from 11 Downing Street, where Osborne is intent on discouraging charity by any means available.

It's also driven a dirty great wedge between the Tories and their Lib Dem stooges, who seem to see charity as an embodiment of the caring society, rather than its antithesis.

To hear chief Lib Dem toady Vince Cable talk, Osborne's cutback threatens the entire infrastructure of the health service and the education structure in the society. Well, it just ain't so.

It's not all charitable donations that have been affected. According to website Philanthropy UK, the top 10 per cent of the population control 56 per cent of UK wealth, but their charitable giving only amounts to 21 per cent of the total.

So the bulk of charitable donations are given by ordinary people who just want to help out, with the tax concession in many cases being signed over for the charities concerned to benefit from.

And at this moment in time, the calls on those charities are increasing as the government cuts back and back on its budget and expenditure on a whole range of medical research, homelessness and welfare issues which should be properly part of the government's concern, rather than left to the charities to finance.

Where's all this terrible confusion come from? There's not much argument if you think about it.

This government of the millionaires, by the millionaires and for the millionaires is absolutely committed to not taxing the wealthy.

In fact, it's cut their tax burden over the period of the crisis while it's increased the burden on ordinary folk and looks set to cut the tax burden on the rich even further.

So it doesn't have the cash to support all the research and social welfare efforts which it has driven into the voluntary sector.

Osborne quite rightly wants a bit more control over where tax revenue goes, but inadvertently he's put his beautifully shod foot right in it and is, while cutting back on government expenditure, also restricting the ability of the voluntary sector to take up the slack that he's creating.

A better illustration of the anarchy of a capitalist economy you'd be hard pressed to find. It's almost certain that Osborne will be forced to back-pedal, but that won't solve the problem.

To a socialist there's an obvious answer, but it's one that Cameron, Osborne and their motley crew of millionaires won't consider under any circumstances.

That is to close the tax loopholes, tax the super-rich and the companies till they squeal, rather than giving them concessions on the top rate of personal taxation and corporation tax, ploughing the proceeds into the fields that are now being serviced by necessity by the voluntary sector.

That gives the government back control over the direction of investment, ensures funding where it's needed and relieves those poor old rich people and corporations of the necessity to give huge sums to charity - they only need to pay their taxes and the problem is solved. And it's all under democratic control.

And if this government does that, I will give this week's wages to the charity of the readers' choice.

I rather think my hard-earned few bob is safe.