Chapter 25 Chapter 6: Finding a way out - 4 A new town emerges

The world is really big, anything can happen. In fact, at the time when the enlarged county party committee meeting in Guoyang County was so lively that it broke up unhappy, in a remote town called "Xingxing" in this county, a plan was brewing that was destined to be written into the history of the reform of the Republic. a big event. We really have no reason to imagine that the quality of rural cadres today is too poor. Most of them still want to do a good job in the rural economy. Only then did I become so interested in an article in the "Farmer's Daily" that was easily overlooked, and immediately started a lively discussion.

This is an article signed by Yang Wenliang, "Loosening Farmers and Bringing Grain to the Market".They became very interested in the tax and fee reform mentioned in the article, and at the same time, they had the idea of ​​"grasp the tax and fee, and use the money to divide the family". When the two talked about the collection of taxes and fees, they all felt their scalps go numb and their heads explode.Seeing that the task of collection is increasing every year, this year, the whole town will complete the agricultural tax of 310,000 yuan, the agricultural special product tax of 240,000 yuan, the cultivated land occupation tax of 24,000 yuan, and the flue-cured tobacco product tax of 810,000 yuan. 50,000 yuan, 1.62 million yuan for raising and retaining as a whole, plus the cost of road construction and water control, the total is 3.2 million yuan, the per capita burden is 100 yuan higher, and the average burden per mu is also 50 yuan yuan or more.In order to complete the above collection tasks, they must organize personnel to call for payment. The cost of these personnel generally reaches 10% of the total collection, and sometimes even reaches 20 to 30%. This additional cost will be added. to the farmers.In particular, the tobacco tax is assigned tasks every year, and the town only distributes it to farmers, at a rate of more than 80 yuan per mu; The cost per mu is nearly 200 yuan, but after a year of hard work, it will cost you money.Farmers complained that the town and village cadres spent ten months every year forcing planting and urging purchases under the scolding, which made the town and village cadres feel uncomfortable.

Liu Xingjie, who has just passed his thirties, is young and energetic. Seeing that it is difficult to complete the task of charging and purchasing this year, he said to Li Peijie with deep emotion: "The State Council has ordered several times that the burden of farmers should not exceed 5% of the net income of the previous year. As a result, this 'upper line' standard used to limit arbitrary fees has now become the 'bottom line' for increased fees. False reports are exaggerated. It’s so prevalent, farmers have to report 1,500 or even 2,000 yuan per capita income even though it’s only 1,000 yuan, and in the end they’re all charged at 5% of these exaggerated figures, what’s wrong with it!”

Li Peijie is much older than Liu Xingjie, and has experienced more things than Liu Xingjie. Hearing the young secretary's remarks, he calculated the price of grain in those years: "There is also a big difference between the national grain purchase price and the market price. For example, soybeans are purchased by the state for only 3.8 to 40 cents a catty, but the market has sold them for 90 cents to 1 yuan. Farmers are very dissatisfied with this. This method has to be Change!" "Yes, how to set up a reasonable method to really reduce the burden on farmers," Liu Xingjie said with a sigh, "to make the fees clear to the farmers, and to make the rural cadres busy for a year to complete the collection. freed from the task."

Liu Xingjie has been looking for a solution since he became the party secretary of Xinxing Town.He found that for the collection of taxes and fees, the grievances between cadres at the town and village levels and farmers were already too deep, and the relationship between the party and the masses had deteriorated seriously. He really wanted to do something in this regard. Li Peijie said, "Let's try the method mentioned in the newspaper." Liu Xingjie said: "I called you here to sum up this matter." So Liu Xingjie and Li Peijie, who were later called "Xingxing Two Heroes", hit it off immediately. The two sat down and made a serious calculation according to the method provided by Yang Wenliang's article: Xinxing Town's monthly salary expenditure is 70,000 yuan Up and down, the annual cost is more than 850,000 yuan; the office expenses are 200,000 yuan a year; the agricultural tax is generally set at 500,000 yuan; 100,000 yuan, and the 200,000 yuan required by the "Five Guarantees and Four Supports", after miscellaneous deductions, the town needs at least 2.6 million yuan in funds for the whole year.The town's arable land area is 87,000 mu. After careful calculation, a one-time payment of 30 yuan per mu per year can basically meet the financial needs of the whole town.

