tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-356580172024-03-21T02:18:54.989-07:00Rowans-blogRowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.comBlogger246125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-64712441418345299282019-08-30T07:16:00.001-07:002019-08-30T07:16:30.208-07:00Will BoJo be shown to have lied to the Queen?<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I despise Boris Johnson, (hereinafter BoJo).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I have always despised the mendacious fuckrat and I am not about to change my mind now.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I have had the misfortune to meet this loathsome man on two separate occasions before, and on both occasions his words have been nothing but empty hot air. I have watched him over the years and I have never had any occasion to change my views that he is an unmitigated liar, a self-appointed braggart and bully, who learned his ill-treatment of women from his disgusting father; who acquired his truculent manners at Eton; and who honed his aggressive behaviour as a member of the infamous Bullingdon Club at Oxford. His bullying conduct has been evidenced in the past by his agreement with an old Eton and Oxford friend, Darius Guppy to arrange for a journalist to be the victim of a grievous bodily harm attack.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">And now, he is a carpetbagging, unelected Prime Minister, shoe-horned into office by a miniscule bunch of dysfunctional and non-representative aged Tory geriatrics who believe, somehow, that this truculent priapic man-child will restore the UK to a world position of influence and power, but based upon nothing other than empty sound-bites and lies gerrymandered by this most dishonest of politicians.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">BoJo's behaviour has been to ride roughshod over the hugely important elements of our unwritten constitution, aspects of public behaviour which are vital in order to make our peculiar system work effectively. These include the importance of 'conventions' and 'precedent', and if these well-defined elements are not recognised and adhered to, our constitutional functionality breaks down.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">BoJo and his selected satraps, including the modern Lord Snooty, Jacob Rees-Mogg, claim that his decision to drag H.M.the Q into this most disreputable of debates, is perfectly normal and a proper use of Her Majesty's time. Well, this is so obviously a lie that it hardly needs nailing, but because there are so many ignorant and ill-informed members of the public who claim a democratic right to spout their uninformed opinions and to pour abuse on anyone with whom they do not agree, it becomes necessary to try and put this debate into context.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Thankfully, some very brave and informed individuals are now seeking to bring legal constraints upon BoJo and his team of publicly-funded liars, and Gina Miller has sought an action in the High Court to challenge the legitimacy and truthfulness of BoJo's advice to the Queen in order to force her to sign an Order proroguing Parliament.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I have used the word 'force' deliberately because I do not believe for one minute that H.M.the Q is unaware of the unconstitutional quality of this action, but she has no choice if confronted by what appears to be a proper request from her Prime Minister to prorogue Parliament, than to accede. She is not a lawyer and she is not required to debate the legality of the action, that is the prerogative of the High Court.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So the Court will look at the nature and quality of the request by BoJo, and they will judge its bona fides. It is perfectly clear to anyone who has been watching this debate that the primary aim of the prorogation is to prevent and to stymie any legitimate Parliamentary time to debate the issue proposed by BoJo and his team of liars.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">What will weigh very heavily in their deliberations will be the public utterances made by Tory politicians in the past few months about the possibility of shutting down Parliament.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In order to be persuaded that the Prorogation is lawful, the Court must examine the evidence of the reason for its request to the Queen. If the Court is satisfied, on a balance of probabilities that the request was made entirely and purely for the purpose of facilitating a Queen's Speech, (a process that usually takes no longer than 2 weeks), which is the explanation being proffered by BoJo the Liar, and his bought and paid for fellow-liars, like Jacob Rees-Smugg, then the Court is likely to deny the request from Gina Miller. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">However, if the Court, having considered all the evidence, (and that will now include the evidence of Sir John Major which is likely to be highly persuasive; the evidence of the Government minister saying too much at a conference recently, and BoJo's own conduct earlier in the year when he privately assured Tory Brexiteers that he would not rule out suspending Parliament to ram through a No Deal Brexit on October 31, will be highly difficult to overcome.<br />
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The then front-runner for the Tory leadership publicly voiced his opposition to the idea of proroguing this session of Parliament, and his spokesman repeated the candidate was 'instinctively averse' to the option.</div>
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He told MPs that he was 'strongly not attracted to' the option at an event after the official launch of his campaign yesterday.</div>
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But <a class="class" href="https://www.thetimes.co.uk/" rel="nofollow" style="color: #003580; cursor: pointer; letter-spacing: -0.01em; margin: 0px; min-height: 1px; padding: 0px; text-decoration: none;" target="_blank">The Times</a> was told the former foreign secretary had privately assured the hard-Brexit European Research Group (ERG) of backbench Tory MPs that he would not explicitly rule it out.</div>
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All this is evidence, and there will be a whole lot more which should point overwhelmingly to BoJo being found to be a liar and a charlatan, and to have acted in bad faith, and if the Court so finds, they have the option of saying so loudly and at great length. Even if they did not overturn the decision to prorogue, it would still make BoJo's position untenable, as a Prime Minister who lied to his Queen.</div>
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I myself have no doubt he lied to the Queen, even by default, but that is BoJo's leitmotif. He is a liar, pure and simple, and we should never forget it.</div>
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</span>Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com16tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-42893997997341674402019-08-19T08:27:00.000-07:002019-08-19T08:27:00.037-07:00Spuddling the facts, muddying the waters.<br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In his very cleverly worded piece in the Sunday Times of 18.8.19, entitled "...It casts itself as the good guy, but the EU's aim has been to humiliate and cheat..." Sir Peter Marshall, adopting frankly undiplomatic language states;</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"...</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Our partners (The EU) also loaded the dice against us. Article 50(2) specifies that the European Council shall provide guidelines in the light of which “the Union shall negotiate and conclude an agreement with that State . . . [The agreement] shall be concluded on behalf of the Union by the Council” (not the European Council, comprising heads of government, but the body a rung below, known as the council of ministers)…". The words in brackets are those of Sir Peter.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"...But they were not having that. The guidelines announced that the European Council “will remain permanently seized of the matter”. The whole withdrawal process was thus further prolonged by its subjection to the European Council’s ponderous timetable..."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Marshall's point is that the EU have deliberately made the negotiating of the EU Withdrawal Process as convoluted and difficult as possible. He appears to effect surprise that the EU would want to fight tooth and nail to protect the integrity of their Union and to make it difficult for members to leave whenever they wished.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">His words are pretty clear, and he rings in a dubious interpretation of the meaning of the word 'Council', suggesting that it means something other than that which it became. What is clear is that Sir Peter appears to be of the opinion that the European Council, by remaining "...permanently seized of the matter..." was a matter for regret at the least, but he builds it up to support his wider allegation of bad faith and cheating.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Now consider his words in an earlier article he published in a piece called "...<span style="font-size: small;">Light at the End of the Tunnel..?, published as a 'Brexit Briefing' on 28.3,18.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">In the polemic it states; </span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-size: small;">"...</span>Sir Peter Marshall reviews the course of the negotiations over the year since invoking article 50 of the Lisbon Treaty. His assessment is “very positive”.<br />
<br />
Maundy Thursday March 29<sup style="border-image: none; border: 0px; bottom: 1ex; box-sizing: border-box; height: 0px; line-height: 0; margin: 0px; outline: 0px; padding: 0px; position: relative; vertical-align: baseline;">th</sup> marks the first anniversary of the despatch of the letter from the Prime Minister to the European Council triggering the Article 50 process. At the half way stage in the allotted span of two years for settling the withdrawal process, how should we assess our progress? The answer is “very positively”..".<br />
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Later in the piece it states;<br />
<br />
"...the European Council wisely decided to remain seized of the matter of UK withdrawal throughout, instead of delegating it in effect from the board room to the shop floor, as specified in paragraph 2 of Article 50..."<br />
<br />
Sir Peter chooses to interpret these words as meaning that the work should have been carried out by the Council of Ministers, but the legislation does not use those words at all, in fact there is no mention of the Council of Ministers, and this is only Sir Peter's interpretation. In any event, he says that the decision to keep the matter in the hands of the European Council, was a 'wise decision'.<br />
<br />
So in March 2018, this former Mandarin thought the process '...is proceeding very positively..,' while now, he has significant cause to doubt the bona fides of our EU friends, and accuses them of bad faith and cheating.<br />
<br />
So what is the truth?<br />
<br />
My points here are only small ones, but from little acorns, etc, etc.<br />
<br />
Having had quite a wide experience of the devious nature of some senior Mandarins in my career, I know only too well how they can swerve seamlessly around issues which do not appeal to them.<br />
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</span>Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-52355833895987435312019-08-11T06:01:00.000-07:002019-08-11T06:01:52.348-07:00Why the Tories cannot come to terms with the end of the last war!<br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Michael Portillo has fronted a superb documentary for Channel 5 "...What's the matter with the Tories..."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">He seeks to try and understand why the UK is still so bedevilled with our apparently damaging obsession with our membership of the EU.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">What the programme demonstrates most clearly is the dysfunctional way in which our constitutional democracy is run, and how, most politics, even today, are deeply infected by the British disease of looking backwards over our shoulders to a mythical and frankly non-representative time when this country was overwhelmingly white, Protestant, when the Church of England represented the Tory Party at prayer; when MPs were mostly middle-aged and older men, when cricket was still played on Sundays in country villages, and there was still honey for tea!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Alright, I may have been guilty of a small degree of hyperbole, but what the programme demonstrates is how generations of Tory politicians have exercised and demonstrated severe anxieties about Europe and the political dimension.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">There is a significant degree of chatter about sovereignty and the inalienable rights of Nation States to determine their own policies and financings, but very little, if any debate on the impact and disregard for historical change.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">One element was very instructive. Nicholas Soames, Winston Churchill's grandson was interviewed and he was asked why the Tories find it so hard to engage sensibly with the EU. He said; "...The Tory Party has never come to terms with the end of the last war..."</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">In this one simple observation, Soames, a true blue Tory to his bootstraps, put his finger on the kernel of the conundrum..</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">This country has always been obsessed with the part we played in defeating Hitler. It is an issue which some people in Parliament, like that pint-sized clown, Mark Francois (whom Soames, to his eternal credit, clearly loathes with a passion), cannot seem to put down, and are forever invoking its memories and image.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Soames believes it has something to do with the psychology of 'standing alone', a kind of 'backs to the wall' meme, and a rejection of any kind of solidarity with other European countries. For myself, I think this conflates with the traditional British dislike of foreigners of whatever kind, their distrust of the French, their lack of respect for the Italians and their fear of the Germans.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">What is fascinating is how the most committed members of the EU and some of the earliest members committed to the success of the European construct were those countries, France, Germany and Italy, closely followed by the Benelux countries, which had suffered so much in World War 2.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">They had been invaded, colonised, their political models smashed, their legal structures trashed, their people abused and massive volumes of death and destruction visited on them. To re-build, they could begin again with a tabula rasa, and adopt the new and emerging emphasis on trading bloc status.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The focus on integrated trading blocs was designed to reflect the emergence of other supra-national consolidated trading groups elsewhere in the world. The age of the Nation State was over, it finally died in the rubble of 1944, and a new economic and political model of closer cooperation and trading interests was emerging.</span><br />
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The European Economic Community (EEC) was a <span style="color: black;"><a class="mw-redirect" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regional_organisation" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Regional organisation">regional organisation</a> </span>which aimed to bring about <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_integration" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Economic integration">economic integration</a> among its member states. It was created by the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Rome" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Treaty of Rome">Treaty of Rome</a> of 1957<sup><span style="color: #000120;"> </span></sup></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"> Upon the formation of the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="European Union">European Union</a> (EU) in 1993, the EEC was incorporated and renamed as the European Community (EC). In 2009 the EC's institutions were absorbed into the EU's wider framework and the community ceased to exist.
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The Community's initial aim was to bring about economic integration, including a <a class="mw-redirect" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_market" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Common market">common market</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Customs_union" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Customs union">customs union</a>, among its <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inner_Six" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Inner Six">six founding members</a>: <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belgium" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Belgium">Belgium</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/France" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="France">France</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italy" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Italy">Italy</a>, <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luxembourg" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Luxembourg">Luxembourg</a>, the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netherlands" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Netherlands">Netherlands</a> and <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/West_Germany" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="West Germany">West Germany</a>. In 1993 a complete <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_market" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Single market">single market</a> was achieved, known as the <a class="mw-redirect" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Internal_market" style="background: none; text-decoration: none;" title="Internal market">internal market</a>, which allowed for the free movement of goods, capital, services, and people within the EEC.</span></div>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">This was a new, and very different way of looking at the world, and because it did not incorporate the United Kingdom, the UK looked upon it with great suspicion. Nevertheless, the British Empire was breaking up, and the Commonwealth no longer looked to Britain for its leading role in their autonomy.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">But Britain had not experienced the same degree of invasion, colonisation and destruction as the Europeans and they would not willingly liken themselves to being in the same political position as the Euro countries.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The British national position adopted by all the Little Englanders and right-wing loopies was that we had won the war, and therefore we did not need to change. They forgot, or at least overlooked the fact that despite not having been the political losers of the conflict, our country was ruined. We were financially bereft, and that we existed entirely due to the willingness of the Americans to bail us out financially on a temporary basis while we tried to rebuild our economy which we had mortgaged to defeat Hitler. We also overlooked the fact that without the USA and to an even greater extent, Russia who lost in the region of 26 million people in defeating the Nazis, we would never have emerged victorious.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Effectively, in terms of finance, manpower, and infrastructure, we, the British were the losers in WW2, and we were not even in a similar position to Germany to benefit from the reconstruction process in Europe. I believe that this was very influential in developing an integral and visceral distrust of Germany and therefore an unwillingness to face the new future as an open and committed partner of the new emerging Democratic Republic of the new Germany.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">For me, this is one of the biggest influences behind the Little Englander's dislike of anything that hints of European-ism.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">All the time we, the Brits, refuse to accept that the times have changed dramatically and that we now live in a new political paradigm where the power-blocs are no longer determined by outdated and irrelevant 19th century concepts such as the Nation State, we will continue to be the sheet anchor on any ability to move forward. It is imperative that we understand this and accept that the political and cooperative model of economic and corporate co-existence in Europe has moved on, and we will never again revert to the models of the post-war era.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">We have to learn to get over the outcome of WW2 and stop surrounding ourselves with replications of invasions and reiterations of old battles. There is no need to forget the sacrifices of those who died to protect their country, but those people would find it very hard to recognise the present state of affairs in the UK. My father who fought through both WW2 and Korea was a committed European and believed in the need for us to make common cause with the other European countries.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Those politicians like Mark Francois and the other petty dictators in the House of Commons who so ritually trot out the useless and outmoded memes of nationhood, sovereignty and control freakery (ever noticed how many of them are former military types?) need to start reading some modern history and recognise that our development as a modern outward-looking nation did not come to an end in 1945, but in reality, began to develop a new way of looking at the world.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Our future lies in trade, but trade with our closest neighbours, not with the USA which doesn't give a flying fuck for us or our people. The Americans parrot the trash about 'special relationships' when it suits them, but that is only when they want to invade some hapless country and they want the UK to sacrifice our young people in support of American 'shock and awe' tactics.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">A close and meaningful relationship with the EU, the biggest trading bloc in the world, is our real future. Never forget, Napoleon, quoting Voltaire once said; "...God is on the side of the big battalions..."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-8165245958444144552019-04-22T04:40:00.001-07:002019-04-22T07:30:55.046-07:00Why the Brexit debate has taken on such a hate-filled rhetoric.<br />
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<span style="background: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I have been following the debate on Brexit with mounting dismay and concern in recent days.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Last week I made a contribution to a FaceBook page posted by the European Parliament. encouraging EU citizens in the UK to register to vote if they wanted to vote in the forthcoming EU elections. I posted a mild supporting statement because I want the EU Parliament to encourage men and women of good faith and best intentions to become EU Parliamentarians. I want them to put a spoke in the wheel of the emergent neo-Nazis and extreme right-wing radicals that are being increasingly thrown up in Europe, and whose hate-filled views and septic memes are poisoning the well of debate.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Recall, I said the EU parliament.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">If the UK gets to vote in this election, I do not imagine that anyone elected to sit in the EU Parliament will be members for very long, much as I would like them to be. I fear that the UK will be dragged out of the EU by the swivel-eyed anti-EU nutters who increasingly populate our debates in Parliament and on social media.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">The page suddenly became the target for an attack from the denizens of extremist opinion and angry, irrational rhetoric, the like of which I have never before experienced. It was as if every flag-waving, tattooed, pit-bull owning, motor-cycle riding, and every other form of uninformed right-wing political fantasist decided to air their lack of logic, their factual ignorance about the EU, and, yes, let's admit it, their downright visceral hatred of Brussels and everything that spells European Union.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">It was a truly horrible experience. I don't mind personal attacks, I just ignore them. If ignorant and uneducated "...graduates from the school of hard knocks and the university of life...", (which a lot of them proudly claim to be, parading their uneducated ignorance like a badge of honour) want to bad mouth me for expressing my views, well, so be it. They simply make themselves look ridiculous and ill-informed for anyone with a modicum of intelligence to identify. But the levels of sheer hatred and vituperation that some of these Neanderthals voiced was truly awful, and did not bode well for the safe future of this country or of Europe. </span></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #001000; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Most of them appeared to parrot the same memes of support for that charlatan, Nigel Farage and his new Brexit Party. None of them appear to have realised that the new entity is a private vehicle for Farage and his galere, over which he has absolute control, and over which he has absolutely no intention of allowing hoi polloi to exercise any control. I wish them joy of the worm, Farage will soon disabuse them of any sense of honour or dignity if he gets his way.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #001000; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I am far more concerned with the level of hatred and vileness more generally which is flooding into public life and debate presently. Where is this level of rhetoric coming from, who is generating this 'Dad's Army' level of swivel-eyed and misplaced Imperialistic nonsense?</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #001000; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Some of the blame has to be laid at the door of some of our more egocentric MP's. Men like Jacob Rees-Smugg, parading his deliberately mal-manipulated logic, or Mark Francois with his war-like rhetoric, identifying the fact that despite being too young for WWII, he wants to start WWIII so he can get a walk-on part.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #001000; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Most recently, Nicky Morgan, M.P, a sensible, logical and caring woman, has accused veteran Euro-hater and antediluvian roadblock to progress, Sir William Cash for </span><span style="color: #001000;"><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">fu</span><span style="background: white;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">elling violence with a 'vain
and bitter' article. This is a very important allegation, because it identifies how the ignorant and the uninformed can be encouraged to engage in vile imprecations, incited by the rabid mouthings and the hysterical language employed by a senior MP, albeit one who has revelled in his anti-Europeanism for many years.</span></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #001000; font-size: large;">Senior Eurosceptic Cash has been accused of fuelling violence against politicians after he accused Theresa May of
"abject surrender" and "capitulation" to the EU. Just reading this use of language, one could be forgiven for believing that Cash and his flag-waving band of false patriots believe we are at war with our colleagues and friends inside Europe. No wonder the Little Englanders and the loony-tune Brexiteer tendency feel empowered to parade their ignorance, and vile hatreds. </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Former cabinet minister Nicky Morgan generously said Sir Bill's words were
"not helpful" while former Foreign Office minister Alistair Burt
accused the veteran MP, a senior member of the European Research Group of
anti-EU Tories, of a publishing "a vain and bitter article".</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Writing in the <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Sunday Telegraph</em>, the house magazine of Euro-haters and the headbanger-brigade membership, Sir Bill compounded the wartime memes and the adoption of his Captain Mainwaring persona when he said this was an "abject surrender" and accused the prime minister of
"capitulation" and "appeasement".</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #001000; font-size: large;">His comments were strongly condemned by pro-EU Tories.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Ms Morgan, a former education secretary, told BBC Radio 4's <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Today</em>:
"I understand that Sir Bill Cash has written an article in which there are
all sorts of phrases about betrayal and capitulation and all the rest of it.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">"As my colleague Alistair Burt has pointed out, this kind
of language is not helpful. It's not the kind of language that our councillors
or frankly any normal people would use."</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="color: #001000; font-size: large;">Nicky Morgan, who has previously received death threats, said she saw a link
between the type of comments made by Sir Bill and violence directed against
MPs. I say its influence extends even further and influences public debate more generally. Her answers are instructive because they point up the connection between these silly and juvenile remarks by someone who should know better, and the kind of pure nastiness being spouted by supporters of the new Brexit Party.</span></span></div>
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<span style="background: white; color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Asked if she believed there was a connection, she
said: "I do. I think it's been shown that the language that MPs or
campaigners, mainly in favour of Brexit, are using is stoking up other people,
often who are sitting at home watching all this stuff and it gets them really,
really angry and fired up and then they say things that they would never say
face to face."</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">She added: "Language is important and the One
Nation group of MPs that I am co-chairing has said very clearly that we should
all think about the language that we are using in these debates. We need to
remember that politics is about much more than Brexit."</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Mr Burt, who resigned as a Foreign Office minister
last month in order to vote against the government on Brexit, wrote to Sir Bill
on Twitter: "A vain and bitter article focused on your prime minister,
with your opinions expressed in words such as mendacity, surrender, betrayal,
appeasement, bended knee...Does it ever cross your mind what you're
contributing to?"</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">I am afraid that Cash and his satraps know precisely what they are doing. These are dog-whistle words, and he and his Ton-Ton Macoutes know that they play well with the narrow-minded and blinkered false patriots who are now flooding to support the Faragista circus of clowns and wibbly-wobbly men.</span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333;"><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif; font-size: large;">Let us always remember the words of Dr Johnson when he succinctly observed that (False) patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel. How many of these new Brexit party supporters will turn out to be simply misinformed and mistaken or downright scoundrels, only time and Brexit will tell!</span></span></div>
