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in reply to Sarah Brown

Indeed it seems because a police officer won't take £50 to let you off it counts as not corrupt but it is corrupt at the highest levels, not the lowest levels.
in reply to Luke

@Luke Exactly that! Here in Portugal, things seem corrupt because there's a lot of, "oh, you want this service. My friend works there. Let me have a word and you can jump the queue".

Which is "corrupt", but "Imma just create a shell company in the British Virgin Islands and you can award it an M25 widening scheme which I won't actually bother delivering, and instead I'll donate 80% of it back to 'charitable causes', as run by your good self, and we'll see what's what. Golf later?" isn't.

@Luke
in reply to Sarah Brown

Something deeply unsavoury is going to on with building management in London as well. The management company gets quotes from their three preferred contactors who are all 100 miles away and charge £80 extra to remove 1 bag of rubbish that could have gone into the communal skip. And the roof still leaks afterwards.
in reply to CharLES ☭ H

@CharLES ☭ H yeah. It’s like this at every single level. This is how one of the richest countries in the world is so grubby. The money is getting skimmed, everywhere.

reshared this

in reply to Sarah Brown

@celesteh 100 miles away from where Charles lives is where I live, many of the property management companies are round here and fight like rats for the "big ticket" contracts from London, turning down work in the local area (as they won't pay the inflated prices) and adding to the traffic problems on the A12, M11 and M25 every rush hour (which leads to many collisions including fatalities)
in reply to Sarah Brown

Ah, but white-collar crime isn’t really crime, is it?

If we had to suddenly examine the UK for building a worldwide money laundering and reinvestment scheme, the SFO would be very busy … if that’s too much, they could check out every closed-shortlist ‘competitive tender process’ … although that would also take a while …

in reply to Josh Davis

@GuerillaOntologist

true, true. 👍
reading the comments, it seems that *every* country is corrupt. that's sad but I'm glad people are paying attention

@goatsarah

in reply to Sarah Brown

I know it’s not a contest but have you already heard about Madagascar ? I am positive when I’m saying Madagascar is far more corrupted that Great Britain.
in reply to Sarah Brown

Don’t forget that all this money ends up in untaxable opaque offshore accounts, the legality of which is managed by those same people.
in reply to Alexander Dyas

@Alexander Dyas truth in advertising; I have an offshore account in a crown dependency and they absolutely send details of my balance and interest to HMRC and Finanças (Portuguese tax authority) every year. I pay income tax on them.

Maybe they have different rules if your balance is beyond a certain amount.

Mx Verda reshared this.

in reply to Sarah Brown

Jersey for instance has a personal tax rate of 20% max for residents, and 0% for corporations based there [0]. My understanding is that all you need to do is register a company there and your business doesn’t pay tax on that money.

As far as I am aware the same is true of places like the Cayman Islands.

The Spider’s Web is a great documentary about this

[1][0] investopedia.com/ask/answers/0…

[1] youtu.be/np_ylvc8Zj8?si=8fuTPG…

in reply to Sarah Brown

depends which country the bank is located.. for example cayman islands has no corporate tax, so people take advantage of that. i think most people just use offshore for flexibility, privacy and protection from lawsuits (so a different type of loophole xD)
in reply to cracc_baby

@cracc_baby I have one because my wife sold her business to a bunch of seppos who wanted to pay in USD, and it was the easiest way to open an account in that denomination. Kept it because it’s handy for buying grey market oestrogen.

Mx Verda reshared this.

in reply to Sarah Brown

I think you've summed it up nicely. I live in hope that the new government will clamp down on the crooks, grifters and super-rich ASAP
.
in reply to Andrew Ginty

@k_ginty would be nice, but unlikely. The Greens might or might not, but they’d be who I would vote for if I could.
in reply to Andrew Ginty

The problem is that the members of the new government have also made a career out of this type of corruption, albeit in a quieter, more discreet, and possibly less voluminous manner. Remember the expenses scandal in 2010?
This entry was edited (2 months ago)
in reply to Sarah Brown

Multiply that by every capitalist country in the world, which is most of them nowadays.

