Who will be worst hit by cuts? Obvious, isn’t it?

The last government directed disproportionate funding, through benefits and public sector employment, towards Labour constituencies, women and families.

As a higher rate tax payer with no kids, I’ve been milked for tax money and have never EVER seen a return on my investment, and likely never will. So it could hardly be the case that I was going to come off worst in any government cuts, was it?

“Women hit hardest by cuts” – umm.. because a disproportionate number of state jobs have gone to women.

“Families hit hardest by cuts” – umm.. because funds have previously been disproportionately channelled towards families?

“Labour constituencies hit hardest by cuts” – umm.. because …. well you get the picture.

I must have missed the headline – anytime in the last 13 years – that said “Al Jahom hit hardest by tax rises to pay for women, families and the public sector”

Oh yeah… I didn’t miss it, did I?

So suck up the cuts, people, because you’ve had your summertime under Labour, and now it’s time for you to enter my wintery world of extortionate taxes for precisely NOTHING in return.

And to think they’ve barely trimmed a slice of prosciutto, when the whole hog really should be slain.

AJ

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Brutal truth

This amused me.

 

I’ll spare you the photo – you can see it a the Telegraph’s site if you so wish. But I warn you: What has been seen cannot be unseen.

Hayley O’Neil, 23, – who also has 20 body piercings – says was also advised to ”stand behind a wall” when she asked a job centre official what post she could apply for.

She eventually left the Job Centre Plus centre in Blackburn Lancs in tears without any interviews lined up after the advisor concluded: ”Who would hire you looking like that?”

Miss O’Neil, who got her first tattoo from her mother as an 18th birthday present said: ”I just felt so humiliated. I couldn’t believe what this guy was saying.

”I said I could take the piercings out but they look a lot worse when they are out."

"The guy said: ‘on first impressions do you think anyone would hire you?’ He said: ‘look at it this way if you were to stand behind a wall – or put a paper bag over your face do you think you would have a better chance?’

I think it’s logically fallacious to suggest that I wouldn’t hire her because of her piercings or tattoos. The reason I wouldn’t hire her is the same reason that she has the piercings in her face: Because she’s a fucking moron.

People. We’re paying for her. And if she doesn’t get a job, it won’t be long before she concludes that her path to security is having some babies. Which we shall also be expected to pay for.

How much longer must we go on like this before the cost/benefit analysis of eugenics becomes too compelling to ignore?

AJ

Déjà Mong

Once you’ve been blogging a while, you find that subjects frequently arise time after time, even though you’ve already dealt with them in no uncertain terms.

Today, it is the turn of the Daily Mail to prattle on …

…. about something I dealt with back in April.

To summarise:

The reason these spaces exist and are right in front of the stores is simply this: Parents spend a fortune in the sort of establishments that have P&C parking spaces, so supermarkets, leisure parks etc have no problem affording this demographic special treatment.

Accordingly, they are a commercial enticement, not the fulfilment of a civic good, which is what disabled spaces are

Boo-hoo, breeders. Suck it up. You’re not special and neither are your screaming sprogs.

And in light of their apparent fury, it’s almost worth using P&C spaces just to drive the point home to them.

AJ

IPSA-daisy

.. and still I’m loving every minute of it.

The details of “bullying” and “intimidating” behaviour towards IPSA workers and volunteers, published by the watchdog in response to Freedom of Information requests, are likely to heighten fears that many MPs have still not accepted the changes made to their expenses system since its widespread abuse was disclosed by The Daily Telegraph more than a year ago.

One thing is for sure. Every time any new legislation is proposed, it’ll be measured by the IPSA yardstick, to see if we’re going to be treated in the way they themselves so despise.

Given how completely indistinct this new bunch are from the old bunch, it’s only a matter of time.

At least the message seems to have sunk in with tired old has-been Tom Harris.

IPSA was born out of panic. It is proof positive that whatever the failings of a headless chicken, it can at least piece together legislation when it’s joined by 649 other headless chickens.