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<b></b><i></i><u></u><sub></sub><sup></sup><strike></strike><span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"></span><span style="font-size: large;"></span>Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-89878329285074947982018-11-11T10:39:00.001-08:002018-11-11T10:49:05.328-08:00<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Armistice Day 2018</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I have watched the service from the Cenotaph and I have also seen the various ceremonies taking place around Europe.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I have watched while old enemies have engaged in services of reconciliation and have held out the hands of peace to each other.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I have listened to the words of solace and heard the songs of peace, and if there is one thing I take from all these images and sounds it is the huge importance of the concept of European harmony and integration.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The concept of Europe has kept us safe and secure since 1945 and it will continue to operate as a bastion of hope and understanding for many years to come.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I take no note of the idiot cynics who argue that it is not Europe but NATO which has held back the tide of new wars. NATO is mostly a creature of the USA, and we all know, particularly under the regime of the orange-stained golfing buffoon who presently sits in the White House, what that means. I ignore the mad Little Englanders who in their insecurity as British people, feel they must insult and confront every other race ,religion and creed which seeks to make a home in the British Isles. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">After over 40 years of EU membership, I thought we might have come to terms with our European status. We have played an important role in Europe, and we have only been besmirched and let down by the crazies in UKIP who cannot see the EU as being anything other than a corrupting influence, draining our British identity, and who feel the need to insult every other European politician, because it makes them feel big and important, which they surely are not.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">I have news for the Faragistas and the loony-tunes racist Ukippers. Being proud members of the EU hasn't made any Frenchmen less French. The Germans have not felt any less German in their status, it is just that they have worn their European identity like a second coat, identifying its ambitions whie revelling in their own identities.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Watching Angela Merkel and Emmanuel Macron holding each other's arms today, resting their heads in symbolic peace on each other's shoulders has made me realise even more how important the European continuum is and why we British must, even more than before, continue to make common cause with our European friends and relations.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Those who know my work and writing know that I am an unreformed European. I believe in a Federal Europe, a common tax-base, a European armed service (if that is what is wanted), a European Intelligence service, and a common cause in information sharing and intelligence gathering and dissemination. I want to enhance Europe, I want to enlarge its remit, I want to make more common cause with its police agencies, its political thinkers and its philosophical leaders/<br />
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In the Press yesterday, an important piece in the Guardian lambasted the British approach to Europe, particularly in the way in which we are behaving like poltroons in our negotiating position. In a scathing critique, the author state;</span>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"...It is often unclear if the UK is trying harder to hoodwink the EU or itself. Ministers have repeatedly called for things they must know to be impossible. Davis promised that a trade deal would be ready to sign next March; May insisted free movement in its current form would end during the transition period; and now Raab declares that he can unilaterally terminate a backstop that both sides agreed will last “unless and until another solution is found”. In sacrificing trust, we have also sacrificed credibility. After two long years, the government not only appears duplicitous, but demonstrably out of its depth.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Brexit’s slow unravelling was both predictable and avoidable. Officials frequently remark that if they had trusted the UK’s motives and competence, they would have afforded the government more leeway. But instead of building bridges, the UK quickly burned them. The EU now suspects the government will do everything it can to wriggle out of the backstop, and is determined to thwart Britain’s faithlessness with a watertight withdrawal treaty. If, in the final weeks, the EU is holding our feet to the fire, it’s because we have shown it that it must..."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Our politicians have sought to hoodwink us, and behaved with such duplicitous mendacity that they are no longer to be given any consideration. They cannot be trusted, they are consummate liars and they have relinquished any right to support or belief. They have wasted every important opportunity to negotiate a decent outcome of the Brexit nausea. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We must hold out for a permanent solution to this madness, so that we can finally put this insanity to rest and finally and for ever manifest our commitment to a lasting European status and membership, the centenary acknowledgements of the end of the Great War and the lasting peace and prosperity that our European membership has delivered, demand no less.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;"><br /></span>Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-43583859612918990642017-11-19T04:05:00.001-08:002018-11-11T09:39:13.631-08:00Why David Davis and his Tory mates make such piss-poor negotiators in the Brexit affairs.<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">An old merchant was lying on his death-bed, and he called his only son to his side.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">"Son" he said, " I am going to teach you the most important thing I have ever known in life. When a man comes to you to do business he wants to screw you for as much as he can. You, in turn don't want to pay any more than you absolutely need to. You ask him his price. He says 'Ten'. He means Eight, so he wants Six, so its worth Four, so you bid him Two..."</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">The other night on 'Question Time', you know that dreadfully slanted and biased, pro-Right-Wing Tory soapbox, usually packed with UKIPpers and other swivel-eyed Brexiteers, Nadim Zahawi, Tory M.P and well-known rent-a-quote opined on the way in which the Brexit affair should be being negotiated. He prayed in aid, so he said, his years of negotiating as a businessman, and in so doing he, like so many other Tories displayed his total ignorance of the true nature of the Brexit discussions.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Tory businessmen always seem to think that life is a simple process of doing deals, and that their commercial expertise fits them well for negotiating the UK exit policy. Their uni-linear minds only think one way and they believe that by holding their cards close to their chest and bullying the other side by threats of walking away from the negotiating table, that this will somehow bring the deal home, advantageously to them.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">David Davis maintains this line in commercial tarradiddle all the time. Ask him why we cannot be shown the contents of the so-called 50 secret dossiers (which in truth I do not believe exist) and he says we mustn't display our negotiating hand. Ask him about the price for our divorce bills and he says that if we disclosed that figure, then the Europeans would only ask for more. And so it goes.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">When we come to dissect the UK approach to the Brexit negotiations, we quickly come to the glaring conclusion that we don't have any real proposals to make at all, and we are just simply waiting for the EU team to lay their hand on the table, so we can find out what they want us to stump up, and then hope to finesse our way round it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">In so doing, our people forget that it is we, the UK, who are asking to leave the EU, we are the ones conducting the proposals for our case to be given a fantastically beneficial deal, but without belonging to the club or making any meaningful contribution, and that therefore it is for us to lay out our suggestions and ideas, and convince the EU team that we have a good case for them to answer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">But no, like a rabid dog in a manger, and on the basis that this is super-effective negotiating expertise, we have hidden our hands and refused to make serious proposals, so much so that it is increasingly infuriating the EU team, who feel that they are being required to negotiate blindly.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">And what we are seeing are the usual predictable tactics of the British businessman in a commercial deal, waiting to see who will blink first.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">But this isn't a commercial sale agreement, and there are significant differences between the two concepts.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">First of all, the EU side doesn't want us (in principle) to leave at all. They would far prefer us to stay as members. So they don't come to the table with any desire to win or lose. If we want to go, well they won't try to stop us, they can't, so no sweeteners there are possible, but they won't lift a finger to help us. So there is no need for them to be accommodating and move towards making our decisions any easier. This is what so many whining, ugly Brit 'Leavers' don't seem to comprehend. Davis and his team keep moaning on about why the EU are not being more flexible and coming round to discussing a new trading agreement, but why should they? They don't need to, they already have a superb trading agreement with us, and nothing they put in its place will be any better, and for them it will be a loss-making deal, so what possible motivation do they have for having any discussions at all about a new trading deal?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Davis grizzles on about the EU needing to start talks about Trade, but until such time as we have answered their outstanding questions about the management of our legal commitments to them, what motivation do they have to believe that we will keep our word?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">So, secondly, before we can leave, we have to settle all our debts. These are legally-binding agreements we have already made as members in full and good standing, and upon which the EU has already made commercial and financial forward commitments. Those will have to be paid.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">How much are they? Well we should be able to calculate them to within the odd million or two because we will know how much we have committed to, and this really shouldn't be a difficult decision or process.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Theresa 'No Mates' made a derisory first proffer at the Florence meeting, but it was so transparently stupid and unrealistic that no-one in Brussels was going to take her seriously. It was the political equivalent of bidding 'Two'! Everyone present knew that, no-one was fooled, no-one was impressed and all it did was reinforce the image of Britain being a nation of skinflints who would renege on the deal at the end!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">More difficult will be the decision about the Irish border, but some sensible and workmanlike discussions with the Irish Prime Minister should be capable of coming to a general agreement in principle, upon which we could leave the civil servants on both sides of the divide to finalise the small print in detail, after all, it's what they are good at. The Eire Government needs to be kept firmly on-side because we don't want them vetoing any final deal that might eventually be put on the table.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">The future of EU citizens in the UK and the other way round should be the work of 5 minutes discussion. How long does it take to say 'everything will remain exactly as it was for those citizens on either side of the Channel who were in situ as of (date to be agreed)"? As this is still an issue about EU status, it is natural that the relevant Court of Arbitration should be the European Court. Even David Davis is now willing to agree that issue in certain cases.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">I know I have perhaps (over) simplified these points somewhat, but not a lot. But Theresa No Mates and David Davis have turned these discussions into a 5 ring circus and they are still dragging their feet, making this country look vacillatory and stupid.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">If we had decent sensible commercial calculations based on logic, fact and bounded by law, then armed with these figures we could begin to have sensible talks with Brussels.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">We have lost sight of our end-game in all this. David Davis is so keen to keep on trying to pretend that he has got bigger 'cojones' than his opposite numbers. he keeps on bidding 'Two', and is then surprised when M.Barnier tells him to 'fuck off' , or whatever the equivalent phrases is in educated French (<span class="short_text" id="result_box" lang="fr">'Va te faire foutre)</span>. when in fact he needs a totally different strategy altogether.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">You see, Davis is already well and truly hoist by his own petard.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">The EU know we want to leave, and our stupid politicians keep telling the world we are leaving. They now even know the date on which we are going (maybe we could tell them the time as well and leave them in no doubt whatsoever!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">This is the negotiating equivalent of going into a deal meeting and saying to the other side that if we don't have the deal we want by 4.00pm we have to leave. If the other side doesn't want to deal and is in no hurry to agree, then we can go whistle up our kilts for any deal at all.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">This is so stupid I find it incredible that it was ever mentioned, but of course we started the clock ticking when we exercised Article 50. We didn't need to do that, it was a futile gesture, but it was done to keep the Brexiteers, the Little Englanders and above all the new 'bastards' in the Right-Wing Tory ranks happy, but from that moment, trying to negotiate this deal in the same way as buying a factory or a hotel chain was deeply flawed.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">If we really wanted to come out of this mess with any semblance of credibility, we should first of all have to have started off by finding a way to morally commit the EU into wanting to do a deal with us. The EU prides itself on being on the moral high ground and they would not want the world to view them as morally corrupt.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">If I were negotiating this deal, I would have kept away from the exercise of Article 50 until such time as I had all the best possible answers to the burning questions that I knew the EU would ask, money, Irish question and EU citizens rights. I would have made sure I had the best possible views on the divorce bill, crunched by accountants, lawyers, academics, main businessmen, CBI etc, etc, and then, and only then, when I had both a best case scenario and a worst case scenario, with which I could live with dignity, would I have started negotiations.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Within the first week I would have informed Brussels, formally and in writing what my proffer was to settle the divorce bill, and I would have made it clear that the amount payable would be settled on the last day of the Article 50 process, but conditional upon and when and only when, we had a commercial deal that suited both sides.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">If they wanted to haggle, well I would know how far my worst case scenario could extend, but I would have made it clear that the deal was not intended to be open to too much negotiation. If they then started to haggle needlessly, then I would know they were not serious and I could hold out on the tabled offer. As time slipped by, the Europeans would have found themselves under such pressure from member states to settle that a settlement would have followed, of that I am certain. Once that had been achieved, they would have had nothing more to hold out for and the rest would eventually have become achievable. Perhaps not in every detail, but to a very large extent.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">The beauty of this model is that we the UK could not have been accused of being vacillatory nor unwilling to deal, and we would have been seen as being strong and purposeful (I deliberately avoided the word 'stable').</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">As it is, we are now royally fucked because we have told so many lies and have beaten around the bush for so long that the EU does not believe us.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Getting this deal done in principle should have been achievable within a couple of weeks, following this model. This would not mean that all the details which still needed to be ironed out would have been completed, but that will be the case now, in any event, and we haven't even reached a workable deal yet, and show no signs of so doing.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">My point is that the Tory Government and its dinosaur-like members have always been difficult about our European membership. To these men and women who are so keen to see us crash out and burn, they have always hated Europe. They are the direct descendants of John Major's 'Bastards' from the Maastricht negotiations. Any sign of being willing to work hand in glove with Europe is seen as a sign of masculine political weakness, so our negotiators have to grind the EU noses in the dirt, kicking them in the balls all the while, screaming all the while' '...There, take that you dirty foreigner and let that be a lesson to you..." </span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">They just don't seem to realise that the people they are really hurting are the rest of us Brits who don't want to leave the EU, who want to stay and work within the best commercial arrangement we have had in this country in my lifetime, and of which we could have been the de facto leader, if they did but have the sense to see.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">We must continue to stand up to them, call out their lies, and stick out for an outcome which still leaves us full members of the EU. A majority of people canvassed in the country now think that leaving the EU will be an expensive mistake and there is still much time to go. Never mind the 'will of the people', this was another lie based upon fraud, falsehoods and deceits, and manufactured by a small coterie of wealthy men who want to damage the traditional Parliamentary democracy in this country.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">We are all Europeans now, it's time for the Little Englanders and the swivel-eyed Brexiteers to grow up.</span></div>
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Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-20232224013305887992017-11-11T05:18:00.001-08:002017-11-11T05:19:20.633-08:00The Little Englanders now intend to blackmail the EU.<span style="font-family: "arial" , "helvetica" , sans-serif;">Ian Duncan Smith and his fellow Brexiteer loonies are now showing signs of real desperation.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Part of Theresa 'No Mates' difficulties in negotiating the exit from the EU is the number of competing voices she is forced to listen to, all giving her conflicting advice. Being the vacillatory dodderer she is, she is incapable of ignoring those, like the Tory dinosaurs, Duncan Smith, Gove, Bo-Jo, Redwood, Rees-Smug, et al, and she ends up being torn every which way but loose.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">In the Saturday Telegraph of 11th November 2017, Bo-Jo Hairdo is to be heard pontificating again on the size of the divorce settlement. Anxious not to be seen to be being openly contemptuous of the feeble leader, Bo-Jo's words are dressed up as being those of his 'allies' or his 'friends' although, 'as every fool know', these are drips of pure venom straight from the Bo-Jo's fangs.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Britain, we are instructed, in the siren tones usually adopted by our useless Foreign Secretary, must not cave in to EU demands for a bigger Brexit divorce bill.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">These bullying requirements come at the time when Theresa 'No Mates' is preparing to increase the UK's offer to the EU, after her initial proffer was considered to be insufficient. The EU, so the Torygraph advises us, wants at least €60 billion.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">This is where it begins to get interesting, so follow closely.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">The talk of the figure in the region of €60 billion has been in the public domain for quite a few months now, it is no stranger. It reflects a round figure of what the UK would owe to the EU in terms of its financial commitments, already agreed to, and to which the EU is committed in terms of future liabilities. We are not talking about some spurious sum of money which the EU wishes to prize out of the UK's fingers, but a financial commitment, freely undertaken as part of our continuing EU membership.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Bo-Jo Hairdo, the bumbling Foreign Secretary who always allows his loose mouth to rule his judgement wants the UK to 'hold its nerve' ahead of the December summit. What does this piece of schoolboy doggerel advice mean in these circumstances? After all, at Eton they speak of little else when the wall game is underway.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">One of Bo-Jo's army of allies (sic) opines; '...You don't pay your bill at a restaurant halfway through: you pay at the end. That's sensible business...' (Clearly a Bullingdon Club member)!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Well, maybe, but at least in a restaurant the owner knows what your bill is likely to be and he doesn't expect you to pay until the end.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Taken together, we are now able to begin to construe the real motive behind these posturings, which is that the Little Englanders are hoping to blackmail the EU in doing a better deal for the UK over the free trade agreement we have repeatedly been promised we are going to get out of the EU. They are now getting desperate because they are finally seeing that the EU ain't gonna give them any better free trade terms when we leave, and why should they. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">This has been the big lie all along, and one which has been repeatedly parroted by all the slack-jawed Little Englanders and the swivel-eyed Brexiteers. I mean, even the vast majority of the rump of dumb 'Leavers' who want so desperately to believe they will be better off outside the EU, will have some difficulty in reconciling this triumph of hope over experience, when they realise that there is no free trade agreement waiting for us with the 27 other member states who have stayed loyal.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Why would or should there be? You don't stick two fingers up to the club, tell them repeatedly what a bunch of inefficient useless tossers they are, and then walk away with all the financial benefits you had before, and get them for nothing.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">I never believed that piece of lunacy from the start and I don't believe it now.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Well, returning to the blackmail argument, the Brexiteers now realise that they have to start getting rough with Brussels, if they don't show more signs of being willing to compromise over the free trade deal. Up to now, M.Barnier and his team have stuck closely to the script of expecting the UK to finalise their commitment to their side of the leaving bargain. David Davis has dragged his feet and obfuscated, claiming he cannot show his hand, and praying in aid a host of what I now suspect are illusory files and dossiers, all of which tactics have been designed to buy him time.Time to try and put pressure on the EU in the fear that the UK will not pay our full and legally-committed share of the bill as outlined above.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">There is some bizarre belief among the swivel eyed and the slack jawed that the EU is absolutely bowel-looseningly desperate for our money, and that more threats of non-payment and pressure will cause them to cave in.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">These are the arguments of the British bully, the playground swaggerer, the playing fields of Eton adherent, and it is not true!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">But still they promote it. In the same piece from the Saturday Reactograph, it is reported thus;</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">"...Tory Eurosceptics have warned the Brexit Divorce bill is 'critical' and that the UK cannot afford to give any more ground. Ian Duncan Smith, Tory M.P and former Conservative leader" (<i>although not the brightest bulb in the box) </i>"...told the Daily Telegraph...; " '...They think we blinked in Florence and now they believe we will blink again. We must not blink...'.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">'...The one big hand we have is money. They are desperate. If we give away that we give away any chance of getting a good free trade agreement. The two get decided at the same time...'</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">'...The money is critical, we cannot give any more ground on this. Tory Eurosceptics are getting really unnerved by this. It is stretching them to breaking...'</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Well, there it is, the Tory Dad's Army of Eurohaters is in a panic mode and believes, in their monocular way, that the only thing they have left is to try and blackmail the EU by threatening them that the talks will break down.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">What they don't get is that there is no downside to the EU if this were to happen. True they will lose out on a voluntary payment from the UK, but then they can probably pursue at least some of that through the Courts, while the implications would play havoc with the UK reputation.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">So, come on Davis. Grow up and man up, and sit down with the EU team and make a sensible binding financial proffer which they can live with. Stop farting around thinking you can finesse a better deal out of them by threatening them, Michel Barnier knows what kind of man you are, he probably knows how much you drink and he knows exactly how far you will go before you roll over. Take the wind out of his sails, make an economically sensible offer and put it in writing. Stop listening to Bo-Jo and the other Euromadmen and make up your own mind.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "arial";">Then, when you finally fuck up, you will have no-one to blame but yourself,</span></div>
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<br />Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-38968770435499365722016-03-27T04:47:00.001-07:002016-03-27T04:47:12.789-07:00Brexit campaigners! - Don’t be fooled by Bo-Jo, the contemporary Don Quixote.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Those who advocate voting ‘Out’ of the EU, so often
damage their cause beyond measure by their ignorant and ill-tempered demeanour
on social networks. The intemperate language they adopt, the abuse they hurl at
EU supporters, the defensive arguments they promote, all demonstrate an absence
of a fuller understanding of the wider issues, and portray many of these
otherwise probably genuine people as a bunch of swivel-eyed fantasists.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">However, in so many cases, they are ill-advised and
factually bereft, because they are very badly influenced by people like Boris
Johnson and other contemporary political EU-deniers, who use the wider
referendum campaign as an opportunity to disseminate a wide range of
self-serving lies, deceits, fantasies and half-digested theories, masquerading
as fully-formed policy, but whose motives are entirely selfish and do not bear
even the scantest searching review.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">One has only to observe the posturings of people like
Boris Johnson, Jacob Rees-Mogg, William Cash, Liam Fox et al, to appreciate the
degree of personal self interest given to these protestations. The first
recognition is that they are all wealthy men, whose own financial interests are
unlikely to be deeply undermined by their desertion of the EU cause. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">They have other agendas, in Johnson’s case, he is so
desperate to become the next Tory Prime Minister, that he will do anything,
espouse any cause, adopt any policy, if he believes it will ingratiate him with
the Tory rump of mean-minded, mealy-mouthed, selfish and bigoted supporters of
the right-wing ‘Little Englander’ tendency..</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Nick Cohen, writing in the Guardian excoriates Bo-Jo and
calls him a liar and a con-man. He says;</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“...If countries get the politicians they deserve, the
possibility of a Johnson premiership suggests that the British are now a nation
of charlatans. No one who has studied him thinks he is telling the truth when
he says he believes that it is in our best interests to leave the European
Union. The reason why he must deceive reveals Johnson’s low character as
clearly as his casual mendacity...”</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Later Cohen points out Bo-Jo’s other shortcomings,
identifying that; </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“...Any man with a functioning sense of shame would have
worried about his long record of supporting the EU. As late as February,
Johnson was saying that leaving would embroil</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;"> “...the government for several
years in a fiddly process of negotiating new arrangements, so diverting energy
from the real problems of this country...”. And so it would. Elsewhere he
acknowledged that we would not get free trade without accepting EU regulation
and immigration</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 14.0pt; line-height: 115%;">...” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">I have adopted the image of Don Quixote for Bo-Jo, as a
means of illustrating his tendency to see enemies where none exist, but which
nonetheless, permits him to imagine them to serve his own ends. Cervantes
describes how Quixote tilts at windmills which he imagines are giants.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“...Just
then they came in sight of thirty or forty windmills that rise from that plain.
