Duty to Parliament

The e-petition receives
some unexpected support

An e-petition to the Government against the beer duty escalator has reached 100,000 signatures, which means that the matter now has to be debated in Parliament. As I'm sure most readers here will know, the beer tax escalator increases the tax on beer by 2% above the rate of inflation, and is a significant reason why beer has gone up in my local pubs by about 50% over the last 4 or 5 years, and - in my opinion - why pubs have been closing down in such numbers in recent years. 

I have written several times about this issue (instead of me regurgitating those arguments, you can see the posts here), but I will just point out one fact: the UK pays 40% of the beer tax in the EU, with the 26 other countries paying the remaining 60%. We can't blame Brussels for that - we created this all by ourselves. To clear up one misconception, the e-petition doesn't call for a tax cut, just for the end of above inflation tax rises.

It's not too late to sign, and more signatures will give the petition even more clout. Just click here.