Word: callaghans
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Even the outward forms of British tradition got bent again last week as Chancellor of the Exchequer James Callaghan took the Labor government's annual budget to the House of Commons. Instead of the shabby red leather case, passed along from one Chancellor to another for decades, he carried in a new and ominously black one. From it he produced the most unexpected tax plans since Sir William Harcourt introduced death duties...
Bitten Bettors. With Britain struggling to defeat inflation at home, modernize its outmoded industrial plant, and raise exports so as to end its balance-of-payments deficit, most of Callaghan's countrymen were braced for higher income, sales, tobacco and liquor taxes, and perhaps higher down payments on installment purchases. They got nothing of the sort...
Instead, following the controversial U.S. example, Callaghan set up machinery for "voluntary" curbs on British investment in the developed countries of the sterling bloc-Australia, New Zealand, Canada, Ireland and South Africa. He confirmed a 21% tax on gambling, effective Oct. 24, a tax on casinos starting Oct. 1, and a widely anticipated increase in corporate income taxes, from 35% to 40%. Britain, said Callaghan, will also ask West Germany to absorb the $224 million-a-year cost of keeping British troops there...
...odds, Callaghan's greatest surprise was a "selective employment tax," aimed at redistributing Britain's strained labor supply to provide more goods for the export trade-without causing unemployment at home...
Something Different. Then came the biggest surprise. Britain, said Callaghan, would switch from the traditional pounds, shillings and pence to decimal currency in 1971. By now the Tories were in full cry. "An uproarious farce," shouted Conservative Leader Ted Heath. "The government is bereft of ideas and fuddy-duddy." Wilson buried his head in mock despair and nearly fell off the bench laughing. Above the roar, Economics Minister George Brown could be heard shouting, "We're on our way, brothers...