Zac Goldsmith

[ItsGrimUpNorth]

I'm sorry but how can anyone vote for someone who only gave up their non dom status during the election campaign? How does someone like that contribute to Britain? He only became a tax payer because of the election. To me, that is a scum person.

And whilst he roundly won his seat, why did he have that gurning hooray behind him during the announcements? That, I have to say, was one of my favourite moments of the election, watching that berk's face. Could you get any more Tory?

reads threads properly, David Newman, his agent. Thank you

falls back down to the floor to carry on laughing at notion that good looks matter.

Oh yes, he won. Great stuff.

Suck it up? How nice.

As for handsome - really not my cup of tea. He's a bit smarmy looking for my taste. But each to their own. Some like the smarm look.

it's not his looks. it's his demeanour. have you not seen it?

no i'm sorry i looked at it again myself and you're quiet right, it is his looks, he really does look unpleasant in pink. mea culpa.

merryberry
at least the hooray has added to the levity of the nation. Everywhere he goes, he gets a laugh, with a hairstyle like that.

'Proof yet again that it's OK to display as much bigotry as you like, as long as it's towards those members of society generally perceived as privileged.'

Keep telling yourself that's what it's about. Haahaa. If you'd read the posts on here you'd see it's far from that.

But thankfully, I don't have to 'suck up' anything or him, either.

And you obviously don't have a clue what bigotry really is if you think you've seen it here.

I hope you don't ever find out, either, because if you think he's a 'victim' of that, you wouldn't last 5 minutes in the real face of it.

LOL.

'that this thread is full of class-based hatred, which is as unappealing as any other kind.'

Um, okay.

Yep. All that stuff about his being a liar and a cheater are all about class.

Whatever.

'suck it up'?

It's not all slurs though - some of the criticism has a lot of substance. You're not his brother in law's wife are you smallwhitecat?

Haven't read much beyond the OP, but if he meets the requirements for standing as an MP, then he should be allowed to pay his £500 deposit and to stand.

If there are aspects of his character beyond that, such as having been a non-dom in the past, it is up to the elctorate to decide on the morality of this.

Imagine he was a British mother with young children and a foreign husband living abroad. The husband turned abusive and the mother fled to the UK with her children and nothing more than the clothes on her back. Who would whine 'non-dom' in this situation?

Read a bit more now..

From what I know about ZG, his green credentials are highly respected both by 'emotional' greens and by scientists.

I am not impressed by his personal life which is a black mark.

I don't have a problem wiht his tax status. It is perfectly reasonable to do your best to minimise your taxes - ExpatinScotland, as an American citizen, would have been brought up with this ingrained in her character, so I am puzzled why she doesn't feel this way now.

I don't know why ZG is non-dom, but I remember his father being told to go back to his hacienda, so perhaps that has something to do with it.

One thing that struck me from election night was how overjoyed ZG was to be elected. The raw emotion was entirely genuine.

Okay, I'll give you a quick summary of the salient points:

• He dropped his non-dom status after a load of adverse publicity (but crucially after he'd decided to stand
• He's a fairweather environmentalist. He has a house in the caribbean which he and his family regularly fly to. Most really committed environmentalists I know limit their air travel severely
• He and his brothers made donations to the tory party to the tune of £40k which both they and party admin sought to hide.

Not really a shining example and I don't think he deserves a seat tbh

It is definitely NOT on to escape paying UK taxes while seeking the right to decide how much everyone else has to pay.

Anyone who has been a non-dom should have to pay full UK tax on their earnings for a set period before they are allowed near parliament. Say five years.

Plenty of other people do have an issue with it.

The Tories have criticised non doms for avoiding tax

Non-domicile status is usually reserved for foreign nationals or people with roots overseas.

Edam, what if a British citizen who had been non-dom, returned to the UK and needed to claim benefits. Would they have to wait fivee years too?

Should returning expats have to wait five years before enrolling their children in state school?

Should returning expats be allowed NHS care?

I felt physically sick watching him and his awful, Hooray Henry mates celebrating his victory.

These are not good people who work hard to serve others.

well duh, smallwhitecat, it's wrong because he's not paying his fair share while deciding how much the rest of us are forced to fork out.

He kept his money abroad to avoid paying UK tax on it. Then pretends to be all new nice Tory-lite but gives the game away by his choice of braying toff pal on election night. That's what was so funny about the berk - not just that he was a berk, but that he showed Zak up for what he really is.

Mme, I'm talking about standing for parliament, not claiming benefits! You shouldn't be allowed to make our laws until you have paid full UK tax on all your earnings just like everyone else for a set period.

So you would advocate different laws for PPCs and benefit claimant? That would mean that any disqualified from either group could not be part of the other!!! Benetfits claimants cannot stand for parlliament - shock horror!

Is there anything to say that ZG did not pay his UK taxes in full? As part of an internationally mobile family, he had some financial interests abroad set up by his father. But he has always been very much committed to the UK.

/tri-national, internationally mobile family worried that we are not allowed a point of view or place in democracy - and penalised by each countries' taxation system. Not at all seeing the benefits of 'non-dom'ness

It's a tax break for foreign nationals partially resident in the UK, not for UK citizens who happen to have a parent who was born abroad. It's a wizard wheeze for keeping your earnings off shore and of course it's financially advantageous. Otherwise people wouldn't do it wouldn't they?