The worst possible time to legislate is in the middle of a crisis; the worst people to draft that legislation are the very same individuals whose behaviour has caused that crisis in the first place.

MPs do not deserve any sympathy for the mess in which we now find ourselves. Nor will we receive it. The mess is entirely of our own making and it is up to us to sort it out. IPSA was an expensive and unnecessary mistake. You should not compound your own mistakes by repeating them or by refusing to admit it was a mistake in the first place.

I wonder when it’ll dawn on the rest of them, if ever.

AJ

Born to be an MP

It’s uncanny.

A newly elected MP who was spotted using her mobile phone while behind the wheel of her car was today banned from driving for six months.

Yasmin Qureshi, MP for Bolton South-East, was also found to have no car insurance when stopped by police, Bolton magistrates heard.

The former barrister and human-rights lawyer had been elected as the constituency’s new MP on 6 May but four days later was caught by police while driving through the town talking on her mobile.

…

The Labour MP, who was not in court, apologised to magistrates through her solicitor, who said she would now have the "inconvenience" of having to use taxis and public transport.

Poor lamb. And for a single offence to.. oh.. wait…

the MP already had nine points on her licence when she was stopped shortly before 3pm on 10 May by police…

She had committed a previous offence of using her mobile phone while driving, in 2008, and two speeding offences, one in 2007 and the other last year.

Hmmm.. female Labour MP, former human rights lawyer, charged with using a phone while driving, already had points for speeding…

Remind you of anyone?

The minister was fined £350 and ordered to pay £75 costs and a £15 victim surcharge after her lawyer entered a guilty plea at City of Westminster magistrates court. Her driving licence was also endorsed with three points.

…

The court heard that Harman already has six penalty points on her licence after being caught speeding in a 30mph zone twice. The first incident happened in April 2007 and the second in April last year.

Might I suggest the strongest commonality is the conviction that the laws they make for the little people don’t apply to them.

I’ll be watching Ms Qureshi – further entertainment is almost inevitable.

AJ

A story of everyday folk: Thick as mince

I really did snigger at this:

 

Raydon? RAYDON?

FFS.

The couple chose the unusual name after they became convinced they were having a boy, and planned to name it Raymond after Mr Cross’s father.

‘When a little girl came along we had to change our plans – I just sort of made the name up,’ Mr Cross said.

You don’t say…

Now, having had my fun pointing and laughing at the mongs from Coventry, you’d perhaps expect me to turn both barrels on the public sector imbecile who allowed this to happen, after all..

Lisa, 21, of Coventry, West Midlands, said: ‘I just don’t understand how this happened.

‘When I took Raydon to the register office, she was dressed like a little girl. She was wearing pink dungarees, a pink top, and had a pink hat on.

But no, not on this occasion.

A spokesperson for Coventry Register Office said: ‘We apologise to Mr and Mrs Cross for the mistake. We have met with them and the mistake has been rectified and new certificates issued.’

‘The process of registering the birth of a child does give the opportunity on several occasions for the details to be checked by parents before certificates are signed.’

So this is just a case to two complete tools looking to hold everyone else responsible for their own EPIC failure.

AJ

What DK said

The IPSA thing rolls on.

I’ve said my piece. Obo has kept the flame alight.

DK steps up to the crease to open the third innings, with style and alacrity.

He responds to a pretty lame cri de coeur relayed by Tory Boy*.

Perhaps these morons could try the old “oh, I couldn’t work out how to do it” on HMRC and see what the reaction is? It would be something along the lines of “you owe us a £100 surcharge plus 10% interest for every day that you fail to submit. Oh, and stop fucking whining about it, twatface.” Which, coincidentally, is pretty much what my response to this IPSA debacle is.

I say, more power to IPSA’s elbow: make these MPs suffer and maybe—just maybe—these people will stop trying to tie the rest of us up in bureaucratic knots. And even if they don’t, at least they’ll be having a miserable time.