And no sooner did Don Quixote see them that he said to his squire,
"Fortune is guiding our affairs better than we ourselves could have
wished. Do you see over yonder, friend Sancho, thirty or forty hulking giants?
I intend to do battle with them and slay them. With their spoils we shall begin
to be rich for this is a righteous war and the removal of so foul a brood from
off the face of the earth is a service God will bless."</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"What
giants?" asked Sancho Panza.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"Those
you see over there," replied his master, "with their long arms. Some
of them have arms well nigh two leagues in length."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">John Major had a word for these kind of people, coined in
his nightmare moment during the debate on the Maastricht Treaty, he called them
‘bastards’, and he was right.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">These people are happy to take everything out of the
Union which they think will profit the themselves, but they do not want to part
with one brass razoo, or make one penny contribution which they perceive might
be of any benefit to any other EU citizens. That is why the debate so often
polarises around the amount of money we pay to Brussels as our contribution,
but never seems to recognise the amount we get back from the EU in wider
benefits. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The debate is all about ‘us’, it is rarely if ever about
‘all of us’. It is a discussion centred in the narrowest self-interest and a
refusal to consider the wider benefit of other people in Europe with whom we
must co-exist, co-operate and correspond if we anticipate a beneficial future,
and it is an argument arrayed by a group of people who seem to know the cost of
everything, but the value of nothing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">This state of mind flows over into discussions of wider
policy and distorts the ambitions of those who want to leave.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">On 11<sup>th</sup> March 2016, Bo-Jo, when talking about
EU trade options, opined; “...What I think we should do is strike a new free
trade deal, along the lines of what Canada has just achieved...”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">However, within days, on 23<sup>rd</sup> March 2016,
having realised that the Canadian model had significant drawbacks, the great
windmill charger was saying; “...I don’t want to imitate the Canadian deal...”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Well, what is it Boris, make your mind up, man. Your
legions of supporters are hanging on your every word!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">What politicians of this type forget is that their
intemperate mouthings become perceived ‘words of wisdom’ to a certain kind of
voter, and those who espouse the ‘Let’s all leave now’ brand of political
chicanery, take these words at face value. And in so doing, they are very badly
served.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Johnson and his fellow travellers should realise, (indeed
I suspect that they know only too well) that by creating a set of misguided
expectations and raising a number of false flags among the intellectually
challenged, they will create a distorted political agenda, which will be seized
upon, and used as justification for even louder demands for leaving the EU.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Take such concepts as ‘securing our borders’, or
‘retaining our own sovereignty’! </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Do those who parrot these hackneyed old mantras truly
believe that any meaningful changes will be generated by clinging to these
worn-out shibboleths? Sir Richard Dearlove, former head of MI6, albeit 17 years
ago, has said that by being out of the EU we would have greater control over
our ability to deport criminals. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">What utter tosh, only last week the Home Office was
forced to admit, in a report from MPs on the Committee of Public Accounts,
who said there had been a "complete failure" by the Home Office to
deal with the problem of removing foreign criminals from this country. This has
got nothing to do with the EU, it is our own home grown failure to deal with
the problem through lack of staff and political incompetence and it is about to
get worse as the Government withdraws even further funding from the Borders
Agency.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Politicians who continue to use these phrases, perpetuating
these untruths, as a means of dragging in support from the uncertain and the
insecure, are laying the groundwork for future disappointment and disillusion,
but why should they care, as long as they get their own way?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">And that is the major problem. Our whole debate on the EU
Referendum is badly distorted and ill-informed. There is great disagreement
over even the smallest issues, we cannot discuss our future inside or outside
the EU because of the polarised attitudes of the Brexit promoters who form
opinions and deliver judgements based upon no knowledge, information, facts or
logic. They can do no less, because they have no evidence on which to act or
judge, so everything they postulate must be the worst form of hypothesis, or
worse, prejudice, inflamed and inflated by the intemperate words of the mendacious
politicians who seek to use the voters to do their dirty work for them in the
hope that they will deliver a result which while it may be of end-use to the
politicos, will serve no useful purpose for the individual voter in the longer
run..</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Those of us who keenly promote the EU status-quo do so
because we know what we get from our membership. We have got 40 years of
experience to work on and we can recite the benefits that accrue to us through our
membership. We have facts, and knowledge, the Brexiteers have an empty vacuum,
and in that unpopulated space, confusion is inevitably generated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Through all this uncertainty and doubt, this huge
confusion exists in the minds of many hundreds of thousands of people. Every
night the news programmes are crammed with commentators debating and
disagreeing. The politicians slink around the studios, pushing their competing
agendas, more and more conflicting statements are made, the tv pundits float
more and more misleading assertions as a means of promoting ‘edgy’ debate, and
the public are left even more confused than ever.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">This doubt is not just felt in the UK, it is also felt,
most keenly, in the EU. There is almost universal unwillingness among our other
fellow EU members to see the UK leave the Union, but at the same time, there is
significant dissatisfaction and frustration at the British Brexit posturing
over their future membership status.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">In the last week I wrote an opinion piece in which I
pointed out that it was not surprising that at a time of significant upheaval,
when ordinary people’s minds were being distracted by this hugely unnecessary
disagreement over our EU membership, and that the communities of the EU more
generally were being conflicted by these debates, that ISIS terrorists should
choose to ‘seize the time’ and engage in a series of ‘Situationist’ style
outrages and attacks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Terrorists are arch masters at exploiting insecurity and
indecision. Their actions are not necessarily intended to have any specific
pre-programmed outcome, they will, in many cases, conduct operations simply to
amplify instability, to take advantage of any perceived lacuna in security, to
exploit any weakness or agitate any form of distraction in the body politic.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">It is done with the primary aim of asserting their
autonomy, of demonstrating their ability to hit at any place and at any time.
In a way, terrorism of this type is defined as ‘theatre’, designed to send a
series of messages and to sow the seeds of confusion, doubt and uncertainty,
and these latest outrages in Paris and Brussels have certainly succeeded in
achieving those ends. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">I have no qualm in asserting that the level of
disinformation and political chicanery which has been practised by unscrupulous
politicians who have deliberately manipulated the mind-sets of hundreds of
thousands of British citizens, has had a direct knock-on effect in rendering a
level of instability and uncertainty to thrive and this has led directly to a
situation where we are placed at greater risk because of the likelihood of
terrorists seeking to exploit the unsettled situation created by these
unscrupulous politicians, around an issue which is of such importance to so all
of us.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The Referendum offered by David Cameron is completely unnecessary,
and has merely been introduced as a feeble exercise by an uncertain politician
in a futile attempt to get his right-wing rump of backbenchers off his case. It
has backfired spectacularly and we are now faced with a period of huge
instability, insecurity and uncertainty, pending the outcome.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The end result will be to generate even more silliness.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">It is in circumstances such as these that our politicians
must realise that their casual words cannot be sprayed around indiscriminately.
They influence people, and in a febrile atmosphere, where there is very little
information or evidence on which to make an informed decision about leaving the
EU, they owe a greater duty of care to choose their words with caution, and not
unnecessarily arouse false expectations.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Listening to so many of these commentators talking about
the UK status in Europe after Brexit. I get the overriding impression of a man
deciding to divorce his wife, all the while congratulating himself that he will
not have to pay her any more housekeeping money, which he will be able to spend
on himself. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The Judge, not unreasonably points out that while this
may be true, he’s going to award the wife a similar sum for maintenance, which
the man must pay, if he wants to see his children “What’s more”, says the
judge, you must stay on your side of the fence and if you want to go to your
wife’s house to see your children, you will have to get special permission in
writing to be allowed in before you go. However, if strangers and friends of
your wife want to come to your house, you will still have to answer the door
and spend time and effort deciding if they can come in, which will take time
and cost you more money.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The man says; “...Well, I will be financially worse off
by getting this divorce, I will gain no benefit...”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“...Yes...” says the judge. Perhaps you should have
thought of that before you started this nonsense in the first place. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Perhaps those who are campaigning so hard for the rest of
us to leave our responsibilities in the EU, should first consider the words of
the poet John Donne when he wrote in 1624;</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“...No
man is an Island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the Continent, a
part of the main; if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as
well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friends or of thine
own were; any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; And
therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; It tolls for
thee...”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.quotationspage.com/quotes/John_Donne/"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">John Donne</span></a></span>,
<i>Meditation XVII</i></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The politicians are doing none of us any good
service by their weasel words and their fantasies. They are causing great
dissension, and they do not have the best interests of UK plc in mind!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Let us debate the EU issue with all the powers at
our disposal, but let us do so armed with facts, with informed views and with
logic. Let us do so above all, with good grace, and with good manners.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-style: italic; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">If you are unable to adopt these simple
requirements, please do not bother to engage on this site, I respect your right
to hold your views, but I don’t have to read them on my own web page. If you
want to be abusive, rude and intemperate, then go and do it on another page of
your own.</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-65353042284156896352016-03-10T09:26:00.004-08:002016-03-10T09:26:40.933-08:00We must ensure that the facts about our EU membership are described fairly.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">“...I hold there is no sin but ignorance...” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Christopher Marlowe </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This EU
Referendum campaign is being marked out by the extraordinarily high level of
lies, distortions and untruths being peddled by the agents of BREXIT, and these
are having a deleterious effect upon the minds of those who are ignorant of the
facts and short of proper information on which to make up their minds.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This is
one of the major concerns of those, like me, who oppose the use of referenda to
determine democratic policy, because too many voters are insufficiently
provided for with necessary information, and instead, tend to be influenced by
those mendacious politicians who campaign to appeal to their prejudices and
inflame their ignorance.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">As a
result, we are in some danger of the Referendum being sidelined by apathy as
many voters decide it is all too much trouble to vote on the day because they
simply don’t have enough information on which to make an informed judgement.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It is in
the interest of the BREXIT promoters to maintain this state of affairs. They
themselves cannot say what life will be like if the UK is forced out of the EU,
because they don’t know. They are instead calling for the British voters to make
a huge leap in the dark, but because they do not have any facts on which to
base their arguments, they are forced back on appeals to the voters’
prejudices, while making sure not to enlighten their ignorance.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Then,
having manipulated various polls to meet their own ambitions, they then publish
these analyses as empirical evidence. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">But in
virtually every example, the answers are based entirely upon ignorance,
prejudice and fear. One thing certainly becomes obvious and that is the British
middle-aged xenophobic prejudice against foreigners. Foreign migrants suddenly
become the butt of virtually any hysterical prejudice that masquerades as fact.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">As an
illustration, a poll of 5,828 over 50s, albeit published in that well-known,
intellectually honest, pro-European comic, the Daily Express, reports that 65
per cent of people who responded, want Britain to ‘throw off’ Brussels. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This is a
classic finding. It is highly doubtful whether those responding negatively had
sufficient knowledge of facts to come to such a decision, but it is entirely
sure that their answers were solicited through the use of emotionally-charged
statements which were predicated by falsehoods.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">As an
example, and ostensibly damningly for the Remain campaign, a third of those who
backed staying in the EU in 1975 now allegedly want to change their vote and
quit. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Do we
know why they want to leave? We are not told! But many people to whom I have
put this question have said back then, they thought they were merely joining a
Common Market for goods and services in 1975. And that is what indeed, they did
join.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">But then
the respondents will pull out the usual shibboleths which they have heard used
by people like Nigel Farage and Jacob Rees-Mogg, and which sound quite clever
if they were true, which maintains they did not vote for ever closer union with
Europe.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Well, I must have been one of
the very few voters who in 1975 actually went and read the Treaty of Rome,
first published in 1957, before I made my mark on the ballot paper?. Those who
did read this document would have quickly observed the statement made in a
short clause in the EU's founding document, wherein the signatories pledged to
work towards “an ever closer union”.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">If you were one of those who
voted in the 1975 Referendum without having read the Treaty of Rome, then you
only have yourselves to blame, because the full realisation of the EU was there
for all to see, and if you voted without knowing the facts, or appreciating
their meaning, then you were as ignorant then as you probably are now.</span><br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">So, I
thought it would be a good idea to look at the results of this survey, and then
see if I could throw any genuine and honest light on the concerns, to establish
whether they were based on logic or prejudice and ignorance.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
survey by ‘Silversurfers.com’ has shown that the biggest concern is immigration
and the lack of control on Britain's borders, with 93 per cent giving it as a
major reason to leave the EU while 74 per cent are worried about the drain on
welfare from foreign migrants. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Well, first
of all, what does ‘control of our borders’ mean?</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">You see,
this is another one of those highly emotive statements closely allied to the wholly
mistaken one about the loss of our sovereignty!</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Loosely
translated, it means the right to determine who can enter Britain freely and
legally and who must be denied such access! But put like that, it loses all its
xenophobic appeal.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">So who
comes to the UK?</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In the 12
months to September 2015:</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">617,000
people arrived in the UK. This is up 0.3 per cent on the previous year, but
294,000 left at the same time.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">257,000,
or 42 per cent, arrived from the European Union. This figure is up 4 per cent
on the year.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">130,000,
or 21 per cent, arrived from the 'EU15' group of countries: Austria, Belgium,
Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg,
Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. This figure is up 5 per cent on the
previous year.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">69,000,
or 11 per cent, came from the 'EU8' group of countries: Czech Republic,
Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia. This figure
fell on the year by 9 per cent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">55,000,
or 9 per cent, came from Bulgaria and Romania. This was up 38 per cent on the
year.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
remaining 2,00 (0.3 per cent) came from Malta, Cyprus and Croatia. This
figure was down by 60 per cent on the previous year.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Every single one of those people has a legal right to come here under
the free movement of people principle in the EU charter, so why do we worry so
much about them? This figure is not even worth discussing as they have the same
rights to come here as any other EU citizen, so why the panic?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Total
immigration to Britain in the year to the end of September was 617,000 - off
set by emigration of 294,000 people – making a total of 323,000 staying here..</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In the
detail of its analysis, the Office of National Statistics said the total level
of EU immigration was largely unchanged - but did note a 'statistically
significant' rise in the number of Bulgarian and Romanian migrants of 15,000 to
a total of 55,000.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Of these,
28,000 had a firm job to go to while 45,000 of the group were in Britain for
work-related reasons. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">So, what
about Non-EU immigrants?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Well, the
total of non-EU immigrants amounted to a paltry 66,000.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">A large
percentage of such immigrants are here on short-term student visas.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Student visas is essentially
the big statistic here and this is the only area in which the government have
been able to make a difference, and The Home Office has implemented stricter
entrance criteria and other limitations to the student visa system since early in
2011, as part of a pledge to reduce net migration to less than 100,000. </span><br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
government won’t cap the number of foreign students, because that would cause
trouble for the higher education sector, but it does want to tighten the system
by which universities are certified to admit them. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">All these
foreign students are paying the top rate of fees for their education and get no
state help in costs or expenses. They represent a real level of financial
benefit to UK plc, and many want to come back to the UK to undertake important
post-graduate research which in turn finds its way in many cases into the EU
business sector.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The most
important immigrant requirement is identified in the medical sector,
particularly in finding sufficient trained doctors and nurses to help staff the
NHS. Every single voter in the forthcoming Referendum needs to factor in that
any medical treatment he or she receives in the future, will almost inevitably
be provided by the reviled foreigner. The UK relies on these people to maintain
her NHS staffing levels.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Up to
3,000 doctors have been hired from overseas by the NHS in the past year, as the
service battles to tackle staff shortages that medical professionals say are
serious and growing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">They came
from at least 27 countries, including India, Poland, Australia and Greece – but
also even Iraq, Syria and Sudan – according to 32 of the 160 hospital trusts in
England who responded to requests from the Guardian for details of their
recruitment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Dr David
Rosser, medical director of University hospitals Birmingham, one of England’s
biggest trusts, said: “The NHS doesn’t have the number of doctors it needs. The
shortage is real. We aren’t training enough doctors in this country, and so we
are dependent on foreign-trained doctors. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Painting
a picture of how wide the NHS is having to cast its net for doctors and other
clinical staff, the research shows that:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">•
University hospitals NHS foundation trust in Southampton recruited the highest
number of foreign doctors – 113 in the last year.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">• The
service is struggling to find enough doctors to work in particular medical
specialities, including A&E, radiology, ophthalmology and general medicine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">• The 23
foreign medics hired by the University hospitals Bristol trust included six
Greeks, three Pakistanis, two Hungarians, two Romanians, two Sri Lankans and
one born in Sudan with British nationality.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">• Five of
England’s 10 regional NHS ambulance services are also pursuing new recruits
abroad. More than 100 of the 200 paramedics the London Ambulance Service is
hiring before the end of March will be from Australia and New Zealand. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">• NHS
trusts in England said they had hired just over 1,000 nurses from overseas,
with experts warning that hospitals were competing with each other for overseas
talent.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Overall
figures from the General Medical Council show that the number of
foreign-trained doctors on its register rose by 2,957 between 31 December 2013
and 6 January 2015. They made up two-fifths – 39.4% – of the 7,500 year-on-year
increase in the overall number of doctors, which rose to 267,150. Of the
267,150 doctors of all types registered with the GMC on 6 January, 97,915
(36.6%) were foreign-trained, including 34,120 (41.2%) specialists. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">When our
British Xenophobes are recuperating from their hip replacement operation, they
won’t care one jot about the nationality of the man or woman providing their
highly expert care!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">As for
the second element of the irrational fear of immigrants, their drain on the
welfare system? Well, contrary to popular belief, most non-EU migrants can't
claim benefits. They can use the NHS (with a surcharge) and schools (depending
on residence), but they have no access to JSA, disability allowance, tax
credits, or housing benefit. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="p">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">EU migrants can claim
certain benefits, but a major report by University College London demonstrates
that such immigrants who arrived after EU enlargement in 2004, and who have at
least one year of residence – and are therefore legally eligible to claim
benefits – are about 60% less likely than natives to receive state benefits or
tax credits, or to live in social housing.</span></div>
<div class="p">
<br /></div>
<div class="p">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Comparing the net
fiscal contribution of these immigrants with that of individuals born in the
UK, in each fiscal year since enlargement in 2004, the immigrants made a
positive contribution to public finance.</span></div>
<div class="p">
<br /></div>
<div class="p">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">In the fiscal year,
2008/09, immigrants paid 37% more in direct or indirect taxes than was spent on
public goods and services which they received. This is even more remarkable
because the UK has been running a budget deficit over the last few years. </span></div>
<div class="p">
<br /></div>
<div class="p">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The study also shows
that on average, immigrant workers have a better educational background than
UK-born workers, but receive lower wages - especially in the period immediately
after coming to the UK. Despite this disparity, these immigrants are net
contributors to the public finances.</span></div>
<div class="p">
<br /></div>
<div class="p">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The main reason for
this is that they have a higher rate of labour force participation (increasing
the number of fiscal contributors), and make less use of benefits and public
services.</span></div>
<div class="p">
<br /></div>
<div class="p">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">For example, in 2008/09,
immigrants represented 0.91% of the total UK population, but contributed 0.96%
of total tax receipts and accounted for only 0.6% of total expenditures.</span></div>
<div class="p">
<br /></div>
<div class="p">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The author of the
study says: “Our research contributes important facts to the debate on the costs
and benefits of EU immigration. It shows that these immigrants are far less
likely to live in social housing or to claim benefits. We were surprised about
the large net fiscal contribution made by these immigrants, given their
relatively low wage position in the UK labour market.” </span></div>
<div class="p">
<br /></div>
<div class="p">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Not only are these
people demonstrably not a drain on welfare benefits, they are net contributors
to the UK economy. </span></div>
<div class="p">
<br /></div>
<div class="p">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">I suggest that taken
as a whole, these researched figures overwhelmingly demonstrate that any fears
of immigration that the over-50s in the UK manifest, are wholly over-amplified,
and are simply inflated by xenophobic fears aggravated by the inflamed rhetoric
of people like Nigel Farage, Iain Duncan Smith and other Right-wing politicians
whose best interests lie in spouting lies, untruths and distortions about
immigrants and the EU right to free movement! </span></div>
<div class="p">
<br /></div>
<div class="p">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Go figure!</span></div>
<div class="p">
<br /></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-44820119714991085832016-03-07T06:59:00.001-08:002016-03-07T06:59:26.574-08:00Why we must all work so hard to protect our membership of the EU!<div class="article-body" dir="ltr" itemprop="articleBody">
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">On Sunday morning, 6th March 2016, Boris ‘Bo-Jo’ Johnson appeared on the Andrew Marr show.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">He was there to speak against Britain’s continued membership of the EU, and he made a complete arse of himself.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Johnson likes to give the impression that he is a voice for Britain,
that somehow he ‘speaks for England’. Quite where this self-anointed
mantle of authority has come from is a mystery to me. As far as I am
concerned, Johnson is a buffoon, a charlatan and a ‘little englander’!</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">However, that is not to say that he is not a very dangerous commentator.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">He possesses that style of speaking which many uninformed British
observers mistake for deep knowledge trying hard to appear as the voice
of the common man.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">In reality, Johnson is a composite ‘chancer’ who has seen an
opportunity to set his cap at becoming the next Prime Minister, and he
is using the excuse of ‘Brexit’ as a means of promoting his own campaign
for PM.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The really evil element to Johnson’s rhetoric is that no-one exactly
knows quite what he stands for. Frankly, I doubt whether Johnson himself
knows who or what he is and what he stands for, apart from the best
interests of Bo-Jo!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Nevertheless, he may have influenced a lot of watchers, and
particularly, the old guard of the Tory party, none of whom have ever
really reconciled themselves to being part of the EU.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The primary problem with all the EU ‘Nay-sayers’ is that none of them
has the slightest clue what will happen when and if this country were
to stupidly decide to vote against remaining a member.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">They do not have any idea how or what will happen to our existing
membership status, and as a result, they have no practical suggestions
or recommendations to make, apart from a generic catch-all ‘we must
leave the EU’!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">On the Marr programme, Bo-Jo characterised the EU as a ‘prison’. He
then proceeded to shamelessly mix his metaphors, (which is something
that Bo-Jo does with impunity), by saying that Britain had lost a golden
opportunity to get out of the prison because Government lawyers had
recently vetoed a plan to assert that Parliament could overrule EU law.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Ignoring the fact that the UK Parliament cannot overrule EU law when
it does not suit them, Bo-Jo disingenuously treated this non-sequitur as
a terrible lost opportunity, claiming that it was his road to Damascus
which had converted him to a Brexit believer.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">He described the facility to get out of this prison thus;</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">“...Actually, it will be wonderful, it would be a huge weight lifted from British business...”</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Here is a typical Bo-Jo, and by default, very common feature of these
pro-Brexit clowns, who steadfastly refuse to see the many benefits that
membership of the EU has brought the UK, and who then engage in a piece
of special pleading on behalf of ‘British business’. This is entirely
contrary to the views of the vast number of established British
businesses who have voiced their opinions that remaining in the EU is by
far the better option for this country!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It is this shameless appeal to some form of petty patriotism which so
identifies the Bo-Jo tendency (along with Nigel Farage, Jacob
Rees-Mogg, M.P for the Eighteenth Century, Iain Duncan-Smyth et al).
