Monday 18 May 2009

Pot & Kettle Department

I'd just like to add a modest footnight to last week's ongoing story of MP's caught with their hands in the till, their snouts in the trough and their boots well and truly being filled.

Don't get me wrong - I'm as cross about this naked avarice as the next taxpayer and will be first in the voting queue whenever that arrives to give the miscreants a good kicking. However, I can't help feeling there has been more than a whiff of humbug about the reporting.

The Paxmans and Humphries are at least entertaining us for their six figure salaries, but I'm referring to our revered National Dailies which have been at the forefront of the hue and cry over mis-use of public funds. Almost to a man, the proprietors of the Telegraph, Times & Sun, Mail and Guardian have so arranged their affairs to milk the tax system for all its worth and pay an absolute minimum of tax and in some cases none at all. The Guardian Media Group, for example, campaigns for larger companies to pay more corporation tax yet paid none itself after making £300 million profit last year. The Barclay Brothers are resident in the Channel Islands, Rupert in the USA and Lord Rothermere reputed to be based in France from tax reasons yet because our PR obsessed Goverments and Oppositions are desperate for press support they don't make a fuss.

I couldn't help a wry smile at the bluff old Lord Foulkes who rather turned the tables on his £92,000 a year interviewer Carrie Gracie.

7 comments:

Geoff said...

Poor Carrie.

But did you see the glint in her eye when Cameron said he's going to get tough?

"My hero!"

Rog said...

Geoff: That's a real burden to Carrie!

KAZ said...

Ooh good for old Foulkesie.
His nose is redder than Sir Alex's.
Do you think it gets punched a lot.

Dave said...

What's a footnight?

Betty said...

I think Lord Foulkes has a red nose because of over indulgence in claret. Hah! That's what the good life does for you. Is the moat round his second home (a French castle) swimming in burgundy?

Journalists, politicians, people in TV - they're all on the fiddle. Mind you, so are builders who ask for cash in hand. I bet some of them have got moats around their homes too ...

Rog said...

Kaz: One suspects he likes the odd tipple. Woy Jenkins new how to ferment wevolution over a glass of fine burgandy.

Dave: A "footnight" is the equivalent of two weeks to our Scottish brethren.

Betty: I bet even Vanessa-Mae is on the fiddle. I don't think plumbers have moats round their houses as it's bad for business.

Richard said...

Oh and who managed to escape virtually untouched, despite him and his MP wife copping for a few grand extra above their combined salaries of about 1/4 million, because his bessie mate and karaoke partner is the editor of the Telegraph? Ed Balls. Shoot the lot of the useless bastards. Except Vince Cable because he's sensible and looks like everyone's uncle.