Do read the whole thing, and admire DK’s ability to make the post stand up without invoking Tom Harris.

While you’re at it, read DK’s take on Chris Huhne’s fuckwitted energy policy. It reflects my view very well indeed.

AJ

* He loves it so

And the wind cries Muahahahaaaaaaaary

I last wrote about Tom Harris and his moaning about the MPs expenses system on May 21st.

His stream of incredulity about IPSA has continued unabated, ever since. He seems completely incapable of understanding that his pain is merely a reflection of the culture of petty and vindictive bureaucracy that New Labour spent 13 years inflicting on the other 60 million of us.

A bureaucracy that is obviously and deeply flawed, and yet is so imbued with a sense of its own infallibility, that it can shift the burden of proof away from the bureaucracy, onto you, the punter.

A bureaucracy that can drive you to distraction with its defiance of simple common sense, then cry abuse and pull down the shutters the moment they detect your pulse go above 72.

And no feasible avenue for appeal or restitution. Sound at all familiar to anyone?

So I shall leave Obo to put him back in his box this time, which he does with inimitable aplomb.

That’s exactly what 13 years of Labour government have made every occasion of dealing with the civil service like for the rest of us. It is exactly how life is for the rest of us, and it’s like that for exactly the same reason: Labour, with an unassailable majority, introduced an endless sea of badly-drafted, badly-thought-through, knee-jerk law to cope with things because that’s all they knew.

At the time, I said that I didn’t think IPSA was going to be a good idea, because, like every other fucking thing you cunts did in power, it was a knee-jerk solution cobbled up by a couple of fuckwits who lived their lives in the political bubble. I was quite happy for you guys to claim legitimate expenses through the old system. You guys took the fucking piss and in a frantic fit of being seen to be doing something, this half-baked, fatuous cock-up was created.

This is exactly how every fucking law you cunts drafted turned out for us: driven by the need to have a soundbite, you rammed legislation through without debate and without thought while remaining entirely immune from the consequences.

Read the rest.

AJ

Work won’t just come to you, northern monkeys.

Much harrumphing and invocations of Norman Tebbit today.

Well, it’s about time. They’re much easier to mow down when they’re on their bikes.

In the mid-nineties, it was self-evident that there were fewer jobs in the area I lived than there were in the south-east. So I cast my job-seeking net further and wider.

I got offered a job in the south-east. I accepted it. I filled my car with my belongings and moved more than 200 miles to an affordable location near my new job.

Best thing I ever did.

What kind of mindset does it take to sit in Doncaster, Newcastle or Liverpool for years on end, subsisting on dole money, when a one-time move to a more affluent part of the country opens up endless opportunities to improve one’s life?

Oh, but what about people with families? Well, I’ve worked in London with dozens of blokes, who lodge in London four nights a week, whose families are back in the grim north.

Eventually, they either go back up north considerably better off, or move their families down south.

Those who can do. Those who won’t can rot in hell for all I care. I’ve paid quite enough in taxes to support feckless northern morons who think that if they sit in a council house in Bradford for long enough, the world will come to them.

It won’t, and the UK can no longer afford to subsidise such a pathetic wastrel mindset.

AJ

My heart. It bleeds for thee.

I’ve already said my piece about the troughbag MPs whinging about their crazy new expenses regime.

But the situation seems to be getting worse for the poor dears.

The supervision of MPs’ allowances following the expenses scandal is in chaos after the head of the new body in charge complained to party whips about abuse of his staff.

…

The agency, nicknamed “I Punish Staff Also”, has also been criticised for revising its rules online without notifying MPs.

IPSA. I punish staff also. hahahahaaaaaa.

Very clever chaps. Inspired. Let me have a go.

HMRC. Hurts My Rectal Cavity.

DFID. Donations Funding Islamic Dictators.

ACPO. Authoritarian Control Pays Off.

Plenty more where they came from.

But let’s have a look at the other side of this coin. The state leeches administering this expenses scheme. Complaining about abuse.

