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.

backfire on whom?

The power elite c, who else?

Think Thornberry.

the horror, the horror

wtf is/was thornberry?

A typical everyday millionaire labour luvvy hypocrite mp, soon to be dispatched to the wilderness.



http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-30139832

oh her ...... a very stupid and instantly forgettable storm in a teacup

I thought this cartoon was utterly brilliant and serves to put some delightful humour and scorn into the 'no receipts - observe the behaviour and attitudes of politicians' affair currently being displayed in the media in the pre-election war between the parties.

Not only do they Ed Balls and Ed Miliband bang in their expenses claims for £hundreds of pounds year after year, without receipted substantiation so as to recoup every last miserly penny and more besides, but they also roll their properties to avoid CGT like the best of them:

Quote:

Mr Miliband met Miss Thornton in 2002. In the following years, they owned separate flats. He originally had an apartment on Chalcot Square but sold this for £342,000 in 2005, before buying a flat on nearby Chalcot Road about a year later for £648,500.

It is not known where Mr Miliband, then 36, lived in the intervening months.

But Miss Thornton owned a flat in Maida Vale. This was sold for £680,000 in March 2008, with Miss Thornton paying no capital gains tax. A Labour spokesman has said this is because it was her primary residence.

Yet when Mr Miliband sold his flat on Chalcot Road for £740,000 in December 2009, he did not pay capital gains tax either, as he claimed this was his primary residence. This is despite the fact that five months earlier Miss Thornton – an environmental law expert on around £200,000 a year – had bought for £1.6 million the family home near Hampstead Heath where they now live. She had also given birth to their first son Daniel earlier that year, in June 2009.

They were able to avoid the tax in part because they were unmarried. Mr Miliband and Miss Thornton became engaged in 2010 and married a year later.

Miss Thornton, however, is still registered as the sole owner of their four-bedroom Victorian property for reasons that are unclear.

Tory MP Andrew Bridgen said Mr Miliband’s family’s deed of variation was clearly designed to cut inheritance tax and condemned the Labour leader’s denial of this. He added: ‘Ed Miliband should now publish this deed of variation that he is currently hiding away and be as open about his own tax affairs as he demands others to be. The public can then judge for themselves.’

this whole board has completely gone to sleep

for sure the market itself is surprisingly (be)calm(ed) given the continuing unrest in ukraine + greece, but it also shows just how much input came from GF, DB and Hays (hope he hasn't fallen off his yacht)

I wonder if Hays just didn't want the continual hassle what with the Election so near . He may be quite an activist on the Cons part.

that did cross my mind ..... it would be a shame if he too has disappeared

i'd also forgotten about shortie, who just got cheesed off with the abuse he got from some quarters and also felt strongly that GF (in particular) was "foolishly" treated by the management

What abuse did shortie get ?? i don't actually know why he left , shame though ..

i think DB in particular kept having a pop at him, but i may have got the person wrong

Perhaps you should reflect on the Europhobes in the Fascist or UKIP loby party:

I saw the White van heroes as the typical football hooligans who would be at home in the UKIP band.

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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/mps-expenses/6469078/MPs-expenses-Bernard-Jenkins-wife-had-holiday-home-while-he-claimed-for-other-house.html

MPs' expenses: Bernard Jenkin's wife had holiday home while he claimed for other house
The wife of Bernard Jenkin, the senior Conservative MP, rented out a holiday home in his constituency while he claimed £63,000 in expenses to live in her sister's house, it can be disclosed.

By Jon Swaine and Martin Beckford8:00AM GMT 31 Oct 2009

Mr Jenkin, a former shadow defence secretary, was left with the biggest repayment bill of all MPs following the audit by Sir Thomas Legg of parliamentary expenses claims since 2004.