In this way, the bold idea of ​​"paying 30 yuan for one mu of arable land at one time, and no one can charge any more" came into being! Can the people accept this approach?Liu Xingjie and Li Peijie mobilized rural cadres to visit villages and households to extensively solicit opinions from farmers.The farmers clapped their hands happily when they heard that no one came to collect money and grain after paying the taxes and fees once. Liu Xingjie, the secretary of the town party committee who was born and bred in Xinxing Town, after listening to the report that he split up to solicit the opinions of farmers, at the joint meeting held by the town party committee and the town government, he said with all his heart:

"I am the son of a farmer. I have personally experienced and witnessed many things in the countryside; I am working on the land of my hometown. If I can't do anything practical and only know how to collect money, my father and villagers will scold me!" The idea has been made, and then they try to find the support of their superiors.At the beginning of October of this year, Liu Xingjie and Li Peijie made a special trip to Guoyang County. They carefully reported to the county party committee and government. County party secretary Wang Baoming and county magistrate Wang Bingyu listened to their reports very carefully. In particular, they learned that they had extensively solicited the opinions of farmers. The town party committee and town government also met to form a special resolution. They were very determined and felt Very happy.Not only did they make it clear that the pilot project is possible, but they also introduced He Kaiyin's specific plan for the reform of agricultural taxes and fees.

Liu Xingjie and Li Peijie were very excited after hearing this.What made them even more overjoyed was that the secretary and the county magistrate not only encouraged them to do a good job in this pilot project, but also decided on the spot that the county party committee and the county government decided to hold an on-site meeting in their Xinxing town on January 3 next year to cheer them on. This extraordinary decision made by the secretary and county magistrate made Liu Xingjie and Li Peijie a little "flattered" with excitement.With the support of the county leaders, the "Xingxing Erjie" has more confidence.

However, not long after that, the two heard about the debate at the enlarged meeting of the county party committee and the story of Wang Bingyu dropping his notebook at the meeting. The collection clearly violated the policies and regulations of the time.It is so difficult to hold an enlarged county party committee meeting, let alone a small town?The two couldn't help but feel a little scared. However, if you are afraid of returning to fear, you still have to do what you should do. "If you see it right, try it boldly and go boldly." Liu Xingjie said, "Whoever finds it out, anyway, we still have Comrade Xiaoping's words!"

Li Peijie said: "I think this reform is beneficial to all departments. The only ones that are not beneficial are township cadres and village cadres, because they can no longer take advantage of the peasants. Since it is beneficial to the country and the collective, and We can reduce the burden on the peasants, even if we suffer a little bit of grievance or even 'unlucky', we will admit it!" Liu Xingjie thought about it and said, "In order to reduce the risk, can we come up with a better way?" Later, this "better way" was finally figured out.They simply submitted the tax and fee reform plan to the People's Congress of Xinxing Town for deliberation, so that they could win the participation of the Town People's Congress and the support of the people's representatives.

