Thread 20 Sunak and the Winter of Discontent

[DuncinToffee]

Previous thread www.mumsnet.com/talk/_chat/4672210-thread-19-from-trussterfuck-to-sunakered

Well they inherited a pretty decent NHS and they've made some direct impact on inflation with Truss.

No mention of what Brexit did to "capitalist economic growth" and our ability to bounce back? What a surprise.

BewareTheLibrarians have you seen that Jenrick stated yesterday that it could be a posibility that families with children to be put on the Rwanda list as to not just deter single male asylum seekers.

Hhhhmmm. I can imagine vetting processes were shredded the moment Johnson and his giant tax bill walked through the door of Number 10.

Is that the one with the posters who think we should tip some of the world's most desperate people into the sea and leave them there?
I don't know why they kept refusing to answer if that is what they meant.

Ah, levelling up money such as this.

www.gov.uk/government/case-studies/montgomery-canal-restoration-supported-by-almost-14-million-from-levelling-up-fund

Now I'm no expert, but I doubt the good people of the Shropshire/Wales borders care that much about the canal, but perhaps care more that the local hospital is grossly underfunded and falling apart, that their children can't go to 6th form college because there are no bus services, that the local libraries and sports facilities lack funding and so on.

"The Local Government Association has warned Jeremy Hunt in a letter that the £3bn-plus shortfall facing councils will lead to cuts, particularly as inflation has worsened since the last local government finance settlement was announced. “Without immediate additional funding, councils will face increasingly stark decisions about which services to stop providing as rising costs hit budgets. This means not just isolated closures of individual facilities but significant cuts to services people rely on, including those to the most vulnerable in our society,” it said."

We probably linked it at the time but worth reading this article in the Guardian about cuts to local authority budgets AND the impact of inflation AND energy prices.

www.theguardian.com/society/2022/oct/28/exclusive-councils-set-to-cut-services-across-country-to-meet-32bn-budget-shortfall

I love a good walk along a canal (not being sarky) but it's just not going to keep the lights on in our council nurseries, leisure centres or libraries or better our transport links (unless we are headed back to the 18th/19th century and then they'd need to do more than 4.4 miles of canal).

I feel like my brain is being melted by all the obfuscation and outright lies flying around. I can't get my head around the 'innocent mistake' excuse being trotted out for attempted tax evasion. It wasn't tax avoidance because that is legal and you may be embarrassed by the publicity but HMRC can't fine you or make you pay as legally you don't have to. The fact he paid the tax and the penalty means that what he did was illegal. Therefore it was tax evasion. It was tax evasion right up until he became boss of HMRC and then suddenly it transmorphed into an innocent mistake. Absolute, utter bullshit. Nobody forgets to include £27 million on their tax return. It was tax evasion and he got caught. He needs to go to jail like all those people who accidentally commit benefit fraud.

Lets imagine that it was an innocent mistake forgetting about £27million pounds much like Sunak just momentarily didn't have his seat belt on.

Are the best people we can find in the country really people who make such simple errors? Don't they realise that, that isn't actually much of a get out.

He needs to go to jail like all those people who accidentally commit benefit fraud
true of course!
But people who commit benefit fraud usually have very little ability to push back, they are at the bottom of society and very easy targets, that's why they go after them rather that the wealthy who have the ability to push back hard and make life difficult for those who come after them.
PLus, a wealthy person who gets away with that kind of thing....well those who move in his circles will be impressed by his ability to circumvent the rules that apply to us wretched peasants, they'll want to cosy up to him, learn how he does it, get some favours from him etc.

He made the simple mistake of thinking his dad owned £27 million worth of shares in his company when in fact it was him. I don't make mistakes like that about who owns the pack of ginger biscuits in my cupboard.

I wonder if he's asked his dad for his shares back.

Are the best people we can find in the country really people who make such simple errors? Don't they realise that, that isn't actually much of a get out
to them we are a lumpen mass of halfwits who will be dazzled and overcome by their wealth & majesty, the effete pwinceling expects us to adore him so much that we forgive any and all transgressions

Aint that the truth.

He needs to go to jail like all those people who accidentally commit benefit fraud.

You're 23 (twenty-three) times more likely to be prosecuted for benefit than tax crime, even though tax fraud and error costs an estimated £20bn a year compared to £2bn in benefit fraud and error.
twitter.com/ProfTimBale/status/1617781231625830401?t=ibiVSPAcqgmAm8feIr-IUg&s=19

Just heard a former minister on Radio 4 say that ministers are required to sign a declaration stating that their taxes are in order when they are appointed to cabinet positions. Someone's pants are on fire.

Sending threatening letters to people stating facts should be a sacking offence by itself

Just another day in Tory

Nadhim Zahawi faces questions over source of £30m unsecured loans to wife’s property company

Government has budgeted £220,000 for Boris Johnson's legal defence against claims he misled Parliament over Partygate - but the bill could go even higher

Suella Braverman is dropping recommendations made into the Windrush ‘debacle’, recommendations accepted by government previously

Those stats say a lot.

What on earth is this all about? It is so murky. This man should not be in Government.

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/jan/26/nadhim-zahawi-faces-questions-over-source-of-30m-unsecured-loans-to-wifes-property-company

Jeremy Hunt declines to say if he has ever paid a penalty to HMRC a la Nadhim Zahawi and claims the public 'aren't remotely interested' in the subject.

Zahawi seems to be bent as a corkscrew. Why the fuck hasn’t he resigned? He’s just an embarrassment now. He must have a huge amount of dirt on some people.

But if you have a cabinet full of corkscrews they get so inter twined that if you pull one out it all comes crashing down.

I would just like to put it out there that I have never paid a penalty to HMRC or had to pay tax late.

Don't think its that hard a statement to make.

It may be the case that it is true for Hunt also, but that each Minister is not saying because one of them (looking at you Sunak) can't say it.

I think Jeremy Hunt may be wrong about the public not caring about rich people who don't pay proper tax...

Its just Jeremy Hunt demonstrating that he is out of touch with the electorate.

He thinks that if he puts exactly the right ingredients in his word salad we won't be able to properly grasp what is happening