How I Came to Embrace the Principles
Embraced by Henry George

Victor Saldji

[A remembrance by Mr. Saldji of his early association with the proponents of the
societal taxation of land values in lieu of other taxes, originally titled
"How I Came to See the Cat -- And Beyond!" April 2011]

I am forever grateful that I did not miss that poster in the Victoria Street area of London, SW1, where, at 16-1/2 I was in my first job, apprenticed to a firm of civil engineers, as a junior draughtsman. The poster invited one to "come to the Henry George School of Social Science, No.4 Great Smith Street, SW1, for a free discussion course."

So I enrolled. Our tutor was Vic Blundell, who was in his element. I believe that he could possibly have recited the whole of Progress and Poverty from memory and not missed a dot or comma. With his guidance, through the 10 week basic course, we all came to seeing "the cat".

Cats are credited with being able to see in the dark. But some of us humans can remain in the dark even while the sun is bright in the sky.

It was no secret at No.4 Great Smith Street, or later, at 177 Vauxhall Bridge Road, SW1, that Vic Blundell had two pet aversions. One was against modern art, the other was against modern economic theory. This was to become manifest.

Troubled waters lay ahead. It was now 1967 and the Parliamentary Labour Party were the Government of the day. Here, let us note a timely word from F. McEachran: "The particular form of heresy into which communism and socialism fall is seen in their failure to recognize the significance of natural law and its connection with human freedom" ["Freedom - the Only End", page 57, Johnson Publications Ltd., London, 1966].

So, with a flourish, Labour produced the "Land Commission Act 1967", with its "Betterment Levy" which applied as and when there was a sale or lease of land or a "project of material development". The land market's reaction was predictable, and, when the Act became effective on 6 April 1967, it was reported that the supply of building land coming onto the market "dried up as if someone had turned off a tap". [Guardian Journal, 21 August 1967]

The first shock to my system came when two friendly conservatives, who had also been attending lectures designed to explain how the Act was to work, said to me: "Congratulations, now you've got what you want". I hastened to assure them that the very opposite was the case, and that the effect of the Act would be the very opposite of what is meant by "Land Value Taxation".

My second shock came when I saw a letter in the Financial Times over the name of "V.H. Blundell" which read:

"The betterment levy is not really being passed on. What is happening is that it is causing the supply of land coming onto the market to be reduced, and that is what is causing an increase in prices".

In the 30 years since he took us through the Basic Course, this letter was clearly not by someone else, who by chance had the same name. It was indeed, from our own "Director of Studies" - it was not so much "carved in stone", as it was branded onto that wooden part of my brain that cannot forget trauma.

Sir Henry Wells, Chairman of the Land Commission, fell into the same trap as Vic Blundell. Sir Henry was quoted in The Yorkshire Post of 26 February, 1969, as having said that he did not think that owners asked more for their land because of the levy. "If they could get 40 per cent more, they would charge it anyway, wouldn't they?"

In the midst of this disarray let us take stock with the assistance of Richard G. Lipsey, Professor of Economics at the University of Essex:

"Under competitive conditions taxes are passed on when each individual producer is induced by the tax to reduce the quantity of the products which he offers for sale". [p.450, An Introduction to Positive Economics. Weidenfeld 1966]

However, the congratulations of the two friendly Conservatives, together with the self-contradictory letter from Vic Blundell convinced me that, without any effort on our own part, we stood to being rendered irrelevant by being identified with the heresies of the Labour Party. So, Durrant's Press Cutting services were enlisted and in due course over 4,000 press cuttings were received, and formed the basis of a press-release through Reuters. This was given generous notice in the leading property journal, the Estates Gazette of London, to the effect that: "The President of the "Land Value Taxation League" has submitted (1 October, 1969) an Open Letter to the Chairman of the Land Commission, containing the gleanings from over 4,000 press cuttings from all over Britain, which indicated that, except in areas where there was no great demand, the Betterment Levy was being passed on in higher prices.

There was an echo, in a central London newspaper, which declared, in a leading article: "There is now evidence that the Betterment Levy is being passed on in higher prices".

A copy of this evidence -- The Influence of the Land Commission on the Supply, Demand and Price of Building Land -- is attached for ready reference, with my compliments, and thanks.