Days of Yesteryear 1: Window Tax



Daylight Robbery

I love history because it provides me with the ability to reminisce on the past with my jovial wistful nostalgia. Whilst twiddling with my briar pipe and befouling the air with my nauseating tobacco, I cloud myself in a smoke that hides my demenour from the ill-educated history-illiterate folk of the 21st century.

Today I look at the odd little income-generator called 'window tax' and yearn for a return to the days of yore when this was as natural as sitting down.

A long time ago, when England was under the terrifying hand of the Dutchman William of Orange, this fearsome tax was imposed (1696 to be precise). It was originally introduced to make up for the losses made due to the clipping of coinage and the financial crisis created by a growing inflation caused by the many conflicts both in Ireland and on the continent.

The idea was to tax the number of windows each house had on a sliding scale: the more windows you have, the more tax you pay. It was an ingenious method of fleecing the population because it was so simple to check: simply look from outside and count the windows.

More and more windows got boarded up rather than face the dreaded tax. Glass production stagnated and the amount of windows made on new buildings declined rapidly. As usual, throughout history, the middling and lower classes complained that the taxes affected them unequally, but as we all know, these burdensome classes are all social layabouts, who need to take some of Norman Tebbit's father's advice and get on their bikes.

Horrible little oiks appealed to the charitable hearts of the medical profession for a century and a half to end the wonderful window tax, citing codswallop about lack of windows creating dark, damp tenements which were a source of disease and ill-health. 'Tax on health' and 'tax on light and air' were the feeble cries from the lazy middle and lower classes, who should be grateful to even have a roof over their head.

Unfortunately for our leaders, in 1851 the unthinkable happened: this lucrative revenue stream ended via a new Act. Luckily all was not lost for the great window tax was replaced by a new house duty tax designed to help the poor out of having to decide what to spend their ill-gotten money on.

Further more sophisticated, but less straightforward taxes grew up out of the medieval minds of the aristocracy, but none had the same je ne sais quoi as the window tax. In fact it has become a beautifully formed, but lost artifact from the times when everyone in England knew their place.

In the current economic crisis we face, and the heroic wars of liberation in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Pakistan and soon Iran and Syria, I would like to see a return to the ingenuity made by our forefathers. Why can we not resurrect a window tax now? This would definitely help to fund our gracious sovereign's wars of empire as well as reduce the amount of money wasted by the poor through their credit cards.

If you would like to join my worthy cause to bring back window tax please do contact me at my hovel:

Room 2,
Footstall 3,
Barnshack Gardens
1 Dysentry Lane
Hunstanton
Norfolk
NR1 9LE

By Lord Emerald Hair-Piece III