On November 23, 1992, the People's Congress of Xinxing Town was held grandly.Of the 110 deputies to the people's congress in the town, except for two people who asked for leave that day due to business or illness, the remaining 108 people attended the meeting as scheduled.At the meeting, Li Peijie, on behalf of the town government, made a work report on "Effectively Reducing the Burden of Farmers and Establishing a Land Contract Tax (Fee) System".After full and serious discussions among the delegates, all the 108 delegates present voted in favour. The people's representatives of Xinxing Town have never been so united in deliberating and passing the proposals of the General Assembly. It can be said that such a major reform work has been deliberated and approved by a township people's congress, which has never happened in the history of the new people's congress! After the meeting, in the history of the Republic, the first proclamation issued by the township government announcing reform was produced.This notice, signed by the mayor Li Peijie himself, was posted all over the villages and markets in Xinxing Town in one morning, and it was widely advertised: "From January 1, 1993, the whole town will try to implement the land contract tax. (fee) system." The content of the announcement is as follows: 1. The full amount of taxes and fees is contracted. Farmers only undertake voluntary labor according to the policy, and do not bear any expenses (the original text should be "no longer", the author's note). withdrawal; 2. For 89,000 mu of land in the town, 30 yuan per mu of contract fee will be paid throughout the year (half in midday and autumn). payment; 3. The town finance office directly signs an agreement with the farmers. During the collection period, the cadres of natural villages and administrative villages are responsible for the implementation, and at the same time require the cadres of the whole town, state employees, teachers, and party members to take the lead in paying the money... This is a unique notice. Although it is posted in the name of a grassroots government, it is the simplest expression of the determination of hundreds of millions of Chinese farmers to get rid of the burden of history and bravely go to the market.Many of these contents undoubtedly have idealized and typical significance for the vast rural areas of China today.It is of course to be remembered by us like all major events in the history of the People's Republic! There was a tax reform in Xinxing Town. The news, like a flash of lightning, crossed the empty fields of Huaibei Plain and alarmed the rural cadres and farmers in Guoyang County.The cadres were all overwhelmed by the collection of taxes and fees, and the farmers were even more frightened by the "three chaos". When I heard that Xinxing Town was experimenting with the "one-time clearing" "fee to tax reform", all the cadres and the masses welcomed it wholeheartedly.For a time, there was an endless stream of people who went to Xinxing Town to visit, learn from, watch the bustle and see what was new. We all live very tired, and have been bound too long and too tightly by all kinds of shackles, both clearly and inexplicably, longing for relief and looking for a change. Now, Xinxing Town has taken the lead and blazed a new path , other villages and towns are naturally eager to try.The ones who moved after hearing the news, first of all, were Dancheng and rural areas. They followed the example of Xinxing town and convened the township people's congress, at which they reviewed and approved the same tax and fee reform plan.Not to be outdone, Madian Township started various preparations in full swing. Every year on New Year's Day, Huaibei is still a world of ice and snow, and the raging northwest wind almost wiped out all life on the Great Plains. However, on New Year's Day in 1993, Guoyang County and Mengcheng around Guoyang , Lixin, Taihe, Suixi and Bo County, but they all spent their time discussing the topic of tax and fee reform in Xinxing Town. On the third day of the new year, the leaders of Guoyang County Party Committee, County Government, County People's Congress, County Political Consultative Conference, and the heads of the county's township party committees and governments gathered in Xinxing Town, and held a joint meeting of the four major groups as scheduled.According to the prior plan of Wang Baoming, the secretary of the county party committee, and Wang Bingyu, the county magistrate, the reform of Xinxing Town will be promoted to the whole county as a typical demonstration through such an on-site meeting. The meeting arranged for Liu Xingjie to speak first on behalf of Xinxing Town. He also made serious preparations and reported with great enthusiasm their practice and experience in reforming the "land contract tax (fee) system" to reduce the burden on farmers.Almost all the participants were listening attentively, and the whole meeting was in an excited atmosphere.However, at this moment, even the secretary of the county party committee and the county magistrate were surprised. The director of the county people's congress suddenly raised an objection, and seriously stated: Although the reform plan of Xinxing Town is reasonable, it is absolutely not legal! The tone of the director of the National People's Congress is unquestionable, and the calm wording reveals a firm veto attitude and an unwavering principled position.People who are well versed in political careers will know that they have a great background as soon as they hear it.No one is unaware that this joint meeting was initiated by the secretary of the county party committee and the county magistrate. In order to publicize the reform spirit of Xinxing Town and promote their reform plan, the secretary and county magistrate worked hard and "bare-chested".Similarly, everyone knows that to dare to disclose such opinions that are contrary to the secretary and county head in front of the county's major leaders and all township party committee and government leaders, not only the provincial people's congress, but at least the regional people's congress must support it. This caught almost all the attendees by surprise. This is a blow to the reform of Xinxing Town and the joint meeting decided by the county party committee and the county