Clearly these men have not appreciated Dr Johnson’s (no relation)
observation that patriotism was the last refuge of the scoundrel!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It all stems from the idea that somehow, by aligning ourselves with
the EU, we have somehow lost a chunk of our much vaunted Sovereignty,
and that Johnny foreigner is making laws which we must obey, but in
which we have had no chance of debate!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Well, what is the reality of the laws which the EU enacts with which we have to comply?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">First of all, all EU laws debated in the EU Parliament have a UK
component participation from our MEPs. Sadly, too many of them are
members of UKIP whose actions are aimed at constantly disrupting and
obstructing the EU process, rather than working in an harmonious and
practical manner.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">1: Acts put in place by UK Parliament with EU influence — account for between 10-14% of our laws.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">2: Regulations influenced by or related to the EU — account for 9-14% of our laws.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">They are all almost exclusively focused on areas of administrative
reform and designed to bring us into common parity with other members of
the EU. They are one of the costs of belonging to the EU Club!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">All these laws have to be debated in the UK Parliament before they
can be enforced in UK law and they have to be passed just like any other
law.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The EU cannot change our tax laws or our criminal laws. So where is our much vaunted sovereignty being impacted?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">What else does the EU effect?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>Free trade</em> - The EU is a trade bloc which means there are no
quotas or tariffs for companies exporting goods and services within the
EU. This makes it easier for UK businesses to trade across the EU's 27
states.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>Common commercial policy - </em>these are rules put in place to
protect EU businesses using things like tariffs, subsides and quotas on
imports from outside the eurozone.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>EU competition law</em> - this means that if you have a company you should have the opportunity to do business across the EU.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The law is designed to stop bigger firms abusing their power by setting up cartels and monopolies.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>The internal market - </em>the single market means UK citizens are free to move, live, study and trade anywhere within the EU.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This also affects you when you go on holiday within the European Union because there are no customs limits.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">There are also no border controls across most of the EU either - the
UK is one exception to that rule, because we have refused to adopt the
Schengen Principles.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>Trans-European networks - </em>many areas of Europe have
benefited from this policy with new roads and transport networks
designed to make it easier for the different countries to transport
goods and services across the EU. Hence the suggestion that the
Cross-Rail link be made larger to accommodate German trains!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>Energy</em> - this is a common policy for European energy needs and proposals for making energy greener.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">EU energy labels have also been introduced on all electrical goods
like washing machines and even light bulbs to try to make us all more
aware of what energy we're using.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>Area of freedom, security and justice - </em>this is designed to
make it easier for police across the EU to cooperate but also to ensure
fair treatment in different judicial systems for all EU citizens.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">There is a European arrest warrant that means you can be arrested
anywhere in the EU for more serious crimes committed in another EU
country.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><em>Common fisheries policy - </em>every EU state must stick to rules
on fishing set by Europe. This affects fishermen in the UK, who are
only allowed to fish for certain types of fish at certain times of the
year to conserve stocks. This has had a hugely beneficial effect on
conserving Cod stocks in the North Sea.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">There are also understandings on public health, the environment,
consumer protection, transport, social policy, plus economic, social and
territorial cohesion.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">There are common foreign, security and defence policies which run
alongside the policies of member states although there is no European
army or single European foreign policy.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Euro MPs don't set our taxes or decide if a local school or
hospital's going to close, but they can have an influence on how we live
our lives.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">MEPs passed a law a few years ago significantly cutting the cost of texting from abroad. Roaming rates were also cut.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The Working Time Directive - which gives workers the right to certain
amounts of rest, stops excessive night work and gives people a minimum
amount of holiday every year – It also that means nurses and doctors are
limited to a 48-hour working week.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Of course Bo-Jo just failed to mention that even if we do leave the
EU, we will still be expected to pay a significant contribution to
Brussels in order to be allowed to trade with the market, and on less
favourable terms. Somebody tell me how that is beneficial to us in any
way?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">We will also be required to allow free movement of people in order to
trade with them, so in fact nothing will have changed, except it will
have cost us a great deal of money in terms of lost opportunities. The
Pound will have suffered badly on the world’s markets while all the
uncertainty about our future commercial stability was debated, and we
will be in exactly the same position, except this time. outside the
Market.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">It is vital that we keep in mind at all time that the vast majority
of those in Parliament who are shouting for Brexit, have alternative
agendas. Bo-Jo believes he can use this destabilising process to
undermine David Cameron and thus promote his own case for Prime
Ministership.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">We have been members now for 40 years and we have become, or so we
are told the 5th largest economy in the world. How is that going to be
enhanced if we cut and run from our primary trading market?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Ordinary people must consider that outside the EU, we will be cut off
from all those provisions that protect our rights, rights which have
been protected by EU involvement. At the same time, we will still be
subject to immigrants seeking to come here, they aren’t going to stop
and go elsewhere.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
</span><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">We must demand that those who oppose our rights ro remain within the
EU, tell us exactly what they propose will be the way in which we will
function in the future. Most of the loudest nay-sayers (Bill Cash, Liam
Fox et al, ) are wealthy men to whom the protections afforded by
Brussels do not matter. But they matter to me and to you, and I am not
going to lie down and let these rights get taken away from me by a clown
like Bo-Jo!</span><br />
</div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-36813370147464651482016-01-25T10:33:00.002-08:002016-01-25T10:33:49.001-08:00The Ridley Report – How the Tories plotted to smash the mining unions and destroy working class opposition<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
destruction of the mining industry was a deliberately worked out plan.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It was an
attempt to take on and smash the most militant determined and class conscious
section of the organised labour movement. And this was seen as a critically
important task by the ruling class and their chosen instrument, the Tory Party. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It even
had a name, the Ridley Report, named after its author. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Ironically
Nicholas Ridley MP, like David Cameron, was another well-heeled rich boy who was
educated at Eton College along with the other rich boys of his generation. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
Tories had been thrown out of office in 1974, during the big upturn in strike
action which is best remembered for its miners’ strikes, with power cuts and
the three day week. Ted Heath went to the polls asking the question: “who runs
the country” and lost! </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The ‘70s
were a period where wave after wave of industrial struggle forced the
bourgeoisie to look to more extreme measures than ‘usual’, while at the same
time the working class, the unions and the Labour Party began to move towards
the left. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Many
workers began to draw revolutionary conclusions on the basis of their
experience, while extreme Conservative politicans began to plot a military coup
to overthrow that well known revolutionary, Labour Prime Minister Harold
Wilson. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In 1974
the Tories drew up a plan as to how they might take on and defeat a major trade
union in the public sector or nationalised industries as they were known at the
time! </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It was a
blatant policy designed to declare civil war against the working class. The
plan was quite thorough, as became obvious when it was leaked to the Economist
in 1978: </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">·
The government should, if possible, choose who and when to fight; </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">·
The plan grouped industries together based on an assessment of how <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>easy they might be to beat; </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">·
Coal stocks were to be built up at the power stations; </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">·
Coal supplies should be arranged via non union foreign ports </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">·
Non union lorry drivers should be recruited; </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">·
Coal/oil dual fuel generators should be built at whatever cost;</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">·
The state must "cut off the money supply to the strikers and make the
union finance them"; </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">·
It was necessary to organise and equip a squad of mobile police, ready to use
special riot tactics to defeat pickets. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-left: 36.0pt; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; text-indent: -18.0pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Ridley
was merely the architect of the plan but it’s quite clear he wasn’t acting
alone. The plan was agreed by the Selsdon Group of right wing Tory MPs, a group
that included among its number both Norman Tebbitt and Margaret Thatcher who was
elected Tory leader in 1975. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Margaret
Thatcher was eventually elected Prime Minister in 1979, by which time the right
wing Labour government was utterly discredited and the leadership isolated
within the active layers of the labour movement. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Society
was polarised, the Tories began to implement an economic strategy designed to
make the economy ‘leaner and fitter’. In other words they sought to make the
working class pay for the economic crisis that erupted between 1979 and1981. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
Tories responded by slashing benefits to the old and the sick, cutting services
and attempting to roll back the welfare state, under the banner of “self
reliance”, “choice” and “the free market”. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
Ridley Plan was central to this programme, the straightforward reason being that
the organised Labour and trade union movement represented the biggest single
obstacle to their plans. 10 million workers were organised in the TUC,
potentially the most powerful force in British society, and the working class
was moving to the left. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
Tories had to risk a confrontation with the unions. The ruling class had no
option, under conditions of capitalist crisis. In the minds of Thatcher and her
cronies there was ‘no alternative’. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It would
be wrong however to look at the Ridley Plan in isolation. It was just one
aspect of the Tories anti trade union onslaught. Even today, after almost 12
years of New Labour, the laws governing trade union activity in Britain remain
the most repressive in any of the advanced capitalist countries. Restrictions
on picketing, the huge bureaucratic process required to carry through strike
ballots and the right of the government to “sequester” trade union assets were
all imposed to try and cut across the potential for militant trade union
struggle, which had been so much a feature of the 1970s. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
ferocity of the struggle that the miners were forced to wage to defend their
jobs and communities however, revealed the limits of the Ridley plan and the
trade union laws. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Despite the plans that the Tory government had prepared and
despite all of the legal mechanisms and ploys that they used to undermine the
strike, the battle of pit closures lasted for almost a year. The level of
support within the working class for the miners meant that millions of pounds
were raised on the streets and from the labour movement to support the miners
and their families. The Tories were forced to move the legal goal posts on
several occasions to try and shackle the National Union of Mineworkers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The class
struggle is a battle of living forces, involving real men and women. The
strategy and tactics of the ruling class are an extremely important factor in
the situation, but of even more importance is the role of the leadership of the
working class.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
Ridley Plan was just part of a drift under Thatcher towards authoritarian rule
in Britain, authoritarian rule now considered necessary by the ruling class.
This was carried out through parliamentary means, a form of ‘parliamentary
bonapartism.’ as the Marxists explained at the time.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This
reflected the crisis of capitalism and the fact that the ruling class weren’t
confident that they could rule through the ‘usual’ methods. Yet the strategy of
the Labour Leaders was to adapt to the new conditions by appearing to be
“reasonable and moderate”. Meanwhile the trade union leaders adopted a policy
of ‘new realism’, essentially weakness and collaboration. Under these
conditions the outcome was inevitable - more attacks on the working class and
the poor, the weak and the old. At the same time however the ideas of Marxism
began to gain ground and began to become a significant factor in British
politics. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The main
lesson of the Ridley Plan for the labour movement and the politically active
layers of the youth is that a Tory government would be forced to move against
the working class, to deal with the crisis that the capitalist system clearly
faces. In the dark corridors, and the city boardrooms similar plans will be
being drawn up today. Our task has to be explain the threat that this poses and
help arm the movement to fight and defeat the Tories. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Adapted
from ‘Socialist Appeal’.</span></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-72915942925765454102016-01-24T05:55:00.001-08:002016-01-24T05:55:06.100-08:00Your children cannot buy a house in London because the criminal banks prefer Russian dirty money.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">I have repeatedly warned that the cost of failing to
interdict the obscene amount of <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>money
laundering that goes through the City of London, will have huge consequences
for ordinary people.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">When any society fails to obstruct the flow of criminal
money, the people who are moving the money become the de facto controllers of
the banking system.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">It is pointless hoping that our children will be able to
stay in London in the future. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Even if there were any jobs for them, they will not be
able to afford the rents of even the smallest flat, never mind have any
aspiration to own a house of their own.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Property prices have escalated way beyond the hopes and
ambitions of ordinary men and women, and London has quickly become the stamping
ground for an army of foreign criminals, tax evaders, pimps, whores and
assorted slimeballs, all of whom have found London to be a very welcoming home of
choice.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">We have sold our once-proud sense of independence and our
strong degree of self-reliance to a bunch of Russian and Asian crooks whose
money will not pass muster, but as no-one in the British financial Establishment
is looking too closely, City practitioners have merely become highly paid prostitutes,
working in the financial bordello of EC3.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">This
dependency on Russian money is even distorting our foreign policy position. </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">England’s
political establishment has become crude and mercenary. A British civil servant
was recently pictured arriving in Downing Street for a national security
council meeting with an open document in his hand, dealing with a proposed UK
response to the crisis in Crimea and the Ukraine. Despite the Russian
aggression, it recommended that Britain should “not support, for now, any trade
sanctions,” nor should it “close London’s financial centre to Russians.”</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Mustn’t
let principles get in the way of enriching the City of London.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The Government agrees, it doesn’t care as long as the
money continues to flood in. Never mind the fact that we have strong laws
designed to prevent and forestall the entree of this money, the laws and the
regulations are widely ignored by George Osborne, Boris Johnson and David
Cameron, in order to permit this cornucopia of foreign dirty money to seep into
every nook and cranny of the financial establishment.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">A recent article in the New York Times points out that
the UK is deliberately breaking step with the Americans over this issue, and
puts the matter this way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“...The
White House has imposed visa restrictions on some Russian officials, and
President Obama has issued an executive order enabling further sanctions. But
Britain has already undermined any unified action by putting profit first.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It boils
down to this: Britain is ready to betray the United States to protect the City
of London’s hold on dirty Russian money. And forget about Ukraine.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Britain,
open for business, no longer has a “mission. Britain’s ruling class has decayed
to the point where its first priority is protecting its cut of Russian money —
even as Russian armoured personnel carriers rumble around the streets of Sevastopol.
But the UK establishment understands that, in the 21st century, what matters
are banks, not tanks...”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
Russians also understand this. They know, as many UK criminal investigators
know, London is a centre of Russian corruption, that their loot enriches
Britain’s empire of tax havens — from Gibraltar to Jersey, from the Cayman
Islands to the British Virgin Islands — a financial empire on which the sun
never sets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">You can
now buy British residency, our much vaunted citizenship is up for sale. And it’s
cheap for a Russian oligarch or crook.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“Investor
visas” can be purchased, starting at £1 million ($1.6 million). London lawyers
in the Commercial Court now get 60% of their work from Russian and Eastern
European clients. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">More than 50 Russian-based companies swell the trade at
London’s Stock Exchange. Planning regulations have been scrapped, and along the
Thames, up go spires of steel and glass for the hedge-funding class.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Britain’s
bright young professionals have now become the foreigners’ poodles, the
oligarchs’ valets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Vladimir
V. Putin, understands the rules of the new game only too well. When you pay the
piper, you own him, and you call the tune. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Putin was absolutely certain that Britain’s
managers — shuttling through the revolving door between cabinet posts and
financial boards — would never give up their fees and commissions from the
oligarchs’ billions. He was right. Never underestimate the British taste for
foreign funny money.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The direct impact is that property prices, already
inflated by the free availability of this money are enjoying a knock-on effect
elsewhere in London, as professional workers, accountants, lawyers, bankers et
al spread wider and wider to afford houses, while the prices of ordinary 3
bedroom Victorian terrace houses, of which London possesses hundreds of thousands,
spread across the Metropolis, spiral upwards exponentially.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Billions
of pounds of corruptly gained money has been laundered by criminals and foreign
officials buying upmarket London properties through anonymous offshore front
companies – making the City of London the world capital of money laundering.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Transparency
International, the respected anti-corruption organisation, reports that some
36,342 properties in London have been bought through hidden companies in
offshore havens and vast numbers are thought to have been bought anonymously to
hide stolen money. The flow of corrupt cash has driven up average prices with a
“widespread ripple effect down the property price chain and beyond London”,
according to property experts cited in the most comprehensive study ever
carried out into the long-suspected money laundering route through central
London real estate. by Transparency International.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Some
sources claim it has skewed developers towards building high-priced flats and
houses rather than ones ordinary people can afford. While corruption and tax
evasion are likely to be the biggest sources of the illicit money, drug
dealing, people trafficking and sanctions busting are also common, police say.-</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">TI’s
research, which includes previously unreleased internal figures from the
Metropolitan Police Proceeds of Corruption Unit, found that 75 per cent of
properties owned by people under criminal investigation for corruption are held
through secret offshore companies.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">London
has become a global magnet for corrupt funds, TI said, due to the high prices
of property – enabling millions of pounds to be laundered at a time – and
Britain’s notoriously lax rules on the disclosure of property ownership. Any
anonymous company in a secret location, such as the British Virgin Islands, can
buy and sell houses in the UK with no disclosure of who the actual purchaser
is. Meanwhile, TI said, estate agents only have to carry out
anti-money-laundering checks on the person selling the property, leaving the
buyers bringing their money into the country facing little, if any scrutiny.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Anti-corruption
experts have repeatedly expressed frustration that the UK does so little to
stem the flow of money stolen from their countries. This author has repeatedly
warned against the impact of permitting foreign-based criminal capital to be
laundered through London.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Robert
Barrington, executive director of TI, said: “This has a devastating effect on
the countries from which the money has been stolen and it’s hard to see how
welcoming the world’s corrupt elite is beneficial to communities in the UK.”</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">If
you have any illusions of watching your grandchildren grow up in London, forget
them, your children won’t be able to afford the housing.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-6262518731650823522016-01-12T05:02:00.001-08:002016-01-12T05:02:28.845-08:00Why we would be MAD to replace Trident<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">We are beginning to witness the first moves in a debate
within the Labour Party which engages with the suitability of renewing our
policy of maintaining nuclear weapons through the Trident programme.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Now that the Cold War is over and Russia herself is involved
in far greater degrees of asymmetric warfare, as indeed are we, the need for us
to maintain large numbers of nuclear weapons has frankly disappeared.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The original justification for their existence was as
part of a Cold War philosophy of ‘Mutually Assured Destruction’ or MAD for
short. The idea being that an attack by one weapons’ owning state on another
would trigger a retaliatory attack before the first bombs arrived, so that both
countries would ultimately be very badly damaged if not effectively destroyed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">However, there is no
justification to undertake a first strike against an enemy, any enemy, and there
is no debate on this, and it is abhorrent to suggest that there ever could be.
