Thought Id start this one going because its rather dead on this board at the moment and I suppose all my usual muckers are either at the Stella tennis event watching Dim Tim (lose again) or at Henly Regatta eating cucumber sandwiches (they wish,...NOT).

Anyway please feel free to just talk to yourself blast away and let it go on any company or subject you wish. Just wish Id thought of this one before.

cheers GF.

What has the tory under its present leadership lowered politics and said "democracy" to?

Is that SUPERCAM or SUPERSCAM?

why have the tax avoiders not been charged . ever one who has put money in tax avoidance must be charged and made to pay back double what they should of paid

but alas the are conservatives so they will not be charged and not pay it back
the con party for the cons

the conservative party silent on the issue the sleaze party who only go after
the poor on benefits which is correct but must be for all cheats

If the Euro continues to drop : it will be viable to buy new cars abroad once again !...

The car dealers in the UK then join together, in what can only be described as a 'fashionable way', and collectively refer to such cars as 'Imports'.

They then further unite and say, "We don't touch Imports".

Then, because they have made it hard for a punter to sell on an Import into the trade, the value of these cars drops excessively.

Thus the initial saving is lost later when the seller gets a low trade in value.

But how about selling such Imports back to the trade out of the UK? That might be the answer to rescue the lost value at 'trade in time'.

At this time, one then has to consider the Euro/GBP relationship once again. So the whole thing is a bit of a gamble and does require a lot of thought.

I imported a new Land Cruiser out of Cyprus years ago, saving myself £6,500 and also earning good profits for:

1. My car dealer in Leicester.
2. His agent in Cyprus.
3. The agent's Cyprus Toyota dealership.
4. The importer in Cyprus who supplied the Toyota dealership in Cyprus

Amazing, eh? Back in 2000 this new LC cost me 'roughly' a mere £27k in total. I think they are now around £58k in the UK???

HSBC HSBC files.

HSBC files show Tories raised over £5m from HSBC Swiss account holders... Oh you don't say.

Is it still running EL?

I kept it for 4 years and so obviously, I've had a few more motors since then. But I would think so, Max.

Thanks EL.

I was asking as with the cost of repairs to modern motors seem to preclude hanging onto them for too long.

A small example:

My wifes general trash hauler (ford mpv) developed a fault with the interior lights/dashboard lights.

Took it to kwik-fit for them to have a look, and had to take it back when their diagnostic guy was in, he couldnt fix it, and said go to fords.

Usual palaver, they want you to book it in and leave it all day so the computer diagnostics can work (£90+vat)

Sod that, looked up the fault on the net, sure enough, there's a fix to reset the electronics....pull the fuse, count to ten, put fuse back in....one minute all told, and £90+vat saved.

I suspect this is why you don't see too many 10 year old cars on the road, they are simply too expensive to repair.

fred - as you may have gathered, i'm not around at the moment
may get stuck into the alan johnson book next, and i'm sure you right that it makes good reading regardless of one's politics
what have you done with hays?

I thought you had gone on holidays with Hays.

I hope you like the book. It is apolitical and reflects the period from the 50s 60s and 70s in which he grew up.

No bitterness in it, but amazing how people grow in spite of the soil their roots were planted in.

can someone keep an eye on international news as something nasty (ukraine?) may be afoot
Dow has quickly dumped 100 points

i currently have very poor connectivity

Does Haystack go skiing/snow boarding?

Manuel.

FTSE indices closed mildly lower as cautious investors continued to assess the Greece-Euro zone face off over its debt burden. Resources stocks were the main drivers lower all day, but were at least partially offset by a rich seam of blue-chip corporate news.

FTSE 100 closed down 10.95 points, or 0.16%, to 6818.17. FTSE 250 was down 26.14, or 0.16%, to 16,632.6. At 4.43pm, WTI crude was down 2.36% to $48.84/bbl. Brent lost 2.75% to $54.88/bbl. Europe's DAX and CAC 40 were lower on the Greece spectre.

=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

Suppose the above applies to DOW.

======

UKRAINE basically unchanged but horrendous.

report on dow is well after london close
prob jitters re ukraine and of course crude is slipping again - march wtl is barely above $49.00

And the chances of another Con party government!

The level that Dodgy Dave and the tories have brought "democracy" to.



Never mind with Dave's Slush funds, sorry Con party donations they will try to buy themselves out of self created trouble.

PS, How much an hour does he get paid as a tennis coach?

I thought today's 'Comment' in the Telegraph was an interesting take on yesterday's very aggressive spat between Miliband and Cameron over the Despatch Box at PM's QT.

From: HERE

Demonised by Labour simply for being wealthy
Ed Miliband's attack on Lord Fink is a depressing development


Ed Miliband, above left, has been accused of making 'untrue and defamatory' remarks about Lord Fink

By Telegraph View; 6:30AM GMT; 12 Feb 2015
Comments 347 (as I type)

To the Labour Party, “banker” is a four-letter word. At Prime Minister’s Questions yesterday, David Cameron was pummelled with question after question concerning his relationship with Lord Green, the former executive chairman of HSBC, whom he appointed as a trade minister. Never mind that Lord Green is an ordained priest in the Church of England, whose imprimatur Labour eagerly sought in the days before it decided that rabble-rousing populism was a substitute for an economic policy. The goal was clearly to tar and feather the Tories as the friends of the wealthy. Ed Miliband even went so far as to accuse Lord Fink, the treasurer of the Conservative Party, of “tax avoidance”.

Unfortunately for the Labour Party leader, this was not something that Lord Fink was prepared to take lying down. He challenged Mr Miliband to repeat his claims without the protection of parliamentary privilege – given that what Labour calls “tax avoidance”, others might call “having worked in Switzerland”. Mr Miliband has let it be known that he will do so today, if asked.

It is difficult to know what is most lamentable about this episode. First, there is the Labour Party’s naked hostility to enterprise and job creation – its attempt to stir up popular feeling against business and businessmen. Then there is the slapdash way in which Lord Fink was accused. It mirrors Mr Miliband’s insistence that Stefano Pessina, the head of Boots, “should be paying his taxes” rather than voicing the concerns of many within the financial community about Labour’s threadbare economic prospectus.

In this instance, he ignored the fact that Mr Pessina was born in Italy and lives in Monaco – making HMRC’s claim on his assets a tenuous one to say the least.

Lord Fink, as it happens, is a grocer’s son and grammar-school boy who, by brains alone, built up Man Group into one of the world’s largest financial institutions – and whose philanthropic works include giving a third of his income to charity, sponsoring schools and supporting a children’s hospital. On any metric, he has done more good for the world, from a less advantageous starting point, than Mr Miliband – yet it is the Labour leader who postures and preens and lays claim to the moral high ground.

The danger here is that people are being demonised simply because they are rich and successful – that wealth creation is being labelled something to envy rather than aspire to. If Mr Miliband is privy to details of Lord Fink’s tax arrangements that are nakedly incriminating, then let him produce them. Otherwise, he should apologise forthwith for a lapse of judgment that ill befits a would-be prime minister.
...............

One of the 347 'comments' makes a very credible point about Tax Avoidance not being illegal. This includes the avoidance of Death Duty.

It goes on to suggest that both Miliband and most of the rest of his Shadow Cabinet will be doing the same. Namely practising tax avoidance by minimising Death Duty.