government! It is precisely because everyone understands that the opinion of the director of the National People's Congress is not mixed with personal grievances. Even if he expresses the opposite view on such an occasion, it is not only reasonable and legal, but also is exercising the power enjoyed by the National People's Congress according to law and safeguarding national policies and regulations. Therefore, it is no longer necessary for the director of the National People's Congress to point it out. Everyone knows: What does it mean to a county party committee and county government to publicize illegal decisions with great fanfare? In the venue, there was a suffocating tranquility. The exuberant atmosphere that shrouded the entire meeting before disappeared quickly in the sudden silence, and disappeared without even a trace. The purpose of the meeting changed in an instant. No matter Wang Baoming, secretary of the county party committee or Wang Bingyu, the county magistrate, it was inconvenient to say anything in this situation. Now that the director of the county people's congress, who is the country's legal supervisor, pointed out that the plan was illegal, and the secretary of the county party committee and the county magistrate became so silent again, the direction of people's thinking naturally jumped out of the idea of ​​​​reform, and the next speech began become ambiguous. The scene summarized at the end of the on-site meeting, many people who attended that meeting are still deeply impressed. Although the secretary of the county party committee is towards the reform of Xinxing Town in his heart, his words are no longer so clear-cut. If there is time. In short, after the on-site meeting, all the supportive leaders became less confident. Tax reform in Xinxing Town is in great confusion. Yes, can such reforms be carried out again? Liu Xingjie and Li Peijie hesitated, but they were unwilling to let it go.After serious discussions, the party and government team in the town decided not to change their original intention, but to continue the tax and fee reform! Liu Xingjie and Li Peijie recognized a reason: this kind of reform is good for farmers; a rural grassroots cadre who does not work for the welfare of farmers is the biggest dereliction of duty! Of course they know the importance of organizational principles, and they also know that the "trial land contract tax (fee) system" is contrary to the current policies and regulations. The great banner of theory", Deng Xiaoping's southern tour speeches are undoubtedly an important part of "Deng Xiaoping Theory". To treat Deng Xiaoping's southern tour speeches with duplicity, or to follow them to the letter, this is obviously holding high the great banner of Deng Xiaoping Theory, implementing If the important instructions of General Secretary Jiang are not implemented, there is a big question of whether there is party spirit! "Securities" and "stock market" have always been considered capitalistic things, but Deng Xiaoping pointed out earnestly: "Are these things good, are they dangerous, are they unique to capitalism, and can socialism use them? Look, but try resolutely." And said, "If you see it right, if you are right after one or two years, let it go; You can close slowly, or you can leave a little tail. What are you afraid of, it doesn’t matter if you stick to this attitude, and you won’t make big mistakes.” Reading Deng Xiaoping's humbling speeches, Liu Xingjie and Li Peijie not only felt cordial, but also felt the shock of their hearts, and even felt a kind of great enlightenment. According to the established plan, they distributed the "Trial Implementation Rules" of the tax reform and the "Tax Collection and Settlement Measures" after the tax and fee consolidation to every farmer in the town, and signed agreements door to door according to the regulations. So Xinxing Town kicked off the prelude to China's tax and fee reform without hesitation! Madian Township, which was planning to carry out reforms together with Xinxing Town, finally withdrew its hand because the party secretary saw that the momentum was not going well; while Dancheng Township, which also passed the reform plan at the grassroots people's congress meeting, was encouraged by Xinxing Town and still decided to join forces with Xinxing Town. Let Xinxing Town stick to it together. However, the good times didn't last long.On March 1, the County People's Congress Law Work Committee and the County Finance Bureau suddenly dispatched staff to Xinxing Township to inspect the work; on March 3, Liu Xingjie, the secretary of the town's party committee, was transferred away. Some people say that the transfer of Liu Xingjie is a "drainage from the bottom" of Xinxing Town's tax and fee reform; The government's reuse of them.However, in any case, the tax reform is in a very difficult initial stage, and Liu Xingjie's transfer is a loss to Xinxing Town after all. Because the mayor Li Peijie became the secretary of the party committee, the deputy mayor Gong Baojie became the mayor.Gong Baojie is also a staunch supporter of tax and fee reform, because his name also has the word "Jie", and later people changed the "Second Second Heroes" to "Xinxing Three Heroes". The reform of Xinxing Town did not stop because of this, but because the reform won the hearts of the people and followed the people's wishes, it soon developed rapidly and the momentum was like a broken bamboo. But on April 27, the situation suddenly took a turn for the worse.On this day, the Standing Committee of the Guoyang County People's Congress formally passed a decision: to revoke the tax reform resolution passed by the Xinxing Township and Dancheng Township People's Congresses. Facing the decision of the Standing Committee of the County People's Congress, Dan Chengxiang couldn't bear it anymore and flinched.Li Peijie is also facing a painful choice.When the formal decision was received, people found that he locked himself in the office alone, staring blankly at the wall and pondering for a whole morning. The next day, Li Peijie went to the county seat. He made a special trip to visit the director of the county people's congress. Trying to get even a little loose tone from the director through his own efforts.But this hope was finally dashed.The answer I got was that there