Poll Tax Riots - March 31 1990.   The Tax Riots the largest protests against the Poll Tax took place in Central London on the 31 march 1990 - the so called community charge introduced by Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative Party saw huge protests in London’s West End and Westminster along Whitehall where the police battled the demonstrators on horse back with batons and truncheons. The tax was a way of giving tax cuts to the rich and raising them for everyone else, which meant that the Duke of Westminster who used to pay £10,255 rates on his estate would only pay £419 – exactly the same as the average working class tenants and householders. The Poll Tax was hugely unpopular up and down the country and eventually was repealed and replaced by the council tax under the John Major Conservative government, and came into effect in 1993. The new system set tax levels on property value, which is still in place today.