The US is equally as corrupt in this regard.

in reply to Sarah Brown

I walked away in disgust 20 years ago and have spent them largely in the USA where there is still plenty corruption but here I could get a job rather than being a pawn in other people's games as I was in the UK.
in reply to Sarah Brown

It's worth bearing in mind that London is often referred to as the laundromat of the world for dirty money.

It's also nicknamed Londongrad because of all the oligarchs hiding their stolen billions in luxury houses that sit empty.

People don't realise how corrupt the UK is because the British (let's be honest mainly English) know how to spin, minimise, evade & manipulate like no others. Even the British public has zero clue just how corrupt it is.

in reply to Captain Jack Sparrow

@Captain_Jack_Sparrow You may have noticed all the posh, English psychopaths who have been in power since forever.

Besides have you seen the inequality in this country?

in reply to Bag Of Zombified Water

@sentient_water
There's also the vast majority of English people who are not entitled, nor are they from rich lineages, and they get pretty fucking sick of being blamed for everything and tarred with the same brush as the Etonian establishment.

Also, there are Scottish and Welsh amongst the elite, not just "English."

in reply to Bag Of Zombified Water

@sentient_water
I'm from the North East, and one of the poorest towns in the North East. You don't have to lecture me about inequality.
in reply to Sarah Brown

So its just a "it can't be corruption if we give another name and make it legal" kind of thing. It reminds me somehow what happens in USA with donations to main political parties which in almost any other country would be plainly illegal.
in reply to Sarah Brown

The writer and mafia expert Robert Saviano said in an interview a few years ago that the most corrupt country in the world was indeed the UK because of all the dirty money flowing to London from around the world.
archive.rai-see.org/uk-is-most…
in reply to Sarah Brown

And whilst people think Swiss bank accounts are the worst in terms of hiding dirty money, the nebulous network of tax havens based on Crown dependencies and "British" Commonwealth nations is unrivalled.

Unlike the Germans, Japanese and US Americans, the Brits don't need an orderly, streamlined and legally coherent system. The Brits thrive on a byzantine, global, murky banking prison colony. They are inmates who somehow were entrusted with the keys.

in reply to Sarah Brown

this really is what UK society is, a sequence of lies designed to keep the Rich on top and the rest of us blaming immigrants for the corruption of the Elites
Unknown parent

Sarah Brown
@Calum Mcgregor best of luck to you. Gave more than a decade of my life to that. Got steamrolled. Difficult to not be cynical about it.
in reply to Sarah Brown

"Least corrupt" is grading on a curve. They probably are in the 10% least corrupt countries.
in reply to Sarah Brown

Why are they replacing a roundabout with traffic lights? Roundabouts generally are cheaper, safer and more efficient than signalized intersections.
in reply to Jim Heartney

@Jim Heartney Because it gives them an excuse to spaff public funds into their own bank accounts via their mates’ “companies”.
in reply to Jim Heartney

wild speculation

@Jim Heartney @Sarah Brown Key word "generally". The roundabout is better a lot of the time, and many traffic light crossings would benefit from being turned into roundabouts, but it's not a strictly better solution in every single case.

It depends on the traffic volumes and the space available to build a roundabout that fits the traffic volumes. This could be one of the cases where the roundabout was rationally a mistake.

