Wednesday 22nd May 2024

[refitman]

Morning all.

[frog222]

Afternoon refit
My turn to sleep in today, and hoping that your back is improved ?

Some long time ago we had great fun on Prem Sikka Guardian articles, a few score comments making debate possible ...

[refitman]

Deepheat and painkillers are certainly helping with my back. I'm glad I'm not back in work until next week.

[frog222]

Afternoon refit
My turn to sleep in today, and hoping that your back is improved ?

Some long time ago we had great fun on Prem Sikka Guardian articles, a few score comments making debate possible ...

PREM-- https://parallelparliament.co.uk/mp/lor ... mpensation

A number of comments have been made about accountability, and directors and auditors have been mentioned. I will put some matters on the record in relation to that. I checked the Companies House filings today and, between 2002 and 2023, there were 83 directors of the Post Office. Despite full inside knowledge, not one of them went on the public record to say that something was wrong. They were complicit, they lied and they committed fraud—83 of them.

The Post Office also had several non-executive directors, who are supposed to challenge what the executive board does. None ever spoke up, despite some also being heads of the audit committee and the risk management committee. There has been a conspiracy of silence, injustice and fraud, and they all need to be held to account.

Noble Lords asked what on earth happened to the money extracted from sub-postmasters under fraudulent pretences. It may interest them to note the Second Sight report from 2015, paragraphs 22.11 and 22.12 of which say that

“for most of the past five years, substantial credits have been made to Post Office’s Profit and Loss Account as a result of unreconciled balances held by Post Office in its Suspense Account … It is, in our view, probable that some of those entries should have been re-credited to branches to offset losses previously charged”.

That was in 2015. The Post Office did not do so. Directors on performance-related pay were very keen to boost the bottom line; they directly benefited from this fraud. They all knew for years that something was wrong but continued in exactly the same way.

Lord Offord of Garvel (Con) --

As we look at public bodies, those of us who have been in the private sector understand how boards work. We understand the role of non-executive directors, which is to challenge management. It is not to nod and pass, or to wave through. It is to be intellectually curious and, if you find something that does not stack up, to probe it and question it. That has not happened here. We have had an organisation that looks and feels like a plc. It has renumeration committees, audit committees, auditors, a board of directors, non-executive directors and a non-exec chair. All of these, when they are put into businesses, are put in for checks and balances, as the noble Lord, Lord Sikka, said. What we have had here is a mirror image of this architecture without any checks and balances. I think this requires us to look quite hard across quite a wide range of arm’s-length bodies.

Same query here, how on earth could NOBODY question a huge increase in 'dishonest' subpostmasters ???

I thank the noble Lord for that searching question. Of course, this covers about three or four different Governments and more than half a dozen Ministers; that is just a fact. The reality is that the shareholder of the Post Office is the taxpayer. The share is owned by the Secretary of State for the Department for Business and Trade. Under the current structure, that is effectively subcontracted to an independent board. If that independent board had acted on an independent basis, this would not have happened. In fact, if Ministers had slightly more inquiring minds, this would not have happened.

I look at myself in my role as a Minister. I look at the advice that I am given and at the decisions I have to make. There is a lot coming through on a daily basis. I ask myself this question: if I had been in this role and prior to Horizon there had been an average of, say, 10 convictions per year in a bad year—maybe five on average—and that went up to 80, even though I was very busy, doing a lot of things, and even though I said I had an independent board looking at this for me, would not that raise some inquiry? This fundamentally is the shocking scale—we are all embarrassed about this—of the abuse here. The accountability piece of this will absolutely come through the Wyn Williams inquiry. That will then move us to the next stage of the lessons that we learn from it.

[frog222]

Deepheat and painkillers are certainly helping with my back. I'm glad I'm not back in work until next week.

Good to hear that it's under some control ......

[gilsey]

The first and third of these are tricky, but the rest could be solved by throwing money at them. IMO that's what they'll do, but only after a miserable 2-3 years of 'fiscal control'. I think Wren-Lewis made a case a while ago for getting off to a good start by taking this on upfront and thereby getting some results before the following election.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Is it actually happening? Are they really about to end the misery?

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Finally!

Rishi Sunak will call general election for July in surprise move – sources

https://www.theguardian.com/politics/ar ... ve-sources

Rishi Sunak will this afternoon call a surprise early election for July, senior sources have told the Guardian

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Oh wait Dan Hodges has confirmed it so maybe not.

[AnatolyKasparov]

Not really that much of a "surprise" is it though.

[frog222]

Finally!
Rishi Sunak will call general election for July in surprise move – sources
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/ar ... ve-sources

Rishi Sunak will this afternoon call a surprise early election for July, senior sources have told the Guardian

Green shoots if you look really hard --

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Goodwin's descent into the gutter continues.

[RogerOThornhill]

Well, let's hope so eh?

[RogerOThornhill]

He was getting a little wet out there...did nobody look at the weather and think maybe this isn't the best place to do this?

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Ha ha he got soaked. Even the weather hates Sunak.

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Not really that much of a "surprise" is it though.

Apparently it is to many Tory MPs whose reactions seem to range from bemused to furious.

I really don't understand why he's done it. All that fuss and nonsense about the Rwanda flights and he's calling an election before they even get off the ground. It's weird.

[gilsey]

He was getting a little wet out there...did nobody look at the weather and think maybe this isn't the best place to do this?

Lewis Goodall tweeted he was sure it wouldn't be today because of the weather.


Standing there in the pouring rain while some wag blasts out D:Ream is peak Sunak imo.

[gilsey]

I really don't understand why he's done it. All that fuss and nonsense about the Rwanda flights and he's calling an election before they even get off the ground. It's weird.

They know more than we do about what's coming down the track in the next 3 months. Something they won't be able to gloss over maybe. Thames Water? NHS finances?

Or maybe Sunak's just not very good at politics.

Also, staying on the MPs gravy train for a few more months is irrelevant to him personally.

[refitman]

Ha ha he got soaked. Even the weather hates Sunak.

[RogerOThornhill]

Haha!

[frog222]

Join a Union , LOL

CRACE --https://www.theguardian.com/politics/ar ... ewell-tour


KETTTLE --https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... i-sunak-pm

There has, though, been one July general election in modern British political history. It took place on 5 July 1945. It was an election that many assumed would produce a Conservative victory. Instead, it ended in probably the most iconic Labour landslide win of the 20th century, with Clement Attlee leading his party to a 145-seat majority over Winston Churchill’s Tories.

[AnatolyKasparov]

Not really that much of a "surprise" is it though.

Apparently it is to many Tory MPs whose reactions seem to range from bemused to furious.

I really don't understand why he's done it. All that fuss and nonsense about the Rwanda flights and he's calling an election before they even get off the ground. It's weird.

It is reliably reported Mrs Sunak has long been pressing him to call an election around now so she can bugger off to the US before the new school year starts.

[frog222]

Not really that much of a "surprise" is it though.

Apparently it is to many Tory MPs whose reactions seem to range from bemused to furious.

I really don't understand why he's done it. All that fuss and nonsense about the Rwanda flights and he's calling an election before they even get off the ground. It's weird.

It is reliably reported Mrs Sunak has long been pressing him to call an election around now so she can bugger off the the US before the new school year starts.

LOL!

NN

[Sky'sGoneOut]

Go ahead, make our day.