Here’s a curious case of somebody becoming a tax resister out of what looks like a misinterpretation of taxes as some sort of contract with the government to conduct business honestly and ethically, where unethical and dishonest conduct on the part of the politicians in charge constitutes breach of contract and entitles the taxpayer to withhold payment. Naturally, such a bizarre argument went nowhere:
Tony Blair was today excused from answering a court summons compelling him to appear in the case of the mother-in-law of a sergeant killed in Iraq who refuses to pay her income tax.
Her son-in-law, Sergeant Les Hehir, 34, of the Royal Artillery, was killed when a US Sea Knight helicopter he was aboard crashed south of the Kuwait border on .…
District judge John Freeman ruled at Weymouth County Court that Mr Blair did not need to attend the hearing as his evidence was not relevant to the case of tax evasion.
He said: “This court has no power to make any decision or interfere in any way in which taxes are spent.”…
She told the court that she had refused to pay the tax because Mr Blair had reneged on a promise to her.
She said he had written to her stating that he would show her his evidence of Saddam Hussein’s weapons programme but he had not done so.
She said: “The relevant evidence I want from the prime minister is the evidence he actually promised me that he will send me the evidence and information of Saddam Hussein’s weapons programme.
“If I wasn’t here and had I been a good citizen and paid my tax bill I would never hear from Tony Blair again.
“I have no conscientious objection to paying tax, I do not care how it is spend, all I want is the evidence Mr Blair promised me.”
