Constitutional Law, International, Politics, Religion

Oh Pickles: Scientology Could Face Loss of Tax Exemptions in England

English communities secretary, Eric Pickles, has proposed that the government may want to withdraw tax breaks for the Church of Scientology — noting controversies over the Church’s activities and alluding to the general view in England that it is more of a cult than a religion.

Scientology is not treated as a religion in England but still receives financial benefits as a charity. In 1984, the organization was described as a cult by a high court judge.

Yet, the City of London Corporation has asked Scientology to pay only one-fifth of the tax rates for its London headquarters near St Paul’s cathedral.

Pickles questioned whether Scientology can be described as beneficial for society to justify the saving of millions in tax payments: “The Church of Scientology is not a registered charity, since the Charity Commission has ruled that it does not provide a public benefit. Nor are its premises a recognised place of worship.”

Indeed, in 1999, the Charity Commission ruled that the church did not pass the “public benefit” test required for advancing religion as a charitable purpose. He also cited the negative views of Scientology by a majority of English citizens.

I am not familiar with English law on the subject but such a basis for rescinding tax exemption would be rejected in the United States – particularly the unpopularity of the Church with the majority of citizens. Such a test would invite a dangerous level of subjectivity and majoritarian control in the denial of benefits.

Source: Guardian

211 thoughts on “Oh Pickles: Scientology Could Face Loss of Tax Exemptions in England”

  3. Buddha,

    Thanks for the link … that was an interesting read … I think the government should put somebody inside that group ’cause it could be a potential terrorist organization …

  5. Awwww. Still suffering from the delusion that your opinion about me matters, Tony? You gonna call me a hypocrite some more? You obviously didn’t see how futile that was from the other trolls who attacked me. Repetition isn’t just a key to the big lie, but a key to comedy as well.

    As you protest too much still.

    How’s that working out for you, Ahab?

  7. @Buddha: It’s not my fault you take such obvious delight in pointing out that charges have been made by others, even as you claim they are “probably” untrue. That would be a fault in your own psyche. But don’t worry, its a very common flaw, we call it “shameless hypocrisy.”

  8. bdaman

    I guess it depends on which you need more, your cards or your house.

    “If for whatever reason any of these signatures is skipped, then the chain of title is said to be broken. Therefore, legally, the mortgage note is no longer valid. That is, the person who took out the mortgage loan to pay for the house no longer owes the loan, because he no longer knows whom to pay.”

    I don’t know. Surely it can’t be that easy. Just because you don’t know who to pay doesn’t mean you don’t need to pay anybody anything ever, I should think.

    I would be afraid to stop payments completely. Maybe put it in an escrow account, but when/if they catch up you might be out of a house and everything you’d already paid on it if you just stop payments completely.

  10. Blouise

    “When you’ve got a race house, you’ve got to let her run”.-Clarence Thomas about his wife.

    Sounds like she’s running and this is what many tea party candidates do. They, like celebraties, will use any publicity good, bad, or indifferent, as long as it gets their name on the page/screen/blog and they know someone will remember it long enough to vote.

  11. Blouise:

    Thanks for the incredible post about Ms. Thomas “reaching out” to Anita Hill. It was instructive. The next time I reach out to someone for a genuine human moment of compassion and reconciliation I will leave a nano-second, heart-felt voice-mail message at her work seeking an apology, notify my publicist, release a statement, and hope to God the FBI doesn’t get involved. I dislike both women — Thomas for being a shill and Hill for her cold, calculating, and hypersensitive attitude — but here Thomas is both the bore and the aggressor.

  13. Here’s a really good one:

    Wife of Clarence Thomas Reaches Out to Anita Hill Over 1991 Episode

    Virginia Thomas, the wife of Associate Justice Clarence
    Thomas of the Supreme Court, left a message last weekend on
    the voice mail of Anita Hill, who accused her husband of
    sexual harassment during his confirmation hearings, a
    spokeswoman for Ms. Thomas confirmed on Tuesday.

    In a message left at the office of Ms. Hill, who is now a
    professor at Brandeis University, Ms. Thomas apparently
    brought up Ms. Hill’s accusations against her husband during
    the 1991 hearings.

    Andrew Gully, senior vice president of the Brandeis
    University communications office, confirmed that Ms. Hill had
    received the message and that she had turned it over to the
    campus department of public safety. That office, in turn,
    passed it on to the F.B.I. (NY Times)

    http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/20/us/politics/20thomas.html?_r=1&emc=na

    Honest to god … you gotta read this article … teabaggers!

  14. Tony,

    Facts?

    It’s not my fault you’ve been called out as a troll twice now and by two different people.

    And that’s a fact.