Or it could be an irrational fear or annoyance with roundabouts, or the mentioned corruption.

in reply to clacke: exhausted pixie dream boy 🇸🇪🇭🇰💙💛

wild speculation

Sensitive content

This entry was edited (2 months ago)
in reply to Sarah Brown

wild speculation

Sensitive content

in reply to Sarah Brown

Not disagreeing with the corruption charges, just wanted to note that the money is public money, not taxes.Taxes are used to control inflation, not pay for public services.
in reply to Sarah Brown

I don’t disagree at all with the thrust of your post, but government spending is not raised through taxation. Government spending is approved by law and funded through an overdraft from the BoE. Taxation is the means by which some of that injection is recovered so as not to fuel runaway inflation.
in reply to Sarah Brown

The trick is to bid as part of a consortium where one or more members of the group is/are located somewhere where beneficial ownership is not disclosable. This did not start in 2010 - some years before I came close to blocking this particular ploy on a particular public contract - only to find that somewhere else nearby it had been already accepted. To clean this up will need both #HMTreasury and the #publicaccountscommittee on board.
in reply to Donald Roy

Which will make who gets the chair of the #publicaccountscommittee next month quite important. The chair has to be chosen from the official opposition - namely the #conservatives although all members of the #houseofcommons vote in a secret ballot. One possibility is #jessenorman - who has something of a reputation for integrity and intelligence - and whose partner - #katebingham - served the #uk well during the pandemic.
This entry was edited (2 months ago)
in reply to Donald Roy

Interesting to note that he - #jessenorman - has had a letter published in the #financialtimes today - which looks suspiciously like an application for this particular job.
This entry was edited (2 months ago)
in reply to Sarah Brown

America works the same way! There's very little bribery, because the Supreme Court has chosen to define bribery as "handing an official a cartoon bag with a dollar sign on it full of money, and then they immediately carry out an official act."

Wait five minutes before the official act? Bag doesn't have a dollar sign on it? Not bribery!

in reply to Sarah Brown

don't forget the houses for mum&dad, and new sailboats company owners had to pay for
in reply to maya_b

@maya_b Motor yachts, please. Sailboats don't cost much more than cars.
in reply to Sarah Brown

was thinking of the Money Mone used for Lady M
autoevolution.com/news/scottis…
in reply to maya_b

@maya_b That is to "sailboats" as the Bugatti Veyron is to "cars".

Most are more like this: yachtworld.com/yacht/2010-jean…

Unknown parent

Luke
@omegaprobe 👍 well phrased
Unknown parent

Unknown parent

Captain Jack Sparrow

@partnumber2 @sentient_water
Did they really. So there was no inequality in civilisation, before the British "invented" it...

OK lol

Unknown parent

Bag Of Zombified Water

@Uraael @Captain_Jack_Sparrow "I don't like pizza"

Jack: "Why do you hate ALL Italians?!!"

in reply to Sarah Brown

When they say things like that I wonder what they mean by corrupt. Sometimes when people say least corrupt they just mean "run by anglo-saxons".
in reply to Sarah Brown

I doubt tgey're "in on the scam" as such. Rather that they operate according to very outdated definitions in which corruption is cash and valuables in the hand . Rather than favours, seats on the board etc.
in reply to Sarah Brown

Thanks for this. I keep telling people Portugal is much less corrupt that it seems. It’s just what we call corruption is perfectly legal and common practice in many other places.
in reply to Miguel Arroz

@Miguel Arroz Yeah. I felt sorry for Costa. The thing he resigned over is what the Tories call, "Tuesday".

Mx Verda reshared this.

in reply to Captain Jack Sparrow

@Captain_Jack_Sparrow @partnumber2 You completely avoided what you said to me.

Great debating style. By the way I noticed your toots on the genocide going on in Palestine. Well looky who got that shit started.

"Gardner Thompson, a British historian, traces the arc of this seminal development in Legacy of Empire: Britain, Zionism And The Creation Of Israel, published by Saqi Books in London. A specialist in British colonial policy in Africa, he argues that the Arab-Jewish conflict in Palestine was precipitated by Zionist colonization and fostered by Britain."

Then there's India, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland & of course the indigenous people of America. The British have a reputation for genocide, exploitation & subjugation of billions of people throughout history.