So the question remains, under what legal justification could Britain possibly
use its deterrent? </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Second strike capability is
frankly a nonsense, as in these days, just a small percentage of the weaponry
possessed by other nuclear powers, would be sufficient, if used first, to return
the entire United Kingdom to a smoking, throbbing radioactive rubble. So all
this talk about sealed letters aboard nuclear submarines signed by the Prime
Minister is all a little academic.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Moreover, Britain is
committed under the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty to move toward
disarmament. By deciding to renew its deterrent, it may undermine the very
treaty that it is so keen to hold Iran to account over. Why should it listen to
another country that is saying nuclear weapons are dangerous and unnecessary
when it refuses to disarm itself?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Finally, I would like to pose
a question as to which nuclear power would the one most likely to bomb Western
Europe pre-emptively?</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">When I was a uniformed police
recruit undergoing my basic training at Hendon, we were lectured in the last
few weeks of basic training, by two men from the Ministry of Defence, who
advised us of our likely role as police officers in the event of a nuclear war.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">It was all so surrealistic
that I doubt if any of us took the scenario planning very seriously. I for one,
considered that the likelihood of my surviving the nuclear winter they
anticipated would be unleashed, was so small as to be beyond consideration.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">However, the one thing I do
recall with absolute clarity was their determination of the identity of the
country dropping the first nuclear weapon to impact on the UK, and that was
America.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">I can still recall my shock
at learning this likelihood, but they justified its use against us thus!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">America had always been
looking for ways of countering Russian aggression and strategic desires. The
way their scenario played was that in the event of a nuclear posturing reaching
such proportions that the likelihood was that weapons of Mass Destruction were
about to be unleashed by the Russians, the Americans would first destroy
Western Europe as a means of providing themselves with a nuclear infected
barrier zone between themselves and the Soviets.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">They argued that the Russians
would first seek to gain a toe-hold in Western Europe so as to be able to face
down America, and thus the first strike would be to deny the Russians such an
opportunity, hence the bombs that would obliterate Western Europe, would be
American.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Any readers who have seen the
film or read the book ‘Dr Strangelove’ will have no difficulty in appreciating
this scenario. That is also why British submarines are armed with US weaponry
which cannot be used except with US authority, because we are nearer Russia
than they are.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">So, when you hear promoters
of Trident talking about the need to have a weapon which can be used as a second
strike capability against some country determined to annihilate us, remember
they are talking about our retaliating against America!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The UK does not need to
replace Trident. It is vastly expensive, and the days are long gone when we
need to worry about our need to sit at the top table in diplomacy. Britain is
not that important any more, and membership of the nuclear club no longer
carries the threat it once did.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">It is time we all grew up,
aligned ourselves with our NATO and EU allies and put the money saved to better
uses.</span><br />
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-18655269635304419272016-01-09T06:15:00.003-08:002016-01-09T06:15:35.370-08:00Who is telling the truth over the dropping of the Culture review of the banks?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Yet again, we are facing the usual tsunami of
disinformation coming from Government, the Treasury and the FCA as to whose
decision was it to decide to drop the review of banking culture.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">George Osborne says it wasn’t him, The Treasury denies
having any part in this decision, and Tracey McDermott, fearless acting head of
the FCA says that it was the FCA that made the decision, but it doesn’t mean
they are going soft on the banks.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The
City regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority, is "not going soft on the
banks", its interim chief executive Tracey McDermott has said.</span></div>
<div class="story-bodyintroduction">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">In December the FCA said it
had shelved plans for an inquiry into the culture, pay and behaviour of staff
in banking.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Such a review was crucial to
a better understanding of why banks have come to resemble organised mafia crime
families in recent years. We, the tax payers deserve the right to know why our
money has been used to prop up an entirely rotten banking edifice, and empire
of crime and wrong-doing, and we are entitled to know how this dysfunctional
system has developed and evolved.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Critics of the decision to
back off say the Treasury successfully put pressure on the FCA to be more
"light touch" with financial firms.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Hang on, we’ve been there
before, haven’t we? Wasn’t it ‘wee Gordie Broon’ who prevailed upon the
regulators to adopt light touch regulation, prior to the banking collapse in
2008. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Look what happened then. The bankers went on a spree of criminal activity
that left the banking industry on the verge of collapse, and we, the tax payers
had to have our pockets picked, to keep these gangsters afloat!</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">But Ms McDermott insisted the
FCA was still taking tough action, including a £72m fine imposed on Barclays in
December.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Speaking to the BBC she said:
"We're not going soft on the banks, we're not being told what to do by the
government. We have objectives which are set for us by parliament and statute,
and we are determined to deliver on those." </span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Fining Barclays millions of
pounds for financial wrong-doing is pointless is not being tough on them. It
merely becomes a deduction from their bottom line for tax purposes, it isn’t
punishing them at all. The only people taking the hit are the shareholders,
while the gang bosses on the 5<sup>th</sup> floor are laughing all the way to
their next bonus.</span><br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Frankly, we would be better off in this country without
Barclays Bank, and I suspect, other major banks as well.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Who says so, well I am indebted to </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Richard Murphy,
a chartered accountant and a political economist. He has been described in the
Guardian as an “anti-poverty campaigner and tax expert”. He is Professor
of Practice in International Political Economy at City University, London. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Quoting from his seminal work </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“...Barclays: the bank that just loves Luxembourg and Jersey, but not
the UK...”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">I have drawn on some of the
following features, and particularly the way in which Barclays reports its
profitability in the UK. Reviewing Barclays own reported figures provides us
with some fascinating insights.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">In examining Barclays own
reported figures for 2014, he states:</span><br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">What I
wanted to see is whether or not it was likely that the claimed allocation of
profits and losses by Barclays accords in any way with the likely allocation of
profits by Barclays to the UK, in particular... </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Suddenly
the UK does not make the loss, which Barclays admit they report in this
country. Instead a profit of almost £1.1 billion is reported. And Luxembourg
does not make a profit of £1.38 billion as is claimed in the original data, but
ends up with just £71 million. Jersey also drops, in that case from £801
million of profit to £53 million.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It is
complete nonsense for Barclays to claim they make a loss in the UK of
significant amount (as seems likely) when in practice more than equal and
opposite sums turn up, virtually untaxed, in Luxembourg and Jersey within their
own accounts.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">So, what
is happening? I have a long list.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">First,
Barclays is, very politely laughing out loud at the UK and is failing to pay
its way as a UK bank. So much for the contribution the City makes: this bank is
not making it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Providing
employment? Barclays is employing people who would otherwise be employed
elsewhere. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">As for
the banking levy, that’s a tiny contribution to the cost of having effectively
been bailed out by the UK taxpayer in 2008 – which all banks were as it was the
system as a whole that failed. So let’s ignore claim that Barclays is
contributing to the UK in these ways: it is not doing anything more than it
should.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Barclays
is a massive user and maybe abuser of tax havens, and especially Jersey and
Luxembourg.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It is
clear that transfer pricing of head office operations is not taking place
effectively in the case of this company. HMRC must have the power to say that a
company must reallocate costs to the group it manages from the UK or a mockery
is made of our tax system. The need for reform in this area is obvious.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
question has to be asked as to why we are so keen to have companies headquarter
in the UK when it is very clear that many other countries benefit more than us
by not having Barclays’ head office in their domain. Barclays could bank here
by all means, but candidly we would be better off without their head office.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">We can
ask in that case how the Barclays’s auditors (PWC) signed off these accounts as
true and fair when that is the last thing they look to be.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This
analysis suggests that Barclays is massively under-declaring profit in the UK
at cost to all of us. The loss to the UK could easily exceed £150 million based
on the above data. And in that case it is time for serious tax reform in this
country.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Now, a
fair and proper review of banking culture, and particularly with regard to the
way they account for their profit and loss positions, would, I suggest, have
had a seminal impact upon the attitude of ordinary British tax-payers, who
would have rightly become very angry indeed at this wholesale exercise in tax
fiddling.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">If
Barclays have been doing it, you may rest assured that the other big players
will have been doing it in order to take advantage of the hyper-relaxed
attitude that Government takes towards the criminal banks in the UK, and it is
legitimate to ask what do these banks really contribute towards the common
weal?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Back in
the day, when the British public had seen the results and the findings of the
Treasury Select Committee, and were asking genuine questions of concern about
the probity and the legitimacy of our banking sector, the Government announced
its intention to undertake a banking culture review. What follows restates its
terms of reference.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“...The
government is today announcing further steps to raise standards of conduct in
the financial system with a joint review by the Treasury, the Bank of England
and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) into the way wholesale financial
markets operate. Strong and successful financial services that set the highest
standards are an essential part of building a resilient economy.<br />
<br />
The ‘Fair and Effective Markets Review’ will be led by Bank of England Deputy
Governor for Markets and Banking, Minouche Shafik, with Martin Wheatley (Chief
Executive Officer, FCA) and Charles Roxburgh (Director General, Financial
Services, HM Treasury) as co-chairs.<br />
<br />
Recent events have demonstrated the need for authorities and market
participants to take action to ensure fair and effective markets.
Forward-looking in nature, this Review reflects the government’s long term
economic plan to ensure Britain remains a world leader in financial services,
with successful institutions operating to the highest standards.<br />
<br />
Drawing on the insights of public officials, market participants, end users of
wholesale financial services, the Review is also intended to reinforce
confidence in the fairness and effectiveness of UK wholesale financial market
activity, and influence the international debate on trading practices.<br />
<br />
Amidst recent serious allegations of misconduct in financial markets, the
Review will focus on those wholesale markets where the bulk of concerns about
misconduct have arisen - fixed income, currency and commodity markets -
although it could have applicability across a wider range of wholesale markets.<br />
<br />
It builds upon the tough action Britain has already taken to punish the
wrongdoers and fix the financial system, including the work of the FCA to
reform LIBOR and the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards which has
led to a new legal regime for senior managers.<br />
<br />
The Review will run for 12 months and is expected to make recommendations on:</span></div>
<ul type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">principles to govern the
operation of fair and effective financial markets; </span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">reforms to ensure standards
of behaviour are in accordance with those principles;</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">tools to strengthen the
oversight of market conduct;</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">whether the regulatory
perimeter for wholesale financial markets should be extended, and to what
extent international action is required; and</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">additional reforms in
relation to benchmarks, in order to strengthen market infrastructure.</span></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">So there
you have it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">During
this cultural review, the question of profit taxation would inevitably have
arisen, and as we can now see, thanks to the insights of a highly qualified
accountant, they would not have passed muster.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">No wonder
the bankers didn’t want any element of their banking culture to be examined or investigated. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The taxation
system however was only one small element of the rest of the long list of
criminal actions, dishonest incentives; commissions which possess all the
criminal qualities of bribes; dishonest actions by banking groups setting up
clients to borrow vast sums of money and then deliberately bankrupting them and
taking over their valuable assets; the institutionalised degree of false
accounting in accounting standards; to say nothing of the vast level of
criminal money laundering which these British banks are providing to their
criminal foreign clients.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Any
culture review would simply not have been able to deflect the realisation of
what a bunch of criminal operators have been allowed to take over the control
of the British wholesale banking industry, and such a recognition would, I am
convinced, have predicated a scandal of such proportions that I truly believe
it would have become an issue of political confidence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">I have no
doubt whatsoever that the big players in the banks prevailed upon the Treasury
and therefore George Osborne to soft-pedal on this culture review, realising
that it was a road to perdition.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Well, the
genie may be back in the bottle for the time being, but I wonder how long the
FCA can keep it there. These things have a tendency to explode at just the
wrong time!</span></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-87546070483674877052016-01-01T08:51:00.000-08:002016-01-01T08:52:50.238-08:00George Osborne - The Bankers' Toady<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">George
Osborne is facing serious accusations of forcing financial regulators to abandon
a review into Britain's banking culture, while under pressure from the banking industry's
biggest names.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
Chancellor is "bowing" to demands to drop the so-called "banker
bashing" probe set up after the Libor rate-rigging scandal, it is now
being claimed. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has announced it will instead "engage
individually with firms to encourage their delivery of cultural change". </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">What a
complete load of absolute utter drivel – what a pile of hyper wabble-babble!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“...Engaging...
to encourage the delivery of cultural change...”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">What on
earth does that mean? What kind of weasel-worded, double-speak bollocks is this,
and more importantly, wtf believes it?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Banks are
operated like Mafia families, they are organised criminal entities, by their
very definition. The culture of the banks is entirely criminogenic – they have
very strong criminal tendencies and they will purposefully ignore or break any law
which gets in the way of their making more and bigger profits.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The truth
is that the bankers have got hold of Osborne, (who doesn’t need much
persuading) and they have bullied him shamelessly into believing that they
would relocate their base of operations elsewhere if the pressure on them to
come clean got too strong.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Instead
of putting them to their threat, Osborne (who likes bankers and who wants to
believe them) has rolled over.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
decision comes after FCA chief executive Martin Wheatley announced, back in
July, his decision to quit the post as Mr Osborne refused to renew his
contract, which was due to end in March this year. Wheatley was beginning to
make his demands heard and understood and he was dishing out some very strong
penalties. The banks didn’t like it or him, and they lobbied Osborne to get rid
of him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">MPs have
already suggested the Chancellor was behind this decision to drop the review,
months after it was set up. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Labour's
John Mann, who sits on the Treasury select committee, said : "George
Osborne is behind it, without any question. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"The
cultural issues are what lay at the heart of the financial crisis. It's
fundamental. Individuals took irrational risks with other people's money. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Well,
yes, but they also stole a whole heap of it as well!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"This
decision leaves us hugely exposed into the future because it allows the banks
to continue to go on acting as they acted before."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">He added:
"George Osborne is bowing to pressure from the banks. HSBC and Barclays
have threatened to leave the country."</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Conservative
Mark Garnier, who also sits on the committee, said he was<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>" .disappointed..." by the decision. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">He told
BBC Radio 4's Today programme: "There has always been this great argument
that perhaps the Treasury is having more influence over the regulator than
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Well, let
us review the facts, because what is becoming clearer is not just that George
Osborne is demonstrating his willingness to support the criminal banks, but is
also proving him to be someone who has a difficulty in determining the truth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Back in February
2013, just when it mattered and in the wake of a major Parliamentary Review
which had attracted the attention of the whole world. the Chancellor made a speech
to J.P.Morgan, in which he announced that the UK's big banks would be broken up
if they failed to follow new rules to ring-fence risky investment operations
from High Street outlets.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He needed some
high-flown words to make it seem like he cared about bankig crime and that he
was serious about protecting the public, but his threats were never going to
happen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The Chancellor
referred to the scandalous conduct of the UK banks in recent years and said
that the taxpayers were very angry at banks' behaviour and would never again be
expected to bail them out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The Chancellor's
speech came on the same day the government introduced its Banking Reform Bill
in Parliament.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Mr Osborne also
said the banking system was not working for its customers, particularly small
businesses and individuals.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The Chancellor
appeared then to have accepted a major recommendation of an earlier
Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards which called for a reserve power
to "electrify the ring-fence" if banks did not implement reforms.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The Ring-Fence:
The High Street activities of each UK bank were to be put into a separate
subsidiary from its riskier investment banking.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Well, that was distortion
number two. The big banks were not going to sit back and watch their flaky
wholesale arms dislocated from their retail cash cows!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Other mis-statements
include the requirement for bank directors to accept the responsibility for the
actions of their subordinates. Well, that provision recently got pulled as
well!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Electrification:
Regulators would be given the power to split up an individual bank altogether,
subject to certain conditions, if the regulator deemed that bank to be
undermining the purpose of the ring-fence. Regulators would also review the
entire UK banking industry each year to determine whether the ring-fence was
proving effective.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Deposit
Guarantees: The Financial Services Compensation Scheme currently guarantees up
to £85,000 of every deposit in a UK bank, although this will be reduced to
£75,000. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Under the bill, if a bank goes bust, the FSCS will be paid out ahead
of other people owed money by the bank. It means that the FSCS will be better
able to recover the money it has guaranteed, which should reduce the potential
bill for taxpayers if there is a shortfall.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Loss Absorbency:
The bill gives the Treasury the power to impose tougher requirements on banks
to increase their ability to absorb losses, in particular by requiring a bank
to borrow money from markets in a form that allows the bank to impose losses on
the lenders if it gets into trouble.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The Independent
Commission on Banking, led by Sir John Vickers in 2011, had concluded that
ring-fencing was the best way to protect "core" retail banking activities
from any future investment banking losses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Osborne said in
his speech, at JP Morgan's administration offices in Bournemouth, that banks
had failed to take responsibility for their actions. The 2008 crisis, which
marked the start of the credit crunch, saw the government use £65bn of public
money propping up Royal Bank of Scotland and Lloyds Banking Group alone.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Osborne also
referred to greed and corruption over banks' rigging of the Libor interest
rate, and blamed recklessness by banks' so-called "casino operations"
for dragging the financial system to the brink of collapse. The reputation of
banks has been further undermined by scandals such as the fraudulent sale of
payment protection insurance and the rigging of the Libor interest rate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The chairman of
the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards, Andrew Tyrie, warned the
banks could not be trusted: "Banks require discouragement from gaming the
rules. They will always try to do so unless strong disincentives are put in
place."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He said once the spotlight
had moved away from the banks, they would be likely to try to soften the
regime: "At that time, banks could be particularly active in testing the
ring-fence and lobbying politicians to alter its design for their benefit.
Electrification creates incentives against such behaviour."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Well, that was
then and this is now, and the banks have been assiduously lobbying good old
George to get him to relax these important measures. And George has done what
the banks have demanded, he has toadied to them shamelessly and has overseen
the dropping of any of the proposed measures.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Indeed, all the
provisions worth anything and announced in the aftermath of the findings of the
Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards have been dropped or cancelled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So how can anyone
believe a single word George Osborne says?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">An enquiry into
banking culture was needed more now than at any time, but it is the last thing
the banks want to see being publicised.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Putting it as
simply as possible, banks exist to reward greed and cupidity. Bankers demand
and expect to be paid salaries and bonuses far beyond the dreams of avarice.