Well, they don’t have to work there. No-one is forcing them.

Perhaps MPs are finally learning the importance of the invisible finger, which would be a very good thing.

AJ

Squeal Piggy

Music to my ears via ConHome.

A member of the new intake, who wants to remain anonymous, writes an open letter to Andrew McDonald, the Chief Executive of the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority.

Do read it. I’m not convinced it’s genuine, but it’s lovely to think of the poor dears in such pain.

AJ

Privatise the roads

Works for me.

Provided the Highways Agency goes with it, or is squashed.

Tolls? I shit ‘em.

New roads that paupers can’t afford to drive on? Lush.

Onwards.

AJ

Greeting fae Glesga

The penny hasn’t dropped for wee Tommy Harris yet.

AS PLANNED, the new body overseeing MPs’ expenses is going the extra mile to make it as difficult as possible for us to do our job.

Good. Do you know why it’s good? Because it reminds you what we all go through when claiming business expenses, or undertaking any other routine admin activity.

Every organisation that has a thousand customer facing staff has 400 other people responsible for making it impossible for the customer facing staff to do their jobs. Making them unable to deliver on their obligations to the customer in a satisfactory manner. Just ask Obo.

Those ‘trolls’ or ‘business prevention officers’ are all on the company payroll to administer rules and regulations that emanate, directly or not, from government.

Someone, after all, has to be responsible for the 10,000 or so fuel receipts my company expenses team now receives every month, subsequent to a C&E/HMRC rule change around 2007.

Someone has to check that the sandwich I bought for lunch was bought far enough away from my branch office to be eligible for reimbursement. I once bought a sandwich 40 miles into a 200 mile journey to a customer site. My claim was denied. Had I bought my lunch at the next motorway services, I would have been reimbursed.

Tom continues:

I understand that the rule is based on a misunderstanding, or perhaps a deliberate misinterpretation, of a Customs and Revenue rule that people who work from an office based in their private homes can offset only a maximum of 85 per cent of their home phone calls for tax purposes.

I know all about that too. Misunderstanding, or perhaps a deliberate misinterpretation, of a Customs and Revenue rule is a battle I frequently have to do.

Last year, I flew to Glasgow, picked up a hire car, went to the customer site, did my work, returned the car to the airport and flew home.

I was taxed on this hire car as a benefit in kind, because the expenses monkey had either misunderstood the rule, or erred on the side of caution lest he be punished for a lax interpretation himself.

I know he was wrong, because I asked a tax accountant. If the hire car had been at my home address, in lieu of the car I already had an allowance for, it would have been a BiK. It wasn’t and it wasn’t.

I lost the battle, but won the war. I was never reimbursed, having been taxed at 40% on a hire car that was a logical and reasonable business expense, but it never happened again.

At a briefing held by Ipsa last week, a very senior, very highly-paid official (not being familiar with the scheme he’s paid to oversee, the only question from MPs he was able to answer was that he was in the “£80,000-£90,000″ pay band) was unable to justify this petty little rule.

I expect it frustrated you Tom, that his attitude was “and nor do I have to, sonny”.

Welcome to the real world.

As I said yesterday, as soon as you are abiding by the same rules as the rest of us, I’ll support any plea for a relaxation of the rules 100%.

AJ

No sympathy week

Sweet sweet tears.

Waaaah.

The Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (Ipsa) was established last year after a collective loss of confidence at the height of the expenses scandal. In an attempt to end the clubby atmosphere, in which MPs would often bully the Commons Fees Office, an outside body was given statutory powers to approve the payment of expenses.

Here are some of the complaints I’ve heard from an array of MPs, whose language about Ipsa would be out of place on this happy-family blog:

• In their initial encounter with staff from the new body, MPs are greeted with a written message which says Ipsa will not tolerate threatening or abusive behaviour. One former minister says:

We are being treated like benefit claimants. Why don’t they just put up a metal grille?

