TAP campaigns on:
​Housing, Benefit/Income/Sanctions, Council Tax and Health

TAP was founded by the late Reverend Paul Nicolson, who sadly died on 5th March 2020. On 4th March, Paul was due to continue his sit down protest, this time outside Downing Street to call for urgent action on behalf of the homeless. This was just a few weeks after a similar protest outside Church House in London where the Church of England Synod were meeting. At just 87 years he was a campaigner to the end.
You can read an obituary in Church Times and in The Guardian.

The work of Taxpayers Against Poverty continues.
For details of all events and activities go to the website:
TaxpayersAgainstPoverty
And follow on Twitter  and  Facebook
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TAP was founded in 2012
(See letter by the Rev Paul Nicolson on the right).

TAP is not a charity but has registered as a not for profit company to be publicly accountable for all income and expenditure. Not being a charity means TAP is free from the political restrictions of the Charity commission.

TAP act without allegiance to any political party. 

The objects of the TAP constitution include:
“The prevention or relief of poverty [or financial hardship] and the promotion of human rights as set out in Article 25 of the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights and subsequent United Nations and European Conventions and Declarations in the United Kingdom
by all or any of the following means.”  

Article 25 of the UDHR covers economic and social rights.

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​Letter to the Guardian 16 February 2012
Ministers at the Department of Work and Pensions repeat ad nauseam their mantra: "It is not fair for taxpayers to be asked to pay for the cost of spare bedrooms, or housing benefit which is high in central London because rents are high etc, etc." Therefore the poorest citizens are thrust into unmanageable debt by caps and cuts in housing benefit, possible eviction, forced migration, undue stress and misery. As a citizen who pays income and council tax, VAT and the excise duty on my evening glass of wine, I steam with indignation each time I am used by ministers to justify such draconian measures making people poorer.

I am glad my taxation is used to enable my fellow citizens, both in and out of work, to buy enough food, clothes, fuel, transport and other necessities, to pay council tax and the rent of secure homes, when they have no other means to do so; and bewildered by the short-sightedness of a policy which deliberately reduces the totally inadequate adult JSA of £67.50 a week by creating rent arrears, with debt-related mental health problems and high extra costs for a hard-pressed NHS.

The self-evident unfairness is the current policy of dumping national debt and deficit reduction on the incomes of the squeezed middle and poorest citizens, while the higher-paid taxpayers experience no financial inconvenience. Meanwhile the OECD reports that $11.5 trillion, including bonuses, is parked in overseas accounts and the Treasury is aware that £100bn of property in central London alone is registered overseas – both out of reach of the taxman. That really is unfair. I hope thousands will join Taxpayers Against Poverty, TAP, to say so loud and clear. All we need is an email.
Rev Paul Nicolson
taxpayersagainstpovertyTAP@gmail.com