The Insomniac Meanderings Post : Where I Owe More Tax Edition

Hello there. Hope you're feeling well today.

There is always a certain fear when the brown envelope hits the floor. You pick it up and find that it's from HMRC (Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs - You don't think I want Wales to be a republic could make me ignore it? Ah well).

Well that envelope came again yesterday and unlike other occasions when it told me a change in the tax code or other admin stuff this time it said I owed them an extra amount of just over £107!!

I am annoyed for three reasons. Firstly I'm an employee which means the tax gets taken at source from my wages every month. In other words whatever has caused this alleged underpayment of tax is not my fault.

Secondly whatever has caused this alleged underpayment of tax is a factor as well. Because I don't know. It doesn't say on the document. I got the wife (who used to work at a pay department) to have a look and she can't see it either. That means on Wednesday (my next day off work) I'll have to ring these people up. The tax office enquiries service does not have a good reputation. And when I say it does not have a good reputation I mean I could be waiting on the end of an imaginary cordless phone line for hours.

Thirdly I'm not a wealthy man but I'm not on income support either. So it's made me realise the trauma families on income support face when similar letters drop into their homes. Even if this extra tax is justified the tax people have spent time and resources on getting just over a hundred pounds from me and other families where there are tax avoiders syphoning off much more laughing all the way to their next glass of champagne!

More on this to come.

To books then and the latest from the library I've read.

Edward Marston - Dance of Death

I've chatted about Edward Marston before in this blog on his Railway detective series so here's one on his Home Front detective Harvey Marmion also a series set in Britain of 1916 during the First world war.. Mr Marston seems to have tapped the entertainment historical detective market judging by the many books he's written. I can see why. Judged as an entertainment Dance of Death concerning the grisly murder of a professional dancer cannot be faulted. It has the detectives, the murder, the suspects and also the feel of historical accuracy.

It reminded me (though set a few decades earlier) of the Inspector Cribb novels of Peter Lovesey. And though not as good are certainly good value for your reading time.

A quick side issue here. I have a rough rule that if a book is part of a series then I read it in chronological order. The big exception to this though are detective series because to me the key is the particular murder and not the detective's family dynamic (there are things that happen here in that regard but I won't spoil by revealing). I'm not particularly bothered that the next Harvey Marmion novel I'll read might be earlier than this one in the series. To me it's funny how for the most part I'm fundamentalist on this issue but with detective fiction I couldn't give a damn.

Politics: And hidden away in the Welsh news was Plaid Cymru's stunning by election victory an increase in the percentage of 18% no less) in Cardiff's Ely ward for the council. It needs to be made clear here. Ely is a working class area which First Minister Mark Drakeford covers in the Senedd. It is the sort of place that Labour would describe as it's heartland. Not any more. The shift might be slow but previous Labour voters are seeing them in Wales for what they truly are. The arrogant incompetent arm of Welsh establishment.

Let this crumbling of the edifice continue. For at it's destruction will come independence.

And let's continue with the state of Cardiff shall we. the Cancer Research charity have opened a new superstore here (which I haven't been to yet). Now am I being heartless for saying that you can truly judge a nation's decline by the fact that a charity can open not just a shop but a superstore?

West Ham beat Fulham last night (I was at work). People say 40 points means safety which means they might get it when facing Cardiff City in two weeks time.....and I will be there!!!....albeit quietly in the home seats.

Until the next time.