  15. Buckeye
    I was joking about a month ago on this site and said if you want to teach the banks a lesson stop paying your mortgages. Well, apparently this will be a growing trend. I know of a few that have. It’s actually pretty smart. If you are in debt but CAN AFFORD TO PAY your mortgage but your house is worth far less now, Why make the payment. Take that money and payoff your credit cards off as fast as you can.

    Example, if you owe say 24k in credit cards and your mortgage is 2k per month, you would be completely rid of credit card debt in one year. You would only have one bad mark on your credit for not paying your mortgage, same as thousand of other Americans but your payment history on your cards would be great.

  16. Bdaman

    Fascinating! This is what people were saying from the beginning. And this is probably why the Republicans are so desperate to gain as many seats as possible. Imagine trying to pass another bailout bill! The mind boggles!

  18. This is worth the read for anyone who might be in trouble of losing their home.

    “Homeowners can only be foreclosed and evicted from their homes by the person or institution who actually has the loan paper…only the note-holder has legal standing to ask a court to foreclose and evict. Not the mortgage, the note, which is the actual IOU that people sign, promising to pay back the mortgage loan…

    “…once mortgage loan securitization happened, things got sloppy…they got sloppy by the very nature of mortgage-backed securities. …These various [securitized bundles of loans or] tranches were sold to different investors, according to their risk appetite… the loans were ‘bundled’ into REMICs (Real-Estate Mortgage Investment Conduits, a special vehicle designed to hold the loans for tax purposes)…

    “But here’s the key issue: When an MBS was first created, all the mortgages were pristine…none had defaulted yet, because they were all brand-new loans. Statistically, some would default and some others would be paid back in full…but which ones specifically would default? No one knew, of course. If I toss a coin 1,000 times, statistically, 500 tosses the coin will land heads…but what will the result be of, say, the 723rd toss? No one knows.

    “Same with mortgages.

    “Now, what does ‘broken chain of title’ mean? Simple: when a homebuyer signs a mortgage, the key document is the note. As I said before, it’s the actual IOU. In order for the mortgage note to be sold or transferred to someone else (and therefore turned into a mortgage-backed security), this document has to be physically endorsed to the next person. All of these signatures on the note are called the ‘chain of title.’

    “You can endorse the note as many times as you please…but you have to have a clear chain of title right on the actual note: I sold the note to Moe, who sold it to Larry, who sold it to Curly, and all our notarized signatures are actually, physically, on the note, one after the other.

    “If for whatever reason any of these signatures is skipped, then the chain of title is said to be broken. Therefore, legally, the mortgage note is no longer valid. That is, the person who took out the mortgage loan to pay for the house no longer owes the loan, because he no longer knows whom to pay.

    “To repeat: if the chain of title of the note is broken, then the borrower no longer owes any money on the loan.

    “Read that last sentence again, please. Don’t worry, I’ll wait.

    “You read it again? Good: Now you see the can of worms that’s opening up…

    “…Now, the banks had hired ‘foreclosure mills’…law firms that specialized in foreclosures…in order to handle the massive volume of foreclosures and evictions that occurred because of the housing crisis. The foreclosure mills, as one would expect, were the first to spot the broken chain of titles.

    “Well, what do you know, it turns out that these foreclosure mills might have faked and falsified documentation, so as to fraudulently repair the chain-of-title issue, thereby ‘proving’ that the banks had judicial standing to foreclose on delinquent mortgages. These foreclosure mills might have even forged the loan note itself…

    The foreclosure mills did actually, deliberately, and categorically fake and falsify documents, in order to expedite these foreclosures and evictions. Yves Smith at Naked Capitalism, who has been all over this story, put up a price list for this ‘service’ from a company called DocX…yes, a price list for forged documents. Talk about your one-stop shopping!

    “…[But the] alarm bells started going off when the title insurance companies started to refuse to insure the titles… In every sale, a title insurance company insures that the title is free -and clear …that the prospective buyer is in fact buying a properly vetted house, with its title issues all in order. Title insurance companies stopped providing their service because…of course…they didn’t want to expose themselves to the risk that the chain of title had been broken, and that the bank had illegally foreclosed on the previous owner.

    …”The fact that Ally Financial (formerly GMAC), JP Morgan Chase, and now Bank of America have suspended foreclosures signals that this is a serious problem…obviously. Banks that size, with that much exposure to foreclosed properties, don’t suspend foreclosures just because they’re good corporate citizens who want to do the right thing, and who have all their paperwork in strict order…they’re halting their foreclosures for a reason.

    “[And] Bank of America halted all foreclosures, nationwide… Why do you think that happened? Because the banks are in trouble…again. Over the same thing as last time…the damned mortgage-backed securities!

    Read the rest here.

    http://www.investorsinsight.com/blogs/thoughts_from_the_frontline/archive/2010/10/15/the-subprime-debacle-act-2.aspx

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