COMMENT: Cardinal Keith O'Brien is a hypocrite

Cardinal Keith O'Brien, the most senior Roman Catholic cleric in the United Kingdom,has criticised the Prime Minister and the coalition government of acting immorally by favouring the wealthy over ordinary people.

Cardinal O'Brien also expressed support for a "Robin Hood" tax on financial transactions.

Now there is much that is wrong with the policies of the coalition government but it seems particularly amusing for the Catholic church to be lecturing the Tory party on economic morality.

It is time that the Catholic church, along with all other religious bodies, paid their fair share of tax as international corporations. The churches avoid and evade paying tax on their annual profits which run to billions of pounds each year.

The Catholic church uses large amounts of donations, given to support the world's poorest and most vulnerable, to, instead, support senior clergy in affluent lifestyles and, of course, to cover up the many child abuse cases that have rocked the church.

The Papacy, with its own state, is a tax haven, and is one of the most offensive places on earth for displaying wealth - and all the while their priests preach about fairness and equality.

As for the "Robin Hood" tax - this clearly demonstrates that the church is acting without conscience, and the Cardinal speaks without morality. Most people agree that the banks and other financial institutions have acted illegally, but, instead of stopping these bad practises and bringing things back to fair, just and legal, the "Robin Hood" tax merely taxes the illegal activity. It makes the state complicit in the wrongful acts.

Jesus, had he existed, would have been a communist. The Pope is no different from a Ceaușescu or Louis XVI.

It is time or the Catholic church to look at itself in the mirror - a disgraced organisation, harbouring paedophiles, giving senior clerics a life of luxury while ordinary people suffer, with policies on contraception that have caused the deaths of hundreds if nous ands worldwide, and with a disposable tax record - before criticising others.

OPINION: The "Tobin Tax" misses the point

Over the past year or there's been a growing call, notably from left-wing politicians, for what's been called a "Tobin Tax" on a variety of financial transactions.

This follows the various bank bailouts and the Eurozone crisis caused, on the whole, by investors gambling, skimming, betting or moving monies from one pot to another at the right time.

The financial markets are, if we were honest, out of control. Millions, billions, trillions are gambled around the world every second and,when things go wrong, banks go bust, governments struggle and the entire world goes into a crisis which could so easily be avoided.

The "Tobin Tax", suggested by Nobel Economics Laureate James Tobin as far back as 1972, would tax all spot conversions of one currency into another. In recent months the call has been to widen the scope of such a scheme into a tax on all financial transactions.

But why? Aren't the transactions, the betting and gambling, the skimming, morally unacceptable?

Instead of taxing the morally corrupt transactions of the world markets why not outlaw the activities?

Isn't taxing something that is morally corrupt just as bad as taking part in it? After all, governments would be financially benefitting.

If a school bully takes lunch money from others in his class the teacher doesn't take a percentage; the bully is punished, the theft is against the school rules.

By calling for a "Tobin Tax" the left has lost the moral high ground and buried its snout in the trough of greed and dodgy dealings it has been objecting too.

Don't tax immoral financial transactions, ban them.