But paying these ludicrous sums of money does not make the recipients any more
worthy, they simply demand even more.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In order to
satisfy this level of greed banks have to find other ways of generating
revenues and profits, and the only real way in which they can do that is to
encourage an exponential level of unmanaged risk taking, and an unspoken
acknowledgement that criminal offences will have to be committed in order to
raise the profits.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">To do that, they
employ middle management who are responsible for ensuring the lowest-level
workers maintain the through-put of profitability, and who are paid high levels
of remuneration. By far the largest percentage of that money is comprised of
bonuses achieved from the earnings generated by their direct reports, so each
manager has a fixed interest in looking the other way and not asking too many
awkward questions about the profits being made by his team members.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Such an atmosphere
generates a culture or a climate of ‘anomie’, or an ‘anomic’ environment,
within which ordinary rules, norms and behavioural determinants are routinely
ignored, and criminality is rewarded.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And when public
concern at this culture of criminality becomes too pronounced, then some form
of Parliamentary enquiry is announced, where the great and the good
pontificate, a lot of hot air is generated, lots of promises are made, and
proposals for change are tabled.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Then, when the
tumult and the shouting has died, George quietly rolls over when the bankers
threaten to take their toys away, and he gives in, allowing them to carry on
like before.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">George Osborne is
presiding over an era where the reputation of the City of London has become
degraded and trashed because its importance to international criminals has
become greater than the Cayman Islands or any of the offshore, funny money
centres.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">For some reason,
this man seems to feel that any kind of financial skulduggery can be permitted
within the Square Mile, and it will not have any shaming or deleterious effect.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There used to be a
time where Ministers of the Crown went to great lengths to at least give the
impression that they meant what they said, but now, as far as George, the
Bankers’ toady is concerned, he will promise to do one thing on one day, but as
soon as his friends in the Square Mile start bleating, he will back down.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And all the time,
the bankers continue to commit financial crimes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We simply cannot
continue to have a man in charge of the UK economy who behaves in this cavalier
fashion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Osborne is not a stupid
man, and he has an army of lawyers to advise him, if he did but want to know. A
man who connives in the commission of criminal offences, and who continues to
permit such activities to occur, in the full knowledge of what he is doing, is
as guilty of the crimes being committed as the person committing them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">He, as Chancellor,
is in a unique position of authority and responsibility, and he is aiding and
abetting these banking crimes, he is turning a blind eye to the provenance of
the criminal money flooding into London; and by his deliberate failure to take
positive action to legislate to help to prevent such crimes continuing to occur,
is evidencing his complicity in the criminal culture he is facilitating within
the banking world.</span></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-47385178002838603372015-12-20T07:43:00.001-08:002015-12-20T07:43:20.070-08:00‘Shoot to Kill’ – Let us dispense with this pejorative catchword once and for all.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">David Cameron is said to be seeking clarity on the law of
police shooting, following a national security council meeting at which police
chiefs demanded greater political and legal backing for police officers required
to carry firearms on duty for the purposes of providing protection to the
public and themselves.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The Sunday Times today carries the banner headline “...Cameron:
Let Police shoot to kill...”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Now I seriously doubt that David Cameron, rash though he
can be at times, has really said those stupid words.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Let us dispense, once and for all, with the completely
mistaken notion that there is or has ever been a police ‘shoot to kill’ policy
in this country .</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The phrase ‘Shoot to Kill’ when used in the context of public
order policing contains a host of pejorative connotations, more reminiscent of
the bad old days in Northern Ireland during the deaths occasioned in a major breakdown
of public order which set the Provisional IRA and soldiers of the Parachute
regiment at each other’s throats in the housing projects of Londonderry in
1972, and which came to be known later as ‘Bloody Sunday’.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">What we do have is a ‘Shoot to Protect’ policy, although
it has been previously described in 2005 as a ‘Shoot to kill to Protect’
policy.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Every police officer who is authorised to carry a firearm
knows full well that the decision to pull the trigger, an action which may very
well have the possible consequence of ending someone’s life, rests with the
officer and the officer alone. He cannot be ordered to fire by anyone else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">He is authorised to pull the trigger when he forms a reasonable
and genuinely-held belief that opening fire is necessary to protect himself,
another officer or a member of the public whose life is being immediately
threatened. Because the speed of the need to make the decision in many
circumstances is so rapid, officers are enabled to use the defence if later
challenged as to the lawfulness of their actions, that they had ‘an honest and
instinctive’ belief that opening fire was reasonable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">But let us be absolutely clear about the potential
outcomes of pulling the trigger of a modern powerful firearm in the hands of a
trained marksman.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Someone is almost certainly going to die.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">So when the officer pulls the trigger, he is doing so,
intending to kill the person at whom his gun is aimed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Our police do not shoot merely to wound, to disable, to ‘wing’,
they are aiming at a part of the body which if hit by a modern high velocity
ballistic round, will almost certainly engage with a vital organ, with
concomitant fatal consequences.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">This is why, when the subsequent investigation of the
shooting is carried out, a major aspect of the enquiry is aimed at determining
the lawfulness of the officer’s actions, because if his actions were not to be
determined to be lawful at the moment he fired, then he would not be able to
avail himself of the defence the law provides.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Public policy demands that we cannot prosecute every
policeman who discharges a firearm as a result of which someone dies, so we
have to be absolutely satisfied that in the vast preponderance of cases, police
officers act lawfully, unless there is a significant body of evidence to prove
differently.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">So we have what is called a ‘rebuttable presumption’ of
lawful conduct on the part of an armed police officer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">This is an awesomely high standard of responsibility and
the officers who exercise these powers are selected accordingly and trained
rigorously, so that they can discharge their duties to the highest standard.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Under normal circumstances, these checks and balances
should be sufficient to ensure that we have the fairest system we can devise
for the control and regulation of firearms officers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">However, two issues have now intervened in this
discussion, which are making it far more complex.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The first is the actions of the Independent Police
Complaints Commission in the way in which they are handling the present
investigation into the shooting.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">In their own information published on Twitter, the IPCC
state the following;</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">“...On
Sunday there was evidence to indicate that a potential criminal offence may
have been committed by the officer in his use of lethal force. We therefore
made the decision to begin a criminal homicide investigation.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This is
not a decision we took lightly. Our decision followed careful consideration of
the evidence available and whether that evidence met the legal requirement that
meant a criminal investigation should be carried out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This
afternoon a firearms officer has been arrested and interviewed under caution.
All the other significant firearms officers have provided detailed statements
as is normal practice.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
evidence we have at this stage does not mean that the officer definitively
committed a criminal act and nor does it mean he will necessarily be charged
with a criminal offence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Ultimately
once we have gathered all the evidence and concluded the investigation I will
make the decision whether to formally refer the matter to the Crown Prosecution
Service – if that happens it will be for them to decide whether to bring
charges and what they should be.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The investigation
is only a matter of days old and the evidential picture is continuing to
develop and just as we took the decision that the investigation should be
criminal, further evidence could mean we reconsider that decision.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">It may be thought that this is a highly unsatisfactory
state of affairs at this very early stage of events. The use of the phrase ‘criminal
homicide’ investigation is vague, and unhelpful. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Homicide is a generic phrase
designed to cover the loss of life of a person at the hand of another. It can
be a criminal act, but it can also be a non-criminal act, it depends on all the
facts and the circumstances. The overwhelming inference from the IPCC is that
the officer acted unlawfully in the discharge of his weapon, which if committed
maliciously, could possibly lead to a charge of murder. The alternative is that
the firearm was discharged accidentally in the heat of the moment, which could possibly
lead to other different charges being deployed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The IPCC report refers to a ‘criminal homicide
investigation’. Quite what this means in these circumstances is unclear, just
as is the suggestion that the matter could just as easily be reconsidered if
further evidence is forthcoming.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">What it does mean is that a lot of uncertainty is likely
to hang over this case and will not help to clarify the policy issues.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The second area of concern, and one which I lay firmly at
the feet of BBC reporter Laura Keunssberg arises out of the disingenuous use of
the phrase ‘shoot to kill’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">She
first used it in an interview with Jeremy Corbyn on 16<sup>th</sup> November
2015, when discussing the Paris terrorist spectacle. Mr Corbyn was asked by the
BBC political editor Laura Kuenssberg whether he would be happy to order police
or the military to shoot to kill if there was a similar attack on Britain's
streets.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Mr
Corbyn said: "I'm not happy with the shoot-to-kill policy in general - I
think that is quite dangerous and I think can often can be counterproductive.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">As a result of his thoughtful and considered answer, the press
and members of his own party rounded on Mr Corbyn accusing him of being soft on
terrorism, which culminated in his being accused of being a terrorist sympathiser
by David Cameron, and threw the potential existence of a ‘shoot to kill’ policy
into the public domain, where it had not previously existed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Mr
Corbyn was absolutely right and he was merely restating British public policy
when he made his answer. The BBC later were forced to issue a clarification of
the policy. </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">“...The
UK's police forces do not have a blanket "shoot-to-kill" policy - but
at the same time, police can be legally justified in shooting even if the
attacker ends up dead...”</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">I
sincerely hope that this deliberately mis-stated nonsense about shoot to kill
policies will now be abandoned, once and for all; that journalists will check
their facts before looking for scandal headlines, and that the IPCC will handle
the investigation into this event with a little more tact and professionalism
than they have recently deployed in similar cases.</span></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-50450641714904967462015-12-17T09:51:00.002-08:002015-12-17T09:51:14.280-08:00Why we cannot trust the Tories on banking crime – They are complicit in its commission. <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 18.0pt;">The Tory Party has
just conspired to give their friends in the Banking sector a complete ‘Get out
of Jail card free’ for life.</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-outline-level: 1;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 18.0pt;">If we ever had any
doubts that the Tories are the party of the bloated criminal plutocrats in the
financial sector, we only have to look at the wording of an obscure section of
a new banking law that was very quietly pushed through Parliament this week.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 18.0pt;">They have
routinely failed to investigate any banking crime committed by the Organised
banking mafias, and none of their senior money launderers have gripped the rail
at the Old Bailey.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 18.0pt;">They have
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checks being undertaken.</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-outline-level: 1;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 18.0pt;">Now, the Tories
have very neatly sidelined what should have been a most effective <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>crackdown on fat-cat bank bosses who connive
at reckless criminal tactics within their institutions, enabling them to pad
their profits and increase their already obscenely inflated bonuses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-outline-level: 1;">
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Labour and Lib Dem peers joined together to voice
their fury after the move which was slipped almost silently into an obscure new
banking law . </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The change is being moved in the small print of the 60-page Bank of
England Bill and may still be challenged in the House of Lords.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The aim of
the new law was to put the responsibility for proper control of banking systems
and bank employees firmly on the shoulders of bank executives, thus making it
their direct responsibility if later wrong-doing was uncovered in their
institution.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It would
have meant that prosecutors could have had little difficulty in deciding who
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proposed new law said managers should be held to account for all rule-breaking
by their employees - and they would only escape punishment if they proved they
had done all they could to stop it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">You may
recall the background to this new law, which was the evidence of massive criminality
in the banking sector which was given to a Parliamentary Committee, but for
which no employee or executive could be found to be liable for its commission.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">As a
result, the Tory Government, under David Cameron and George Osborne determined,
to pass legislation which would remedy that lacuna in the law. There was much
talk of concern, and being seen to be tough on the causes of financial crime.
Cameron and Osborne needed to be seen to be standing tall and talking tough on
City crime at that time, because the impacts of the policies of austerity were
beginning to be felt very hard across the country.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">But the
law, passed by MPs in 2013, is now being repealed just weeks before it was due
to come into force in March.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The City
institutions and their weasel-worded PR agencies have been quietly lobbying
Government, saying how unfair it would be if the burden of proof of innocence
was forced on to the shoulders of those accused of the wrong-doing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">There has
been a lot of blather talked about ‘natural justice’, The Bill of Rights,
‘Magna Carta’, and any number of other arguments that well-heeled City lawyers
can be paid even more money to identify.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">But none
of it amounts to a row of beans.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The new
law stated that managers should be held to account for all rule-breaking by
their employees - and would only escape punishment if they proved they had done
all they could to stop it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In other
words, instead of allowing senior bankers to wash their hands of all
responsibility for the wrong-doing carried on by their employees, wrong-doing
which was contributing in no small way to the bottom line of the bank’s
profits, and thereby, to the bonuses of the directors, the law would have
required them to prove what they did to ensure that wrong-doing could not be
carried out.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">You might
not think that this was too onerous a requirement, after all, it is inherent in
their role as directors, and is part of the fiduciary duties of care that they
owe the bank and its shareholders as directors, so they would only have been
required to prove what they should otherwise have been doing anyway.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">But in
the Alice in Wonderland world of the City of London and its banking class, such
burdens were felt to be unfair to the overpaid Mafiosi who run our banks. It
was argued this was requiring the bankers to prove their own innocence, a
feature as many well-heeled and well-fatted QCs opined was contrary to English
Common law.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Well, not
really, since 1953, anyone found carrying an offensive weapon has been required
to prove that he had it with him for a lawful purpose. But this law was
designed to deal with oiks and yobs and the lower orders without the law, so
no-one gave a toss that they were being required to prove their own innocence.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">But when
it comes to bankers and the untouchable protected species, different rules must
be seen to apply.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">So, Instead
of bank bosses having to prove they did enough to stop rule-breaking, the regulators
will now have to prove they did not.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">That will
shift the 'burden of proof' from bankers themselves to organisations like the
Financial Conduct Authority, making it more expensive to pursue high-salaried
bosses.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Lib Dem
Baroness Kramer accused "outrageous" George Osborne of "buckling
to pressure from his friends in the banks" - and warned it could allow
bosses to <a href="http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/city-broker-rigged-libor-bank-6592680"><span style="color: windowtext; text-decoration: none; text-underline: none;">turn a blind
eye to another LIBOR rate-rigging scandal.</span></a></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>"People are no longer talking about the
banks so the Tories think they can go easy on them’ she said.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"The
government claims the rule will make it hard to hire good people. They've
obviously been in conversation with the banks to come up with statements like
that."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Of
course, why didn’t we think of that ourselves?. ‘Good people’ ie, previously
experienced criminal bankers will know about the new law so may be wary of
putting themselves in harm’s way.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Of
course, keeping dodgy bankers out of the top jobs might be thought to be a very
good thing, but again, not in the world of the City and Canary Wharf!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
Tories have clearly quickly forgotten their much vaunted promises about going
after the guilty men and making sure that the City of London is a clean place
to do business in.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Susan
Kramer again;</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"It
is as if they have already forgotten about the 2008 crash, Libor fixing or any
one of the other scandals that cost the taxpayer billions. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"Senior
managers in our banks should not be allowed to wash their hands of failings.
Ignorance is not an excuse when our economy and British livelihoods are on the
line."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This is
the mendacioius Tory politicians all over, and Baroness Kramer is right, but
sadly, her views will not carry much weight in the City or in the Carlton Club.
The Tories know on which side of their bread to spread the butter, and that
will only come from their friends in the financial sector who want to be able
to bring as much dirty money into this country as possible, but without having
to demonstrate any personal responsibility for its handling.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This is
why I say that we cannot trust this Government to tell us the truth on their
dealing with banking crime. They are making too much money out of its
commission. Oh they will huff and puff when it is necessary so to do, and they
will say all the right things to get their lickspittle friends in the media to
write them good headlines when they need them, but then, when the hue and cry
has died down, they will quietly renege on their public agreements and simply
not carry out their agreed promises.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This is
why I say they are complicit in the commission of banking crime. They know only
too well what their shiny suited friends in the City are capable of doing, and
by repealing important aspects of much trumpeted laws, even before they have
been given a chance to work in practice, they are conspiring with the City
Mafias to commit even more crime.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The usual
Civil Service bromides have been trotted out to justify this appalling breach
of faith.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">A
Treasury spokesman said: "The government has taken concerted action to
improve conduct across the banking sector and deal with the abuses and
unacceptable behaviour of the past.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"We've
introduced the toughest rules on bankers’ pay of any major financial centre,
and hardwired responsibility and accountability into the financial system, with
those senior managers responsible for bringing down banks facing up to seven
years in prison.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">(Well,
these rules have already been watered down to such an extent that they are
illusory and will never be promulgated).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"We
are extending the Senior Managers & Certification regime so that tough
standards of personal responsibility and accountability apply beyond banking
and across the entire financial services industry.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"This
will ensure that all financial services firms in Britain operate to the highest
standards."</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">And if
you believe this pile of 24 carat tosh, you will believe anything!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">George
Osborne and David Cameron have just sent their banking friends the clearest
message that it is ‘business as usual’. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">So fill
your boots boys, because this government ain’t gonna come after you!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-21205343656425766412015-12-11T05:41:00.003-08:002015-12-11T05:41:52.560-08:00BBC - Stop smearing Jermy Corbyn!<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The biased BBC are up to their usual tricks again, smearing Jeremy
Corbyn. </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">last night's news reported the conviction of 4 asian men for
fraud on pensioners. </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Great play was made on the completely unmerited and
unsubstantiated story that the money obtained was going to be used for
supporting DAESH terrorist aims, although there was a subsequent
admission that no charges had been brought or sought on any issues
involving terrorist activities.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> At the end of the story, one defenda<span class="text_exposed_show">nt
was alleged to be associated with Jeremy Corbyn, but no other detailed
explanation was offered. This totally unjustified smear turned out to be
that JC had written an MP's letter for the man (a constituent),
confirming his residence in JC';s constituency, when the man was
applying for bail. MPs do such things time and time again and there is
nothing wrong in such an action, but theBBC sought to use the
association as a terrorist-related smear on JC.</span></span></span><br />
<br />
<div class="text_exposed_show">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
This morning on the Today programme, not exactly known for its
fearlessly honest and fair reporting of Corbyn issues, Oxford educated
Labour MP Emma Reynolds pontificated on the need for JC to dissasociate
himself from a 'Stop the War' Coalition meeting tonight. </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">This
lightweight MP and ex-policy wonk, who has only been in the HoC since
2010, and who has never held down a proper job of real work in her life,
used a lot of old smears about individual members of the Coalition to
suggest that these are the sort of people with whom Labour should not be
associated, and therefore, by default, JC should not attend the
meeting. </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Ms Reynolds was one of those Labour MPs who voted for the
bombing campaign in Syria, against the will of the Party, so her
opposition to the Stop the War event is more about her personal
opposition to JC as much as anything else. </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"></span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> JC has been openly
associated with the Stop the War Coalition since 2001, and only resigned
ffrom an office there when he became Leader of the Labour Party. His
alignment therefore is not exactly a secret. Quite what contribution Ms
Reynolds' spiteful involvement made on the programme was very
questionable, but it gave the BBC yet another opportunity to try and
smear JC.</span></span></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-56328864664400888412015-12-08T07:38:00.001-08:002015-12-08T07:38:11.192-08:00BBC reporting - biased and crass<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">I'm sure I cannot be alone in thinking that the standard of reportage on the BBC is plumbing new depths of bias and crass insensitivity.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">During the recent days, the reporting of Labour Party issues and particularly where they concern Jeremy Corbyn or John McDonnell has brought out the worst in the reporters, and in particular, Emily Maitliss, and Laura Kuenssberg of Newsnight, followed closely by Allegra Stratton.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The floods in Cumberland have brought out new lows in the maner of questioning and reporting.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">One poor man on last night's news who had been completely flooded out for the second time was being questioned about his experience.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The reporter was leaning against the door frame in a casual manner, asking 'How do you feel'?</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">He could see the poor guy he was questioning was distraught, turning away to hide his tears.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The whole episode was so awful and insensitive, had I been the poor victim I would have punched the reporter on the nose and asked him how he felt.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">The BBC clearly received a lot of critical calls, because by News at Ten, the piece had been taken down.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Another reporter was asking the occupants of a house who were having to stay upstairs because their ground floor was completely flooded.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">'What's it like down there?' he asked.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Again, you could see the obvious distress on the faces of the occupants. I wonder how the reporter would have felt if the answer had been 'soaking wet you fucking idiot'! </span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">That's the problem, ordinary people are too polite when confronted with a camera and a microphone.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Get a grip BBC and smarten up your act. People's misfortune is not a scoop opportunity for your reptiles!</span></span>Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-69893063164341729612015-12-08T07:09:00.000-08:002015-12-08T07:09:23.246-08:00Tristram Hunt is the problem not the solution.<div class="_5pbx userContent" data-ft="{"tn":"K"}" id="js_6">
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">Tristram Hunt demonstrates the real reason why Labour lost the last election.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
'Labour must turn back to its moral mission of tackling inequality'
says Tristram Hunt MP. He calls for a discussion on social inequality.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
This is precisely why Labour was beaten in the last election, too many
people who might otherwise have voted Labour, had become sick, tired and
disillusioned by the procession of political elites within the upper
echelons of the party talking utter bollocks and <span class="text_exposed_show">using
the language of socio-liberal wabble-babble, instead of saying what
they mean! You couldn,t get a straight answer out of any of them. When
it came to discussing policy, I don't know who was worse, Cameron or
Miliband.</span></span></span><br />
<br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> This
self-opinionated academic sets his cap at opposing the man who was
elected overwhelmingly to lead the Labour Party, and by whose words and
actions, is attracting thousands of former disenfranchised, old but
loyal, Labour voters back to the party and to the real fight for social
justice.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> You may not agree with me, but I doubt if Dr Hunt, on
his own would have encouraged the Fire Brigades Union to re-align with
the Labour Party again. Labour lost its political soul and its electoral
strength, among other reasons, because many thousands of ordinary
honourable Labour voters, decent men and women, nurses, teachers, former
coal miners, ex-steel workers, care workers, etc, found themselves
alienated by the tosh spouted by the policy wonk ellite that had risen
to the top of the party under Blair and subsequently under Miliband.