And how do you think the rest of us feel, when we see that sign in hospitals, airports, railway stations and anywhere else some officious shithead is about to bugger up our day?

Good. Carry on.

• The requirements for payment of expenses are too stringent. If an MP wants to claim for the travel expenses from the constituency to Westminster of their spouse or civil partner, they must produce their marriage or civil partnership certificate. If they want to claim travel expenses for a child (under the age of 16 and in full time education) they must produce the original birth certificate. This is what the rules say:

Prior to any reimbursements of this nature taking place, MPs wishing to claim for this will need to submit a completed application form via the online expenses system.

To support this pre-approval, they will need to provide the original certificate of marriage, civil partnership, or utility bill to prove co-habitation.

Evidence for travel for will be the same as for MPs, based on the mode of transport.

One minister is furious:

For Christ’s sake, what has happened if this bloody authority doesn’t believe me when I say my wife is my wife? A utility bill to prove co-habitation? Good God.

Ahahahahaaaaaaa. It’s tough, and it’s shit. It’s tough shit, matey. Sup it up you leeches.

• Taxis home can only be claimed after 11pm. One woman MP says:

What happens on a January night in London? I suppose I will have to take the tube, then a bus and then a long walk home. That is not safe.

That one woman MP can sup it up, too. Is she suggesting that women MPs be afforded special treatment?

MPs are resigned to the fact that there is nothing they can do. They have completely lost the trust of the public which is no mood to tolerate any easing of the rules.

That’s not quite true. All I ask is that they have to abide by the same expenses rules that are imposed upon the little people. I would hope a little more vast quantity of much needed reasonableness could be infused into those rules, which would be a Win-Win.

Some hope.

AJ

Don’t fuck with Rochdale, Gordon

He should be thankful he didn’t do that in a town where they can afford to throw eggs ;o)

I really shouldn’t laugh, but I’m creased up here, with saliva spewing from my ears.

Oh, the scars on my back…

Footage with gracious thanks to Channel 4 News.

As to why any of this matters – and it could have been a lot lot worse – I defer to Patently.

AJ

Stop fucking moaning

… is Old Holborn’s message to those air-travellers stranded in Europe by the ash-cloud.

His tips for getting home are remarkable in their insight and inventiveness. I commend them.

AJ

Your problems bore me

LOL @ this…

Apparently the priest fell asleep because he’d just finished buggering a choirboy.

AJ

And so the socialists start to eat each other alive

Splendid:

At least while we’re being fucked by the Tories, we can watch the disintegration of the left. Lovely job.

AJ

Dubai. Again.

Just why, exactly would you go there?

A British man is facing six months in a Dubai jail for making an offensive gesture towards an Iraqi.

Simon Andrews, 56, is said to have lost his temper during an argument with aviation student Mahmud Rasheed and ‘flicked his finger’ at him.

Mr Rasheed complained to police and the Briton was arrested for outraging public decency and has been banned from leaving the country as he awaits trial.

Whatever – it’s their country, but I’ve got no sympathy for anyone who comes unstuck while visiting the place.

AJ

Permit me to translate

… this bollocks for you.

TSSA supervisory staff will walk out from [Tuesday] 6 – [Friday] 9 April, while RMT signalling staff will strike between 0600-1000 and 1800-2200 on the same dates.

At the press conference, RMT thug Bob Crow was keen to stress that he was going to lengths to avoid striking over the Easter holiday, so as not to disrupt people’s holiday plans.

Which is patent bullshit whichever way you cut it. He seems oblivious to the notion that there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people who rely on trains to commute to work, but who wouldn’t fucking dream of using the cunting things on a day off.

What’s more, he, and his poxy members, know just as well as I do that his monkeys will be far too busy lapping up overtime at double or triple pay over the bank holiday weekend.

Look:

(Good) Friday 2nd April:

Saturday 3rd April &:

Sunday 4th April:

Bank Holiday Monday 5th April:

Hmmm. Gravy.

AJ