The MP for North Essex was told to give back the £1,000 a month in public funds he paid Mary Fraser, the sister of his wife Anne, to rent her farmhouse as his “second home”.
Mr Jenkin said the arrangement was approved by Commons officials and that the rent charged by his sister-in-law was “somewhat less” than market rate, meaning that taxpayers got a good deal.
Yet today it can be disclosed that the Jenkins also own and rent out a seaside holiday home nearby. The house, which is registered in Mrs Jenkin’s name, is listed on tourist websites as being available for £650 a week in high season.
While the holiday home, which is advertised as housing six people, is in Mr Jenkin's constituency, the farmhouse he designated as his second home is in the neighbouring seat of Braintree, represented by his Tory colleague Brooks Newmark.
Related Articles
MPs' expenses: repayments will top £1 million 31 Oct 2009
The holiday home cost £150,000 when bought in August 2004. If its entire value was mortgaged, it is unlikely that the monthly interest payments on the loan – which Mr Jenkin could have claimed on expenses – would have totalled £1,000 a month.
The disclosure therefore raises the question of why Mr Jenkin needed to bill taxpayers for a second home outside his constituency when he could have lived more cheaply inside it.
Mr Jenkin yesterday said: "The fact that I am an MP does not preclude my wife from running her own business. She acquired a small two-bed holiday let property on a buy-to-let mortgage. It would not have been appropriate to claim taxpayers' money to pay my wife's mortgage on a holiday home.
Of the farmhouse, he said: "We needed to rent a family home with easy access to London and to all parts of my constituency, one of the the largest rural constituencies in Essex, and near to my wife's elderly mother. This arrangement with my sister-in-law was openly agreed in writing by the House of Commons Fees Office."
The controversial living arrangements of Mr Jenkin, who has been an MP since 1992, were disclosed earlier this year during The Daily Telegraph’s investigation into MPs’ expenses.
He claimed the farmhouse owned by his sister-in-law was his "second home" while designating a house in London that he shared with his wife as his "main home".
Since 2006, MPs have been banned from entering into financial arrangements with family members, yet Mr Jenkin continued to do so until August this year.
In the course of his audit Sir Thomas, a retired senior civil servant, has also said that agreements with family members dating back to 2004 are "tainted" and should not have been allowed.
This has left Mr Jenkin with a £63,000 bill. The MP has appealed against the ruling, insisting he was not aware of the rule change and was assured by Commons officials that the arrangement was acceptable.
The farmhouse, which is near Chelmsford, is owned outright by Mrs Fraser, Mrs Jenkin’s older sister, who lives at Moniack Castle near Inverness, which has been in her husband’s family since 1580.
On the other side of a lane from the farmhouse is a historic country house owned equally by Mrs Fraser and Mrs Jenkin, where their mother lives.
Mrs Jenkin, a PR consultant, went out with Richard Curtis, the screenwriter, while the pair were studying at Oxford University.Curtis has said that Mrs Jenkin, his first proper girlfriend, broke his heart.
He has included an idiotic character called “Bernard” in many of television series and films, including Blackadder and Four Weddings and a Funeral, prompting Mr Jenkin to accuse him of being "eaten up with jealousy that I got the girl".


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Why he wasn't prosecuted I cannot understand?

But reading about "Finks" and Tory slush funds I understand!
=-=-==-

No wonder the Church are questioning the morality of the Cons Party who for me are using the techniques of Goebbels when they blamed the Jews for the problems of Germany and vilified them along with the weakest or most defenceless in society.


The present tory party are living up to the name of the "Nasty Party". Personally there is a stench around their present leadership.

But perhaps they are offering the right wing voters what they wish for.

Fred , now a working class/retired snob

Fred's new pin up girl

Projected results


Cons Lab libs Also rans

244 313 18 75

Hung Parliament. Labour short by 13

Greece is interesting.

If they decide that the offer of the EU is not satisfactory and opt for asking Russia (who is in economic difficulties itself) for loans, and the loans are based on Russia having military bases on one of the Greek Isle, I think there maybe a lot more squawking than we are having at the moment.

certainly the threat of russia in the med is not an unlikely card to be played, and thus a very interesting thought of yours - unlike most of your other stuff i'm afraid :-)

Manuel,

Unfortunately you are not maturing like good port.

I would think you miss the contents of my postings by scanning.

Sometimes I question why I send epistles to the great unwashed.

Anyway, the market doesn't know what to make of Ukraine or Greece.

======

Serious question has the oil market bottomed out or has it got further to go.

Looking for a 2 year long.

.