They were sick of the fact that when challenged about their commitment
to social justice and commitment to Labour values, these tory-lite
spokespersons, many of whom had never held down a proper job of work in
their life, but had risen inexorably to the top of the New Labour elite,
started to spout the weasel words of the need to work within the
'discipline of the market', or the Peter Mandelson oily outpourings,
instead of standing up for what they believed in their hearts and their
souls.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> Jeremy Corbyn is returning the party to its strong
working-class centre. He doesn't just talk the language of social
justice and he doesn't talk about moral missions, without demonstrating
exactly what he means in his actions as well as his words.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"> This
is why men like Dr Hunt can not forgive him, because the man with the
experience of representing working people has finally got the job that
Hunt would have liked, except he didn't have the guts to stand for it.</span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;">
We don't need any more fucking discussions on social inequality
Tristram, we need action, and we need to be sticking it to the tories
and their austerity programme. Austerity is another word desiged to
mean the complete eradication of the Welfare State, let us have no
illusions, and just talking about the class gap and inequality over
Sherry and tapas in the college senior common room, ain't gonna cut it,
professor!</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif;"><span class="_3c21"><div class="_3ekx">
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<a href="http://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fow.ly%2FVyFHo&h=VAQEl2zPu&enc=AZNTm9ndeQrdSilI5eXADbN_V_Uylgo-Z67sKWzCOFWDhFs2tfkXEy7RtiQXGdBeWTXGd2wr2o7CkdIm40NyXQFvF-Rfk_eT1VYFfFYSYUHdtpU2WpYT0RF8qm4_O3UJh1uK4zIgQFpQyJY2CC19dCTXaahY1_-uPYz52FR8GwIXgtot-5CPALiswtm9JAOIydlkuJqldQDWHOZV4MRzlrQv&s=1" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Labour must turn back to its moral mission of tackling inequality</a></div>
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Tristram
Hunt will urge Labour to turn its focus back on inequality. Here he
explains why colleagues should start talking about the class gap</div>
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Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-59035188770506573992015-11-27T03:48:00.004-08:002015-11-27T03:48:55.520-08:00Barclays Bank Money Laundering Breaches – The Financial Conduct Authority is as much a problem as a solution!<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The
Financial Conduct Authority says that Barclays bank ‘cut corners’ on financial
crime checks and did not properly monitor a £1.9bn transaction carried out on
behalf "politically exposed" ultra-rich clients.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Well,
in the Alice in Wonderland World inhabited by the ‘Financial Complacency Administration’,
they may very well think that this is what happened, and by such a finding,
they identify themselves as being part of the bigger problem in the
perpetuation of the criminal sink which is the City of London, and proving that
they are frankly ‘captured’ by the very bank they are required to supervise and
regulate.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">By
adopting this view, they manage to underplay the seriousness of the conduct
engaged in by this Organised Criminal bank, relegating its effects to being
little more than a series of understandable oversights.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">This
is not the case.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Barclays
conduct has been the most deliberate and egregious exhibition of criminal
behaviour, undertaken to make vast profits which they would not otherwise have
made, and done to both play up to the sensibilities of a bunch of Middle Eastern
clients, and to confuse and mislead anyone who had any reason to question the
transactions.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">It
is of interest to note that tje FCA go to great lengths to state that there was
no evidence that the monies involved were the proceeds of crime, and Barclays
associate themselves with that statement.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">That
is not the point.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">To
wilfully breach the Money Laundering Regulations 2007 in the way that Barclays
have done in this case is to commit a whole series of criminal offences and
Barclays should have been prosecuted for this deliberate and shameful conduct.
But guess what, yet again, one of the world’s leading criminal banks has been
allowed to walk away Scot free.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">How
does this happen?</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">I
mean it’s not as if the Money Laundering Reporting Officers and Compliance
Officers in Barclays didn’t know the laws and the regulations pertaining to
these matters.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The
law on these issues is quite clear and unequivocal.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Failure
to comply with the various legal obligations and responsibilities placed upon an
individual and a business by the Money Laundering Regulations 2007 is enforced
by a tough regime of penalties, well tough on paper!. These measures apply to
all businesses caught by the regulations. Senior Managers and all relevant
employees MUST be trained in the legal and regulatory responsibilities for
money laundering and terrorist financing controls and measures. There is
therefore an obligation on employees to comply with the regulations. </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">It
follows that businesses can leave themselves exposed to punitive measures by
the actions of employees<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">.</b></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Under
Money Laundering Regulations 2007 (MLR 2007) regulation 47 places obligations
upon officers of a Company and Partners.. Any officer in a Company who consents
to or is involved in committing offences under the Regulations, <strong><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-weight: normal; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">or where any such offence is due to any neglect on his part</span></strong><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">, </b>they will be INDIVIDUALLY liable to
prosecution for the offence as well as the body corporate. <strong><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-weight: normal; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Failure of senior managers to comply with the MLR 2007 obligations may
result in financial penalties or a prison term of up to two years and/or an
unlimited fine. </span></strong></span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Barclays
has been fined £72m for failing to properly carry out anti-money laundering and
financial crime checks on a major transaction in 2012 on behalf of ultra rich
clients. </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The
supine Financial Conduct Authority said the bank did not carry out the
appropriate customer due diligence checks to establish the purpose of the
£1.88bn transaction, or to sufficiently corroborate the source of the funds
from the clients who were said to be prominent people in public life. </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Regulation
5 of the Money Laundering Regulations 2007 states;</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Customer due diligence
measures” means—</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">(a) identifying the customer
and verifying the customer’s identity on the basis of documents, data or
information obtained from a reliable and independent source;</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">(b )identifying, where there
is a beneficial owner who is not the customer, the beneficial owner and taking
adequate measures, on a risk-sensitive basis, to verify his identity so that
the relevant person is satisfied that he knows who the beneficial owner is,
including, in the case of a legal person, trust or similar legal arrangement,
measures to understand the ownership and control structure of the person, trust
or arrangement;</span><br />
<br />
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">and (c) obtaining
information on the purpose and intended nature of the business relationship.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">In
fact, Barclays applied a lower level of oversight than required for other business
relationships of a much lower risk profile. </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The
FCA said that the bank went to "unacceptable lengths" to accommodate
the clients and did so because it "did not wish to inconvenience the
clients". </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">"Barclays
agreed to keep details of the transaction strictly confidential, even within
the firm, and agreed to indemnify the clients up to £37.7m in the event that it
failed to comply with these confidentiality restrictions," the FCA said. </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">This
is the largest fine ever imposed by the FCA for failures to comply with
anti-financial crime rules . </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">In
this case, the FCA said Barclays' clients were classed as politically exposed
persons (PEPs) who should have been treated as higher-risk clients. So yet
again, another series of regulations was ignored.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Instead,
Barclays carried out even less oversight than it would have on much lower risk
business. </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The
regulator said that Barclays “...did not follow its standard procedures,
preferring instead to take on the clients as quickly as possible and thereby
generated £52.3m in revenue..."</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Barclays
wilfully ignored the regulations regarding the taking on of customers in order
to facilitate the needs of some wealthy clients.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"> </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The
billion-pound transaction was cloaked in secrecy with unusually tight
confidentiality clauses, meaning few within the bank knew of its existence, or
where to find the due diligence records, which were kept only in hard copy and
not in the bank's IT systems. </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Again,
this was a breach of the record-keeping regulations.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">The
fine includes the £52.3m revenue that Barclay's made on the deal, plus an
additional charge of £19.8m. The top-up was reduced by 30pc as the bank agreed to
settle the case quickly. </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">“Barclays
ignored its own process designed to safeguard against the risk of financial
crime and overlooked obvious red flags to win new business and generate
significant revenue. This is wholly unacceptable," said FCA enforcement
boss Mark Steward. </span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">“Firms
will be held to account if they fail to minimise financial crime risks
appropriately and for this reason the FCA has required Barclays to disgorge its
revenue from the transaction.”</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">What
makes matters worse is that today, 27<sup>th</sup> November 2015, I rang the
FCA Press Office and asked why no prosecutions had been brought against
Barclays for these wilful breaches of the Money Laundering Regulations.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">I
was told that no criminal offences had been identified. I pointed out the
criminal breaches of the regulations. The beardless juvenile who was answering
my questions also said that only civil regulatory breaches had been identified.
When I pointed out that breaches of the regulations carried 2 years
imprisonment, the boy on the other end of the phone seemed unaware of that
fact. He then said that the FCA couldn’t prosecute for such offences anyway.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Finding
that I was getting no sensible response from this representative of the Fantastically
Cretinous Apathy, and rapidly losing the will to live, I rang off. If this is
the standard of intelligence and knowledge inside the FCA, no wonder we are so
badly served in our dealings with the crooks in the Square Mile. Wasn’t it
Schiller who said; ‘Against stupidity, the very gods themselves rail in vain’!</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Barclays
bank went out of their way to deliberately and wilfully ignore every regulation
designed to provide a first line of defence against dealing with the possible
proceeds of financial crime. They ignored the law, tried to cover up the
conduct, and went out of their way to behave as dishonestly as possible.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">For
these offences, their shareholders have lost £52.3 million.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Is
it any wonder that we have one of the most criminally inclined commercial
markets in the world. We have regulators who are not worth a spit, who
adamantly refuse to make big examples of these criminal enterprises when they
have the opportunity.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">Is
it because they haven’t got the bottle for the fight, or has the Treasury told
them to soft-pedal on the banks right now.</span></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<br /></div>
<div style="line-height: 115%;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";">I
know where my money is being placed!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-16576260590936365562015-11-24T04:50:00.003-08:002015-11-24T04:50:57.825-08:00Anti-money laundering controls in the UK not fit for purpose.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">These are
the findings of the latest report by Transparency International (TI), a global
NGO which monitors issues pertaining to financial and economic crime.</span></div>
<h2>
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; font-weight: normal; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;">Their latest report entitled “...Don't Look,
Won't Find: - Weaknesses in the supervision of the UK’s anti-money laundering
rules...” spells out in sparse terms the inadequacies of the UK anti-money
laundering regime.</span></h2>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
findings of the TI report make for sorry reading. I set them out here;</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">A system not fit for purpose:</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"></span></div>
<ul type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Poor
oversight - </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
majority of sectors covered in this research are performing very badly in
terms of identifying and reporting money laundering. Major problems have
been identified in the quality, as well as the quantity, of reports coming
out of the legal, accountancy and estate agency sectors. One supervisor
even admitted it carried out no targeted AML monitoring at all during
2013.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Lack
of transparency - </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">20/22
supervisors fail to meet the standard of enforcement transparency demanded
by the Macrory standards of effective regulation.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Ineffective
sanctions - </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Low
fines, in relation to the amounts being laundered, failing to be effective
deterrents. Of the 7 HMRC regulated sectors, that includes estate agents,
the total fines in 2014/15 amounted to just £768,000.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l1 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Independence
questioned – </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Just
7/22 supervisors control for institutional conflicts of interest, whilst
15 are also lobby groups for the sectors they supervise.</span></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The research highlights that:</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"></span></div>
<ul type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">A third of banks dismissed
serious money laundering allegations without adequate review</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In the accountancy sector,
at least 14 different supervisors have some responsibility – leading to
widespread inconsistency and variations.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In property, only 179 cases
deemed suspicious by estate agents in 2013/14.</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Just 15 suspicious cases
reported through art and auction houses.</span></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Regular
readers of this blog will know that I have long been warning of the unenforced
regime of money laundering controls in this country, and the risks we run by
allowing a vast amount of foreign black money to have unrestricted access to
the UK’s institutions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
present state of affairs identified by TI is merely a restatement of what has
been the status-quo for a long time, but the UK Government adamantly refuses to
take the necessary steps to enforce the laws on the prevention and forestalling
of money laundering effectively, as she has done since the laws were originally
introduced.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It is all
part of that classical degree of hypocrisy and mendaciousness which attaches to
British attempts to regulate its financial industries, and which follows a long
historical pedigree.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Back in
the day when the original Financial Services Act of 1986 was being discussed,
the City of London experienced a collective crisis of conscience when Margaret
Thatcher declared that she wanted to see a regime of financial regulation
introduced to ‘police the City’.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Thatcher
was agnostic as to what form of ‘policing’ this should take, but she did not
want the cost of the new regulations to fall on the shoulders of the tax-payer.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">She was a
committed disciple of the Hayekian principles of the ‘Enabling State’, and she
could not understand why the City could not regulate itself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">She was
therefore reassured when a group of City grandees came together to identify a
method whereby the function of financial regulation would be undertaken by the
City on behalf of itself.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Thatcher
fell for the proposal outlined, hook, line and sinker, and the City then began
a hugely concerted effort to concoct a plan which would possess all the imagery
of being a regulatory organisation, but one which, in practice, would be little
more than a huge talking shop..</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
original architects of the plans realised that in order to get approval to be
able to operate the new regime of ‘self-regulation’, they would have to make
the edifice look as if it intended to operate effectively.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">So a
modicum of money was set aside by the City fathers to start to create the new
animal, and the various financial interest groupings <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>were sent away to come up with proposals for a
Self Regulating Organisation (SRO) model which would be agreeable to their
members.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">What this
failed to take into consideration was the degree of self-interest and special
pleading which different financial groups were capable of generating, and it quickly
became very clear that the different groups of City players could not and would
not operate together in a concerted manner.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The Bank
of England was a regulatory entity in its own right and as it had existed since
God was a little boy, (well, since 1694 anyway) and it had no intention of
being aligned to any other group or body.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The Stock
Exchange also let it be known that it had no intention of sharing a platform
with any of the lesser breeds, while the Stock Brokers and Stock Jobbers who
worked there all joined an organisation called The Securities Association
(TSA).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">They in
turn refused to have anything to do with those men and women who engaged in
various forms of Investment Management, Fund Managers etc, who in turn joined
up with a new body called IMRO or the Investment Managers Regulatory
Association.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">They in
their turn considered themselves to be a rather snooty crowd, who did not want
to be associated with those dreadful mechanics who engaged in the rather
mundane and arcane practices associated with developing Life Assurance and Unit
Trust products. These chaps were left to join LAUTRO, which stood for the Life
Assurance and Unit Trust Regulatory Organisation.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
wide-boys who traded the esoteric products and contracts in the markets which
were beginning to be known as derivatives, joined the Association of Futures
Brokers and Dealers (AFBD), while those who sold Life and Pensions products,
whom nobody else wanted to have any association with at all, became members of
the Financial Intermediaries, Managers and Brokers Regulatory Association or
FIMBRA.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The whole
Tower of Babel existed under the supervision of an umbrella organisation called
the Securities and Investments Board, (SIB).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It will
come as no surprise to anyone to realise that within a relatively short space
of time, it became absolutely clear that not only did this monstrous edifice
not work effectively as a regulating entity, but that it was not intended so to
do.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Every
entity had its own rule book and series of procedures, as well as competing and
conflicting disciplinary codes. Members were only subject to the rules of their
own organisations, enforced through their contractual relationship.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It didn’t
take long to realise that The City had used its genius for giving all the
impressions of complying with the laws in public while derogating from them in
private. There were far too many competing interests, overlapping fields of
jurisdiction, differences in regulatory interpretation, deviations in policy
issues, and generally, a complete failure to create a model which could and
would work in harmony in order to regulate the City effectively.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This did
not happen by accident, it was a deliberate and cynical policy, undertaken by
powerful City figures, to create a monster which would never be capable of
concerted best practice.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It was
done to head off and then dilute the effects of the demands for financial
regulation, and it entrenched a group of City interests, giving them remote
control over the day-to-day operation of the financial regulatory regime. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Within a
matter of years the whole rotten edifice had to be swept away, and a new model
put in its place, with a new set of legal provisioning and new entities used to
control its players, when new Act was introduced in 1990.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Even
then, the earlier models had captured the various memberships, and now financial
regulation was entrapped in a monstrous edifice of immovable rules and regulations.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The overriding
failure was to create a single supervising body with simple rules which could
have brought its influence to bear on all the market participants, subjecting
them all to a simple but tough regime of market supervision. That failure has
been complemented down the years and is now replicated in the ridiculous and
pathetic failures of first the Financial Services Authority, and now the
Financial Conduct Authority.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The same
was true for the implementation of the rules and laws dealing with money
laundering.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">I have an
interest to declare here as I was very much personally involved with the
introduction of the new laws dealing with Money Laundering from the start, and
I wrote the first legal text book which was published on the same day as the
new Act came into force, April 1<sup>st</sup> 1994, an apt day in some ways!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">I now
realise that my colleagues and I who worked so assiduously to help educate and
advise the financial sector on the new laws, were guilty of a modicum of
naivety in our approach to the new laws.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Most of
us who advised on the new laws and regulations were lawyers, working in
partnership with police agencies, and we had all had long experience of the
problems associated with trying to identify and determine the legal ownership
of sometimes vast sums of money, during the course of our investigations.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Despite
all our entreaties, the banks remained resolutely silent and were remarkably
unhelpful in our work, claiming the sanctity of the client’s right to
confidentiality.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The new
laws were intended to provide a way to cut through this Gordian knot, to give
the cops the information they needed to catch the criminals, while protecting
the reputation of the bankers at the same time, by providing them with a
defence against civil suit at the hands of their clients for passing on information
to the Police.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">We, the
police and prosecutors had grown so used to hearing the protestations of the
bankers that really they wanted to help us, but their hands were tied by the
law, that we genuinely believed if a way could be found to give them a defence
against civil suit, they would be as good as their much protested word, and
become more cooperative with us!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Of
course, we had fallen into the trap that the City players had set for us! </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">They had
no intention of passing information to the Plods, particularly as it was well
known that any institution that did play that game would lose clients hand over
fist.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Why would
any bank with a regular source of money about which no questions needed to be
asked, suddenly want to start asking the very questions which nobody but the
cops wanted answers to?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The other
factor we had not considered, and of which it is only now that I finally have
come to realise the reality, is that in truth, the Government did not want
these laws being implemented too closely. either.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">When you
govern an entity like the City of London, with its vast association and
relationship with the global off-shore secrecy banking havens, you begin to see
the huge amount of black and dubious money which comes washing through the City
institutions every day of the year.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This
money possesses huge benefits for this country and if the price to pay for its
continued arrival is that a blind eye is turned to its sources and the laws designed
to prevent it from coming, then the blind eye will be turned.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Let me
explain!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It is
only recently that, in mulling over some of my old adventures and experiences,
that I have recalled some of the more esoteric moments of my career.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
original money laundering law was intended to deal solely with the proceeds of
drug trafficking. Generally speaking, even most banks (until HSBC broke the
mould), turned their noses up on the proceeds of drug trafficking. Drugs were
generally considered to be grubby, and bad for business, and most institutions
had little qualm about trying to keep drug money out of the system.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
original law, was derived from a Directive issued by Brussels, the EU Money Laundering
Directive, and all members states had to comply with its implementation by a
fixed date. So the UK had no choice than to enact a new law dictated by the EU.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">We are
all familiar with the level of agreement that most British institutions have
with EU pronouncements, but nevertheless, the UK was bound to implement the
terms of the Directive by April 1994.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">So work
was being undertaken to draft and bring a act to the Statute Books which would
meet the needs of the EU.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">At the same
time, in the USA, our American cousins were playing with the idea of extending
the implications of anti-momey laudering laws to the proceeds of all criminal
behaviour, nit just drug trafficking, and it was becoming clearer and clearer
that the UK would undoubtedly follow suit, to keep in lock step with our US
cousins!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">As the
time came for the new laws to be implemented, we were already being drawn into
conversations and discussions about what we would come to call ‘All Crimes Money
Laundering’..</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
problem with this provision was that the proceeds of ‘All Crimes’ included
money from Tax Evasion, capital flight mechanisms, and other criminal
activities, fraud, theft, corruption, City crimes, etc, etc.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This kind
of money, and particularly capital flight and tax evasion from other countries
made up a vast sum of available investment capital, and the banks liked this
kind of money very much indeed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Would
they declare it under the new regulations?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">What was
becoming clearer was that H.M.Government was also beginning to have doubts and
second thoughts about the wisdom of these laws. It is of interest to note that
once the laws were implemented, no agency was designated as having the power to
enforce the regulations. It was as if HMG did not want the laws to be regulated
too closely or too effectively. It was enough to have the laws, we didn’t have
to be assiduous in enforcing them! </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Sound familiar!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">As part
of the public awareness educative process, I, with a few others travelled the
country giving public lectures on the implications of the new laws. One of my
fellow-speakers was a rather oleaginous character from H.M.Treasury.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">One night
we were giving a presentation in Manchester in the Free Trade Hall!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">After the
opening comments, the floor was invited to ask any questions that might be
bothering them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">A portly financier
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>stood up and said; ‘Do any of these laws
and provisions have anything to do with the issues of tax and/or revenue
matters generally.’</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Our
friend from the Treasury indicated he would answer this, and with breathtaking insouciance
he said that these laws would have nothing whatsoever to do with tax or revenue
matters. This answer seemed to appease the audience who soon drifted off home.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">On our
way South to London in the train, I asked my colleague about this question, and
I asked him why he had lied so blatantly, as we all knew that tax evasion and uauthorised
tax avoidance would be caught up in the new provisions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">His
answer was a masterpiece of Whitehall wabble-babble.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">He said; “...The
word ‘lied’ is a very strong word. I was just being economical with the actualite.
