Author Archives: Shaughan Dolan

Shaughan Dolan

The Independent View: Time for Liberals to embrace pledged taxes?

By Shaughan Dolan | Thu 9th June 2016 - 2:46 pm

conscienceHypothecation – the act of reserving a specific tax for a specific purpose – is making something of a comeback under this Chancellor. The question is how should Liberals respond?

The treasury only has one commandment “Thou shalt not hypothecate”.  However, George Osbourne, forever a political Chancellor, has been busily pledging taxes for a number of worthy causes such as women’s charities (Tampon Tax) PE in schools (Sugar Tax) and flood defences (Insurance Premium Tax)

The Chancellor knows that linking taxes rises to specific benefits offsets some of the political damage caused by hitting tax payers in the wallet. It’s also good for voters and it helps keep the Chancellor honest, and makes sure that tax rises remain accountable to the electorate.

Conscience: Taxes for Peace Not War is an organisation that has long argued that the right of conscientious objection should be extended to tax payers. It seems that whilst our bodies are free from conscription, our finances are not. Every bullet, bomb and soldier trained and deployed in war-zones overseas are not there by accident, but because we paid for it.

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Posted in The Independent View | Tagged and | 18 Comments
Shaughan Dolan

The Independent View: Liberals need solutions to the migrant crisis – and conflict prevention will be key

By Shaughan Dolan | Mon 7th September 2015 - 2:52 pm

 

So this was the tragedy of a Britain with open hearts and closed borders. The growing humanitarian crisis in Syria coupled with instability in North Africa is creating one greatest migrations waves seen since the end of World War II. Jordan alone has taken over 1.1 million displaced Syrians and is now suffering water shortages that could lead into larger migrations into other Middle Eastern nations.

The reaction to this has been largely isolationist policies, with commentators in the UK describing these migrants anywhere between ‘cockroaches’ and ‘a swarm’; the narrative media focused on dehumanising those fleeing conflict.

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Posted in The Independent View | Tagged and | 60 Comments
Shaughan Dolan

The Independent View: An Arab EU could be the answer the Middle East needs

By Shaughan Dolan | Fri 22nd August 2014 - 9:25 am

The Islamic State is a symptom of a much wider and more dangerous split in the Islamic world between Sunni, Shia and Kurdish communities across the Middle East. Whatever action Western governments undertake to stop the Islamo-fascists ISIS, more must be done to mend an age-old split between Sunni and Shia Muslims.

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Posted in The Independent View | Tagged , , and | 21 Comments
Shaughan Dolan

The Independent View: We need to talk about peace building

By Shaughan Dolan | Thu 5th June 2014 - 1:20 pm

temple of peacePrevention is better than cure has been the guiding principle of modern medicine. This simple mantra has for some become a philosophy of how to live better – we deal with problems before they develop, avoid potential issues through careful management and plan cautiously for an uncertain future.

Government policy has never been a big fan of prevention – there aren’t always votes in solving a problem before it escalates. A bigger problem is how you measure prevention – if the problem happens anyway you will be blamed for wasting money. If you avert the problem entirely you will blamed for wasting money. In the prevention game it can often be a no-win scenario.

Conflict prevention has proven itself to have real value time and time again.

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Posted in Op-eds and The Independent View | Tagged and | 8 Comments
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