Archery1969 wrote: ↑Wed Jun 28, 2023 4:08 pm
Michael5482 wrote: ↑Wed Jun 28, 2023 12:39 pm
Archery1969 wrote: ↑Tue Jun 27, 2023 8:29 am
Banks borrowed £137 billion during the banking crisis, most of which was paid back. They were never asked to pay interest by Brown.
The big damage was done by borrowing £400 billion during Covid. Interest on that is now a killer to the economy.
Making large corporates pay their way would need multiple law changes and international agreements. None of which will happen overnight. Plus they can hire better accountants and lawyers. Also, many are linked to pension funds and you wouldn’t want to cause a run on those as that would be worse that the banking crisis and Covid put together.
Therefore, tax payer is always the easiest answer, always has been and probably always will be.
Damage has been done over years of mismanagement, incompetence and border line criminality by Governments.
So we can't make them pay taxes as it would effect pension funds but we can allow them to pay huge dividends and go broke leaving the tax payer to pick the pieces up.
Look at this Thames Water carnage this morning, a private company supplying a public service about to be bailed out by the tax payer while they've been having a disco on dividends for years. About time we start putting these politicians and private sector criminals in jail.
+ 1
But going after peoples pension funds would not only cause financial havoc but also be political suicide for any party.
In my opnion all public services should be brought back into public ownership. But that could prove more costly than the £400 billion we spent on Covid support and Governments dont tend to run these type of things any better than private companies do.
The best one is BT, they paying huge numbers of contractors to sit at home most of the time and only working 1 or 2 days per month. There is a big scam going on there as reported to me by a current BT openreach contractor. He is given 5 jobs per week, private plus commercial but they often do 5 in 1 day but the company is charging the cost for 1 per day per job. Therefore, private plus commercial customers are being ripped off and the reporting side is a little imaginative to say the least. The Government did and is paying BT to rollout the broadband infrastructure across the country but half the engineers are sitting at home, being paid, doesn't make any sense as how BT is paying them until you figure out its one big tax payer rip off. Probably one of the biggest in history. BT management should all be in jail and I am sure they would be if someone bothered to investigate whats going on with tax payer money.
Another scandal waiting to unfold by the sounds of things.
I really hope this Thames Water fiasco will be the catalyst to bring the private sector abusing public money to task along with the people responsible for giving it out.
I'd have no issues with these private company's if we had the best public infrastructure like rail, water, broadband etc but we don't. They've siphoned (and continue to do so) public money to pay shareholders while running up debt it's criminal.
About time there brought back under public ownership and ran as not for profit enterprises with every penny re-invested in continuous improvement of services not to line shareholders pockets. 1.4 billion the water industry in the UK paid in dividends while the likes of Thames Water looses 250 Olympic swimming pools in water due to leaks every day.
No wonder the chief exec resigned of Thames Water yesterday. She's had her pockets lined and off into the sunset leaving a trail of destruction behind. She wants dragging in by the national Crime Agency and waterboarding (pardon the pun)
Interesting to see how the Tory's deal with this but it's another nail in their coffin. Not sure there's room for anymore nails mind
