OK I know I shouldn't read the Evening Standard, but the cheek of Shirley Porter...

[CaligulaCorday]

... is quite astounding. Having declared that she was only worth £300,000 to avoid paying the £43 million surcharge, she's now bought a house for 1.5 million or something.

The sheer, bare-faced cheek of the woman...

[twinsetandpearls]

that reminds me of my ex husband who could not afford to pay maintenance and then bought a town house in knighstbridge to the tune of 1.7million!

[WishICouldGiveUpWork]

Am not given to outbursts really and am pretty even in my opinions butI FECKING HATE SHIRLEY PORTER!!!!!!

[catsmother]

I think I once read an article about her which was entitled something along the lines of "the most hated female Conservative (and it's not who you think it is)".

Revolting, leech of a woman.

[CaligulaCorday]

What amazes me is that she can actually get away with it.

Our papers sneer at Italy and its corruption, but wft is this? This woman should be in prison for what she did. But our system is so corrupt, that instead she does a deal to avoid paying a fine, flits off to Israel for a number of years, then swans back and buys a house worth well over a million pounds. How precisely does that differ from what those dodgy Italian politicians do? Can someone remind me why our system is marvellous and everyone else is corrupt?

[UrsulatheSeawitch]

er - no.

[MerlinsBeard]

erm, who is shirley porter

[CaligulaCorday]

She was the leader of Westminster Council in the eighties MoM - even Mrs Thatcher found her scary. She was the one who sold off graveyards for 15p to her mates and was found guilty of gerrymandering by setting up a housing policy which moved Labour voters out of the borough of Westminster and moved people who were more likely to vote conservative in. One would have thought that offences like vote-fixing, gerrymandering etc., would in a democracy be considered such a serious offence that they merit a prison term, but apparantly not.

[CaligulaCorday]

Can't remember now whether the 15p graveyards were an urban myth in the end

[WideWebWitch]

She is vile, I agree. And should be in prison, true. God, wonder if she'll sue us?

[CaligulaCorday]

LOL, she can certainly afford to can't she?

Funny that.

[ilovecaboose]

Was it Rosie Millard who wrote about how poor she was and that they were going to go bankrupt and how they didn't know how thye were going to feed the children etc etc etc

and then mentioned how they might have to sell one of the 4 houses they owned (but it wouldn't raise enough to support them apparently).

Do these people live in the real world? DO they think that the rules/laws are only for others (the 'poor huddled masses') or something.

If a small business person did something like what SHirley POrter has done do you think they'd escape prison or would the Inland Revenue be down on them like a ton of bricks.

[MerlinsBeard]

ah, i was born in '81 so that will be why i dunno who she is or what she did!

[southeastastra]

i once worked with someone who was related to her and we were never allowed to mention her. old bag should have paid big time.

[CaligulaCorday]

LOL at never allowed to mention her.

Like She Who Must Not Be Named.

And You Know Who.

[CaligulaCorday]

It's amazing how many people in the world there are who can't be mentioned...

[speedymama]

In this country, the poor are pilloried, made scapegoats for many of the bad things going on in society and the govt spends huge resources hunting down benefit cheats.

On the other hand, the rich who break the law, get away with it because they can afford to. The rich get away with tax avoidance but you very rarely hear the govt trumpeting about how much resource they are using to stop this crime in the same way that they do for benefit cheats.

Moral of the story: One law for the rich and one law for the peasants.

[fistfullofnappies]

yes, we never saw any tv adverts about tracking down cheats who move Tory voters into Council flats did we.