See it like this. If the market believes that tax matters are caught by the new
provisions,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>they will dig their heels
in, and mount such a backwoods revolt that we will not get the legislation
through in this parliament. This will create a problem for us in Brussels, and
set us against the Commission, particularly as we have run out of time to implement
this law and we will be in default and subject to default actions. My masters
do not want that so I have had to be a little judicious with the truth in order
to get the people in the hall to sign up...”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">If ever
there was a piece of legislation that nobody wanted, it has to be the
anti-money laundering laws. They are routinely ignored, as we have seen when
HSBC laundered billions of dollars of Mexican drug money and no-one did anything
about it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Our laws
have been implemented in such a hap-hazard and piecemeal fashion, again with
overlapping agencies seeking to implement the rules, so that like the early
days of financial regulation, we have no-one who takes full responsibility for
the whole market sector. For years, no-one would take charge of enforcing the
Regulations and even today, they are not properly policed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Yet
again, we have laws which, frankly, are not intended to be obeyed, and successive
Governments have routinely turned a blind eye to the implications of any
failure to enforce them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Perfidious
Albion ideed!</span></div>
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<br /></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-20643762948969399182015-11-22T04:53:00.003-08:002015-11-22T04:53:39.858-08:00Why we are all being so badly let down by the findings of the HBOS Report.<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">After God-knows
how many years, we can finally read the report into the squalid collapse of
HBOS!</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Lest we
forget, this bank collapsed because it was run by a bunch of unqualified
chancers who were allowed to take over the asylum!</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Much of
what follows is taken directly from the report.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The main
report, from the Prudential Regulation Authority and the Financial Conduct
Authority, the FSA's successors, blames the bank's executives for its failure,
as well as being critical of the FSA. </span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">At the
same time, a parallel report, from Andrew Green QC, is the most damning,
suggesting the two regulators should consider banning as many as 10 former HBOS
executives from the City. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Andy
Hornby in particular should be re-investigated by the authorities, the report
found, alongside the entire senior management team. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"HBOS's
weak risk culture meant that controls could be overridden when convenient"
</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">PRA/FCA
report.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Too much
time has elapsed (very conveniently) for regulators to fine those responsible,
though they could still be banned from the industry, Mr Green says. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In
addition the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills could bar them from
being a director in any company. “Once the FCA and PRA have conducted their
review into enforcement action, we will establish whether there is any new
information to consider," said a spokesman at the Insolvency Service. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The study
from the Bank of England and the Financial Conduct Authority also found
then-regulator the Financial Services Authority failed to identify the risks
that the bank was running, and that when it did spot problems, it failed to
act. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">That was
partly because of "a sustained political emphasis on the need for the FSA
to be 'light touch' in it's approach," said the report, pointing the
finger at the government of the day. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Lord
Stevenson was responsible for running a board with little banking experience
and little ability to challenge the bank's executives, the report said. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Meanwhile
chief executives James Crosby and Andy Hornby pushed the bank's staff to grow
lending constantly with little regard for risk. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">They
"played a fundamental role in reinforcing a culture within the firm which
leaned heavily towards growth", the report said, and placed only "a
low priority... on risk." </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">When
bosses did worry about growing risks it was "purely as a threat to
growth" rather than as a threat to the bank's survival or the wider
economy. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">"HBOS's
weak risk culture meant that controls could be overridden when
convenient," the report said, adding that even when the bank's bosses
wanted to slow lending 2007 and 2008, the culture was such that staff continued
to smash lending targets. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">There was
a repeated failure to appoint directors with experience of risk management, the
report said. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Combined
with a lack of board experience in the industry - only one non-executive had
experience in banking, and he joined in May 2007 - this led to a culture in
which external auditors were "kept under pressure" and their most
dire warnings on bad loan levels ignored. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">As a
result, former FCA enforcement boss Clive Adamson told the new report's authors
that the bosses who were most "culpable" for the crash had yet to be
punished. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The joint
PRA/FCA report said HBOS collapsed due to a lack of liquidity, with the failure
explained by a number of reasons including: </span></div>
<ul type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">the board failed to instil a
culture within the firm that balanced risk and return appropriately, and
lacked sufficient experience and knowledge of banking;</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">a flawed and unbalanced
strategy and a business model with inherent vulnerabilities arising from
an excessive focus on market share, asset growth and short-term
profitability;</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">the firm’s executive
management pursued rapid and uncontrolled growth of the Group’s balance
sheet, and led to an over-exposure to highly cyclical commercial real
estate (CRE) at the peak of the economic cycle;</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">a failure by the Board and
control functions to challenge effectively executive management in
pursuing this course or to ensure adequate mitigating actions; </span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">and the fact that HBOS’s
underlying balance sheet weaknesses made the Group extremely vulnerable to
market shocks and ultimately failure as the crisis of the financial system
intensified. </span></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
authorities have asked accounting regulator the Financial Reporting Council to
investigate HBOS' auditor KPMG. To date the FRC has declined, awaiting the
publication of this report, reiterating that stance in a statement today,
following another review of its own. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">First of
all, the collapse of this banking edifice was the result of gross incompetence,
negligence, reckless lending policies, coupled always with a culture of taking
ever bigger and bigger risks.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">That a
famous British banking institution could have been served in this way says much
about the way in which the banking industry was allowed to develop during this
period of unrestricted growth and massive greed.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It demonstrates
what can happen when the regulators fall down on the job of regulating the
institution properly, as in this case. This failing was amplified by the
Government policy of ‘light touch’ regulation, in which the regulators knew
that Gordon Brown did not wish to see anything that might impede the climate of
entrepreneurialism which he so blindly believed existed, so a hands-off
approach was adopted.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This was such
a stupid policy, particularly at this time, but it reflected the awesome combination
of arrogance, greed, and stupidity, coupled with political support.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">No one
among any of those responsible for the prudent workings of the bank seems to
have give a moment’s thought to the fact that the money with which they were
playing, was entrusted to them by members of the public.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">But none
of this surprises me!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">For
years, the City has been staffed by venal and dishonest men and women who rely
on each other not to grass when the sticky brown smelly stuff meets the air
conditioning.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">You can
be as thick and stupid as you want, but as long as you play by the rules of the
club, you will be protected.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Now,
these stupid people are being protected yet again. It has taken years for this
report to see the light of day, and as a result, more reports and enquiries are
being called for. The City Establishment knows that if you let enough time
elapse between the egregious events and the final reckoning, the greater the
chance of walking away from the mess Scot free! </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">That is what is happening here.
More and more reports will take more and more time. Will it never end?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">None of
us are served well by reports which do not recommend direct action against
those responsible for creating the losses. Sadly, it seems no-one will be going
to prison (yet again) over these huge failings.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">It was
ever thus!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-72030216522039486632015-11-12T04:46:00.000-08:002015-11-12T04:46:17.617-08:00By their words shall ye know them!<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Who is standing in the way of criminal charges being
brought against City bankers?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Regular readers of my blogs will know that I have been
regularly posing questions which ask why the Government is studiously ignoring
the wrong-doing in the City of London.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The sheer volume of criminality which has been occasioned
by the banks is breathtaking, yet Ministers say nothing and do even less.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">I am at a loss to offer any kind of satisfactory
explanation for this stony silence from the Government, and even when the
losses occasioned have been so egregious, and the conduct so manifestly
criminal, officers of the Crown still stay resolutely shtum!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">It is as if the message has gone round Whitehall; ‘Say
nothing, do nothing and in the end, people will forget’!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">It is a major scandal that such a level of gross
criminality has been occasioned and yet Government has not uttered so much as a
murmur</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The banks commit wholesale fraud on their customers. They
steal their money, lacerate their accounts, inveigle them into crazy derivative
products, and then manipulate them to death. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Their traders play around with important global
benchmarking products, manipulating them for their own dishonest ends.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">They play around with the foreign currency values, they
cheat clients using derivative markets, and the Government does nothing to
punish them!.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Our laws on money laundering are regularly and routinely ignored.
Foreign criminal money floods into London, and the banks casually accept it
without turning a hair.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Our spineless regulators cower in the corner, like
modern-day Uriah Heeps, claiming they can do nothing about the criminality of
senior bankers, all the while imposing fines which do nothing but damage the
interests of shareholders.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">When I was a detective at the Fraud Squad, we had regular
meetings with civil servants from the Department of Trade and Industry, which
was just about the only other agency in those days that existed to deal with
City fraud.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">They would tell us in no uncertain terms if the cases we
were investigating were ones which the politicians wanted investigated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Under Margaret Thatcher, the Government of the day wanted
to encourage a ‘climate of enterprise’, and they did not want criminal cases
being brought which might give the impression that the City of London was a
hotbed of criminality.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">So any case which needed to be referred first to the
Secretary of State for Trade and Industry (like Insider Dealing, or Fraudulent
Trading) before charges could be laid, would join a long list of similar cases
which were gathering dust while the time-wasting experts in the Department of
Timidity and Inactivity did nothing to prosecute them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">My brother officers and I quickly learned how to charge City
suits with ordinary criminal cases of theft and false accounting, charges which
did not need ministerial approval to bring to court, and we began to get
convictions, but they soon stepped in and stopped us doing that.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">If this behaviour was being conducted by a Trade Union or
a group of workers, you may rest assured that the Government would step in, but
because it is being carried on in the stinking City, it gets ignored. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">I know perfectly well that when a minister or a
Government department doesn’t want something to happen, then masterly
inactivity will be the order of the day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">And this is what we have got right now, masterly
inactivity of an order which we can only wonder at.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Well, my friend Ian Fraser has helped me to come up with
some explanations, which may offer some insights, and they make for unhappy
reading.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">For answers, we must turn to the career and political
motivations of Ms Harriet Baldwin. Ms Baldwin is not the sole perpetrator of
this lack of action, she is just one in a long line of politicians who looked
the other way, but she is in post right now, and her background ad cv are superb
examples of the kind of people who hold down important posts intended to
regulate the City!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">She was educated at Marlborough School, and read Modern
Languages (French and Russian) at <span style="color: black;"><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Margaret_Hall,_Oxford" title="Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford"><span style="color: black;">Lady Margaret Hall</span></a>,
<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford_University" title="Oxford University"><span style="color: black;">Oxford</span></a>. She
earned an <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MBA" title="MBA"><span style="color: black;">MBA</span></a> from <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGill_University" title="McGill University"><span style="color: black;">McGill University</span></a> in Montreal. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Ms
Baldwin was elected as the Member of Parliament for West Worcestershire in May
2010. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She was appointed to become the
Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy to Russia before joining the government in
February 2014 as Assistant Government Whip. In the July 2014 reshuffle she was
promoted to Lord Commissioner.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Harriett
Baldwin was appointed Economic Secretary to the Treasury (City Minister) 11 May
2015.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">She had
previously enjoyed a successful 20 year career in finance, working for
J.P.Morgan Chase, and specialising in currency markets for pension funds. She
was also on the National Council of Business for Sterling. Not that being
employed by J.P.Morgan Chase was anything to boast about. A flaky record of
dodgy dealings resulted in </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">2013 with an onslaught of endless
investigations and scandals for the bank. By year’s end, news outlets reported
the stunning <i>$20 billion</i> in fines the bank paid to settle cases in 2013
alone, some of which may not wrap up for many years. Counting back to 2009, the
penalties number <i>$30 billion</i></span><i>. </i><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">The
wrong-doing by this one bank alone could have gone a long way to paying down
the UK deficit !</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">So, not
what you would call a inexperienced City player, and she no doubt enjoys the
usual City memories and shares in its cultures! And this is the whole point!
She is a creature of the Square Mile, she joined the City after Oxford. She is
part of the elite group of young women who learned to compete with ‘the chaps’,
while holding down a very competitive role in a major global investment bank.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">All this
is highly credible, and I intend no disrespect to her for her cv. But it also
stereotypes her as a City insider, a free-marketeer, someone who knows where
the bodies are buried! She believes in the City ethic,she knows what questions
not to ask and this may mean that she is not entirely enamoured of the
regulatory ethos!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Well, we
don’t need to extrapolate from her history to see that she is no friend of
financial regulation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Back in
2005, </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">when
Ms Baldwin was still a City slicker,</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"> she co-authored a paper entitled ‘The Leviathan is
still at large’, a report produced by a team from the Centre for Policy
Studies, and addressed to the Financial Services Authority. It took the form of
a big whinge and a lightly disguised dressing-down of the FSA’s coduct of
affairs, and was clearly intended as a major shot across the bows for the
regulator from its City constituency.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">This
paper contained all the usual bromides one would expect from the CPS, and in
its introduction it moaned that;</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“...The industry also feels that the FSA is vulnerable to political direction
and influence. The FSA is seen as being unable to defend the industry it is
intended to support against political or public criticism. This has created a
sense of insecurity about future regulation. The ability of the industry to
plan and to innovate is severely undermined.The industry fears that the FSA is
an increasingly defensive and risk-averse organisation. This has contributed to
a culture of prescriptive and increasingly complex regulation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Such a
culture is damaging to all the industry ñ but most of all to the small business
sector. Innovation is at risk of dwindling, competitiveness falling and consumer
choice declining.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
characteristics needed to succeed in the global capital markets include the
following: expert, responsive, lateral-thinking, proactive, unbureaucratic,
fast-on-the-feet, decisive, cost-conscious, imaginative, outward-facing and
open. The industry expects its regulator to mirror these characteristics.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
industry’s expectations are not being met...”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">In other
words, the FSA is failing to back the City to the hilt and gives every
indication of doing its proposed job properly, which we in the Square Mile
would not wish to see!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">In the
document, Baldwin and co-author David Gauke now Financial Secretary to the
Treasury, and others, called for a regulatory regime that "recognis[ed]
the skills, sophistication and ability of senior management to manage their own
business risks; and remov[ed] many of the prescriptive compliance burdens under
which they labour" </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Now
remember, this document was written when the financial sector was behaving like
a demented sociopath on Speed, engaging in just about every kind of dishonest and
dirty financial practice under the sun. In just over 2 years, the Government
would have to be throwing billions of pounds of tax-payers’ money at the
collapsing banking industry, just to keep the flaky edifice afloat! Talk about “...recognising
the skills, sophistication and ability of senior management to manage their own
business risks...”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Nevertheless,
the document contains a distillation of the views of a lot of unbridled free marketers,
and we have to remember that the same people are now in positions of major
authority!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: normal; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; mso-outline-level: 1;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB; mso-font-kerning: 18.0pt;">As Economic
Secretary to the Treasury (City Minister), her r</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">esponsibilities include financial
services policy and overall strategic relationship with UK financial services,
including:</span></div>
<ul type="disc">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">banking and financial
services reform and regulation (at home and in the EU) including the PRA </span></li>
<ul type="circle">
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 72.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">financial
stability</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 72.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">City
competitiveness</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 72.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">bank
lending and access to finance</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 72.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Help
to Buy</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 72.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">financial
conduct and the FCA </span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level2 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 72.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">asset
management</span></li>
</ul>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">RBS, Lloyds and UKFI </span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">bank taxes</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">asset freezing and financial
crime</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">retail financial services,
including consumer finance, financial advice and capability, working with
the DWP Pensions Minister</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Equitable life</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">delivery of pensions reforms</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">foreign exchange reserves
and debt management policy, National Savings and Investments and the Debt
Management Office</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">departmental minister for HM
Treasury Group</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">women in the economy</span></li>
<li class="MsoNormal" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto; tab-stops: list 36.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">parliamentary deputy on
economy issues</span></li>
</ul>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Whoops, among her other responsibilities is that of
financial crime, so it is to Ms Baldwin we must look for policy determinations.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Now, it is perfectly possible that Ms Baldwin’s views may have softened
somewhat since the publication of the Leviathan report, and she may now be in
favour of a far more robust form of financial and City regulation!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">She may be, but I don’t see any evidence of it, while I do see lots of
evidence of a major slackening of a number of important constraints.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">By their words shall ye know them!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-35658017.post-79110388269971300862015-11-08T05:39:00.003-08:002015-11-08T05:39:29.956-08:00If the British won’t prosecute criminal bankers, America has no problems doing it for them!<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%;">The New York Times reports:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">A jury in
Manhattan on Thursday November 5<sup>th</sup>, found two former London traders
guilty in the first convictions in the United States stemming from the global
investigation into the rigging of an interest rate benchmark known as Libor.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">As the
jury foreman began reading out the verdicts on the 19 counts of fraud and
conspiracy against Mr.Anthony <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Allen and
the nine for Mr. Anthony Conti, Mr. Allen slumped low in his chair, his chin
resting on his left fist. As the guilty verdicts slowly tallied all 28 counts,
he stared off to his right, away from the jury seated to his left.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Now
consider this salient fact!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The verdict
against the two, Anthony Allen and Anthony Conti, took less than a day and a
half of deliberation, and was a surprisingly quick victory for the Justice
Department as it makes a renewed effort to prosecute individuals for financial
crimes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Trying
the two former Rabobank traders before a jury presented a challenge for
prosecutors, resting in part as it did on the arcane technicalities of how
Libor is calculated. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Submissions for Libor benchmarks are made at a certain
time in London in different currencies and for numerous different short-term
maturities in the hundredths of a percentage point.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Yet this
Manhattan jury took less than 9 hours to give their unanimous verdicts, and in
so doing, they sent a very strong message, not only to the two bankers, who
must now be looking at some serious gaol-time, but also to the criminal banking
fraternity at large, if you cannot do the time, then don’t do the crime!</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Right
after the verdict, one juror, Howard Wasserfall, said that “it was pretty obvious
to us something was going on that was interfering with the way the Libor rate
was supposed to be” calculated.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">A retired
mail carrier, Mr. Wasserfall pointed to the emails and text messages among the
traders that the prosecutors presented and especially to the testimony from
three other former Rabobank traders who had earlier pleaded guilty to
participating in the scheme.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Despite
the complexity, the jurors appeared to take a lively interest in the specifics
of the case, with more than a half-dozen taking notes regularly during the
trial.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“I think
this shows that the government can obtain convictions even in complicated
cases, and this was not the simplest case,” said John Coffee, a law professor
at Columbia University.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">So,
straight away we can give the lie to the oft-repeated mantra so beloved by UK
regulators, that it is too difficult to try these kinds of cases in front of
juries.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">I have
been saying and blogging for some time now that the criminalisation of British
bankers for the plethora of disgraceful crimes which they have been allowed to
commit with impunity, would ultimately be dealt with by American prosecutors
and juries.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">When you
commit offences which have international ramifications, and which impact the
interests of US citizens, you are taking a huge risk that you will face trial
in a US Court.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The trial
of Allen and Conti began on Oct. 14. Prosecutors said the defendants had
conspired to submit bogus rates to be used in calculating Libor, which is based
on submissions from 16 banks, to help other Rabobank traders make more money on
trades in which they stood to gain from a higher or lower interest rate.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Allen,
the global head of liquidity and finance, supervised Conti, a senior money
markets trader who made daily Libor submissions.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Conti, is
a British citizen and a former senior trader with Rabobank. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
journey for the two men, both British citizens, to Federal District Court in
Lower Manhattan was the product of a long-running push by regulators and law
enforcement in a number of countries to investigate the manipulation of Libor, the
benchmark used by banks to set interest rates on mortgages, credit cards and
other kinds of loans.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">More than
a half-dozen banks, including the Dutch bank the two men worked for, Rabobank,
have now paid more than $10 billion to settle charges with regulators and law
enforcement agencies that they conspired to rig Libor.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Leslie R.
Caldwell, the assistant attorney general for the criminal division of the
Justice Department, said: “Today’s verdicts illustrate the department’s
successful efforts to hold accountable bank executives responsible for this
global fraud scheme.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
convictions on Thursday will now embolden prosecutors as they weigh whether to
bring cases against individuals in the currency manipulation scandal.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0cm;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">“The
Libor cases have been a symbol of the department’s commitment to taking on the
major banks,” said Brandon L. Garrett, a professor at the University of
Virginia law school. “I think it was very important for the government to show
that both individuals and the corporations will be held criminally
accountable.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Prosecutor
Brian R. Young said the defendants had “left a paper trail a mile long,” and
had been “active and enthusiastic participants” in a scheme with other Rabobank
traders.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">These
verdicts should mark the start of a long campaign of attrition against criminal
banksters who have committed so many crimes in the past few years.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">The
behaviour identified was so blatant and so cynical and carried out by bankers
of senior status, that it should be seen as a warning to Governments and
regulators not to start de-regulating or backtracking on hitherto accepted
standards of desirable regulation of the financial sector.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 115%; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-GB;">Give
these criminals an inch and they will steal a mile.</span></div>
Rowan Bosworth-Davieshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16384252276434877281noreply@blogger.com4