But please tell us why you're their biggest fanboy?

in reply to Sarah Brown

That puts the Brexit under a new light. EU puts a lot resurces to prevent that kind of thing, at least when european money is invested. I can imagine the people you describe not liking it at all.
in reply to Sarah Brown

It can be difficult to walk away, especially if other places look as bad/worse. I choose to pick my battles, for me it's the #ClimateEmergency, and try to focus within/outside the system as much as possible.
Unknown parent

Alex Leathard

@omegaprobe Essentially, yes; that’s my understanding.

But it’s only ever _partially_ repaid because no government claws back 100% of its spending back through taxation.

Someone, somewhere, in the pyramid that trickles down from central government spending, saves in a way that limits what government can reclaim.

Plus, the humans running governments place different value on different types of value exchange, e.g. capital gains vs VAT.

in reply to Sarah Brown

Same in the US. I recall during several Hurricane disasters the monsters that snapped up the food box contracts sending expired and inedible food of insufficient caloric value and pocketing the bulk of the funds without repercussion.
in reply to platanoutre

@platanoutre Ah, but the UK goes a bit further. If you merely pocket the funds, there will be no more for you.

You have to return them as "political donations".

It's money laundering on a national scale.

in reply to Sarah Brown

yep. See also energy and trains. Oh, and local post offices. Plus the City Of London enjoys being an autonomous zone. Technically it's not corruption when it happens above board, but the result is the same.
Unknown parent

Mx Verda
@calmonty
You gotta accept where you’re actually starting from if you want to make a realistic plan to change it.
Unknown parent

in reply to Sarah Brown

'least corrupt' and 'not corrupt' aren't exactly the same thing, are they? That's a gap you could drive a truckload of dirty cash through.
Unknown parent

Sarah Brown

@OddOpinions5 So you pluck 1% from ... somewhere, and then call it "waste", rather than what it is, blatant theft from the British people.

Even if it's as small as you assert, that is 12 billion pounds stolen by these wankers, from ordinary people, for their own enrichment.

A truly staggering amount of money, and that's after you tried to minimise it.

Found the Tory.

Unknown parent

Sarah Brown

@Omega @Alex Leathard I think it's just the in-thing, pavlovian response from certain corners of the Internet when some people see the phrase, "tax payers' money", and feel an irresistible urge to well actually all over everything.

Might be something to do with the crypto bros and their broken down Fiats. Not sure.

Unknown parent

Sarah Brown

@OddOpinions5 No. Using shell companies to skim billions off of infrastructure projects and donating it back to the people who awarded it isn't "waste". It's blatant, shameless theft.

And yours is the sort of attitude which allows it to continue, while those responsible then stand up in parliament and rant about "benefits fraud" and "illegal immigrants stealing our money".

in reply to Sarah Brown

@omegaprobe I’m sorry, I thought I could help clear up a misconception. No harm intended.
in reply to Sarah Brown

There's a reason there's Londongrad.

UK is probably one of the most corrupt countries in the western world. This came to the fore around brexit. There's so much corruption lingering on of 'jolly fine chaps' doing what 'jolly fine chaps' do, i.e. have a word with a friend, or a friend of a friend and whoopee, more cash. Think Greensill. If it were in e.g. France, Cameron would be in jail. Instead, he's been made a Lord.

in reply to Grant

@Grant That last Prime Minister of Portugal resigned because his chief of staff had been alleged to have a financial interest in the award of a lithium mining contract. This caused the government to collapse.

Can you seriously imagine a Tory Prime Minister resigning because one of his staff was financially involved with a company being awarded a national contract, let alone it causing fresh elections? The idea that there was even anything wrong with it would be ridiculous to them.

Yet Portugal is "corrupt" and the UK is not, apparently.

in reply to Sarah Brown

Here's one...