was no room for maneuver: "Don't do it anymore, it's illegal!" But he was still not reconciled, so he went to the county party committee and asked for further reforms.Of course, Wang Baoming, secretary of the county party committee, knew that the decision passed by the Standing Committee of the County People's Congress was supported by his superiors. At this point, it was obviously inconvenient for him to make a clear statement, so he said, "If you do it again, you will be fired!" This sentence was added meaningfully: "If you are withdrawn, you can still be activated again!" Li Peijie naturally understood. On the way back to Xinxing Town, Li Peijie's mood was very complicated. He really felt the tragedy of "sometimes the truth is in the hands of a few people". He thought: If anything that violates the current policies and regulations is opposed without analysis, and must be resolutely stopped and killed, then will the rural areas of China still have the experience of "big contract" in Xiaogang Village, Fengyang County?People in Xiaogang dared to be the first in the world, did not have the courage to rush to "take risks" without being afraid of going to jail and beheaded, so how could there be such a good situation of reform and opening up today? He thought, what kind of official is the secretary of the town party committee?After tracing it down, it will be a big deal to lose the black hat. As long as you can do a good job for the common people, it is worth sending them home to start farming again! Li Peijie made up his mind and wanted to "go to the dark side of this road"! From then on, regardless of the conference or meeting, Li Peijie claimed that no further reforms had been made as long as he was asked by the higher authorities, and that what he did was still the same as before.He insisted that he wanted to "cross the sea without the sky" and "do his own thing". Since the agreement signed between Xinxing Town and farmers stipulates that after paying 30 yuan per mu of arable land, they will no longer undertake other obligations other than the voluntary labor stipulated in the policy. The enthusiasm of farmers for farming is unprecedentedly high, and many farmers take the initiative to start High-efficiency agriculture, only medicinal materials and Guoyang’s special dried moss, have been expanded to 10,000 mu at once, which is twice and nine times more than the previous year; pond lotus has also expanded to 5,000 mu, which is five times more than the previous year. above.Because everyone was willing to invest and put their heart into farming, God helped again, and there was a rare bumper harvest in the afternoon season.As a result, no militiamen, no police officers were used to collect taxes and fees this year, and no village cadres came to the door to collect pork chops. The whole town completed the task smoothly in only ten days.This has not been seen in many years. Due to the constraints of the "Trial Implementation Rules" of the reform, the phenomenon of stretching hands indiscriminately has been curbed in Xinxing Town, and the per capita burden and per mu burden of farmers in the town have both decreased by 3% compared with the same period in 1992 before the reform. Seventeen and twenty point six percent.This was unthinkable in the past. What surprised Li Peijie the most was that after the trial implementation of the "integration of taxes and fees" in land contracting, the rational transfer of land "surfaced", and the land began to be transferred to the hands of capable farmers.Li Peijie sent people to find out, and found that there were more than 100 households in the town who subcontracted land spontaneously, and one of them transferred more than 60 mu of land, and the net income of a crop of high-quality soybeans was more than 20,000 yuan.Also because there is no need to organize people to come to the door to demand money and force food, many establishments do not need to be retained. For this alone, the town has streamlined and diverted more than 300 village and group cadres, which greatly reduced the burden on farmers. Although Li Peijie and Gong Baojie kept their mouths shut and never mentioned the word "reform", all this could not be hidden from the information department of the county government.Section chief Wang Wei believes that he has the responsibility to feed back the new changes in the tax reform of Xinxing Town to the province.On this day, Wang Wei wrote down what he had learned into a material of a few hundred words, and reported it to the Provincial Government Information Office concisely. A reporter from the Anhui Branch of Xinhua News Agency received the material provided by Wang Wei and found it to be very newsworthy, so he compiled it into an internal reference and published it on the internal edition of "Ban Yue Tan".Unexpectedly, this piece of news, which was only the size of dried tofu, angered some leading comrades of the Guoyang County People's Congress. After learning that it was Wang Wei who disclosed the information, they approached Wang Wei and questioned him: "How can you report such information to the police?" How about going up there?" They thought that the news was a "leak" for Guoyang County and smeared the faces of the people of Guoyang! At the report meeting on the completion of the expropriation task held by the county government, Li Peijie found that many people looked at him strangely, so he estimated that rumors of reform might have spread.In order not to cause trouble for the county party committee and county government leaders, when it was his turn to report, he simply told a big lie.He said: "Xingxing Town is completely following the decision of the Standing Committee of the County People's Congress, and has not implemented the original method of tax and fee reform." He said it seriously.He had to learn to tell lies seriously. Once Li Peijie tasted the sweetness of the reform, he made up his mind to persevere in this reform, but at the same time he had to continue to weave outrageous lies against his will.Party and conscience, in fact, are not contradictory at all. They should be one thing, but because of the "land tax (fee) system reform" in Xinxing Town, Li Peijie, including Gong Baojie, live in the "organizational discipline" and conscience almost every day. In the painful choice...