As you may recall, I have something of an ‘issue’ with Sir Kier and his entire government, concerning the repeated (ad nauseam, as they do all their annoying little catchphrases, as if we’re all goldfish who can’t remember the word ‘change’ from 22 seconds ago) use of the term ‘working people’. From the context it is delivered it is simply an euphemism for ‘working class’, but you can’t say that because that perpetuates the class wars, and no-one wants that, especially working class oiks and their rabble of dirty progeny.

By Kier’s definition, lawyers aren’t ’working people’, despite putting in 85-hour weeks. Nor bankers, brokers, accountants or anyone in an office. Doctors are only ‘working’ until they become consultants at which point, even pulling 72 hour shifts, knee deep in blood and other bodily emissions, they forfeit their claim to be ‘working people’.

And now landlords. Who have been declared, by the Prime Minister himself(!!!) as ‘not working people’. Why? Well the obvious reason is that the PM is a tosser, but more interesting is why our country is so intent on demonising landlords. Screwing them over with onerous taxes and heaps of unnecessary expenditure. Like changing the batteries on the smoke alarms. That costs £4.99 for a 12-volt. Whereas a couple of burnt-out tenants is free. You do the maffs.

In Australia, if you rent a second home you are perceived as ‘helping society’ and thus get special tax breaks on rental income. Over here, in a nation completely dependant on private landlords, we use the HMRC to kick the shit out of those benevolent enough to entrust an incredibly valuable asset to negligent cretins incapable of looking after them as they pour cooking oil down the sinks, seal themselves in completely, blocking up the vents, so they create pretty little mould cultures and wreck the washing machines.

‘Rogue landlords’, we read about and see on the news. Oh, wait a minute, he’s actually a cabinet minister, oooops. Everything is done to make ‘landlords!’ into hate figures, modern day overlords, feudal villains with dirty teeth and waxed moustaches. That way, when the government screw them over with more and more taxes and, in upcoming months, less and less control, all the ‘working people’ cheer loudly.

Eventually, the millions of ‘small time’ landlords will sell their investment homes because of sheer lack of any kind of return and there’ll be an even bigger housing crisis than there is now. And the money capitalised from the sales of so many houses can be used more profitably. Perhaps on a new slave trade. Investment in drug gangs. Selling vapes at infant’s schools. At least they’d show a profit and wouldn’t incur all the persecution-taxes than landlords suffer.

Yes, I’m a (very small time) fucking landlord. For now.

Happy Saturday

A xxxx