Despite this... he still became PM and either way, there were zero consequences:

EDIT:
Replaced link to FT article, which is behind a paywall (shame.. FT's good). Found this instead:
itv.com/news/2022-07-26/hes-hi…

This entry was edited (2 months ago)
in reply to Bag Of Zombified Water

Once again you are conflating the actions of the British establishment with the entire British people.

Please tell us where you are from, so I can blame you for the evils historically comitted by your successive governments.

This entry was edited (2 months ago)
Unknown parent

Captain Jack Sparrow

I agree, England has a high level of ignorance and a dominant RW press, unfortunately

However generally less than 50% vote tory, even in 2019 when the tories won a landslide. I think that was 47% of the English vote.

Most ppl vote for a more progressive parties.
It's a free fediverse though, if you want to carry on hating an entire nation because of the evils committed by their elite, (and I'm not denying they happen) that is up to you. Goodbye.

This entry was edited (2 months ago)
Unknown parent

CassandraVert
@GhostOnTheHalfShell
The Arab Spring was essentially a GINI protest.
Yet at the time, the US' GINI index was worse than Egypt's.
And it's only gotten worse since then.
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Captain Jack Sparrow
@partnumber2 @sentient_water
OK. let's draw a line through this insane and pointless argument and agree that the English establishment have a lot to answer for, but they are not solely to blame for all the wrong in the world.
in reply to Captain Jack Sparrow

@Captain_Jack_Sparrow @partnumber2 No you're doing the conflating, not me.

I certainly never blame millions of people for the actions of a handful of monsters.

I'm not telling you where I'm from you mentalist. Besides would it matter?

in reply to Captain Jack Sparrow

@Captain_Jack_Sparrow @essjayjay Man makes sweeping generalisations about someone they've never met then acts as if that's true.

Not certain but pretty sure that's a straw man argument.

in reply to Bag Of Zombified Water

@sentient_water @partnumber2
Am I their biggest fanboy? That's news to me, I just ask that people distinguish between the British governments and establishment, and British (or English) commoners, who are also frequently downtrodden by their own elite.

I think you have a chip on your shoulder, old boy.

Also, I am entitled to my own opinions about the genocide Israel is committing in Gaza. If you don't like that, then feel free to fuck off.

in reply to Captain Jack Sparrow

@Captain_Jack_Sparrow @partnumber2 Nope that's you. Refer to the first thing I posted. I explicitly excluded the Scottish & Welsh & majority of the English from my point.

But your thin skinned defensiveness suggests you're heavily invested in the English being seen as noble distributors of civilisation.

in reply to Bag Of Zombified Water

oh, please fuck off.

I am neither in denial or in defense of any of the many evils committed by the British empire, and have never said anything in their defense.

My only point is that not "all English" are in support of their establishment, nor should they be held in the same contempt.

Sorry if that is too difficult for you to comprehend.

This entry was edited (2 months ago)
in reply to Captain Jack Sparrow

@Captain_Jack_Sparrow @partnumber2
If you can't see that the fanboy comment was a joke based on your own statement then you're either not paying or not being a good faith actor.
in reply to Bag Of Zombified Water

goodbye, go and attempt to bully someone else.

or perhaps get a life.

This entry was edited (2 months ago)
in reply to Captain Jack Sparrow

@Captain_Jack_Sparrow @partnumber2 Passive aggressive much? Yes I probably should get a life but it's pretty difficult being physically disabled & autistic & traumatized but thanks for highlighting that.

Really "nice" of you.

in reply to Captain Jack Sparrow

@Captain_Jack_Sparrow @partnumber2 This is what you responded to. Where I'm very clearly not making a generalisation. You replied to this. This is what you've been basing your whole tirade on.

'People don't realise how corrupt the UK is because the British (let's be honest mainly English) know how to spin, minimise, evade & manipulate like no others. Even the British public has zero clue just how corrupt it is."

You engaged with me. You started insulting me. You wouldn't drop it. But please tell everyone how I'm the bully.