Jerry Giles

I do not believe a word our governments say. Whistleblower & Freelance Tax Consultant. Make your tax problem my problem. Dm for fee quote.

[Ragged Trousered Philanderer @RaggedTP]

I thought these messages were fake... but these are actual real messages sent between Matt Hancock and his media special adviser, Damon Poole, regarding how to handle the emergence of the Alpha (Kent) variant of COVID-19 from December 2020.

[Jonathan Pie @JonathanPieNews]

Andy Burnham's 'looking at' scrapping the gas standing charge, the £108 a year you pay for the privilege of being connected to a bill. In Westminster, 'looking at' means roughly the same as when your landlord said it about the damp you reported in 2023.

[Mike Fairclough @1MikeFairclough]

Prime Minister Andy Burnham stood before Parliament at PMQs today and raised Liz Truss’s new book, BANK JOB.

Now Sky News is asking whether Kemi Badenoch will be reading it.

Meanwhile, sections of the dodgy mainstream media are already running hit pieces before they've read a single word of the book.

They appear to be a bit jittery about what Liz may have written. And perhaps they should be.

BANK JOB challenges the comforting fiction that the people we elect are always the people who wield the real power.

It exposes Liz Truss’s account of an unelected establishment, from the Bank of England and Whitehall bureaucracy to a captured media class that reinforces its narrative.

At its heart is a question every voter deserves an answer to:

WHO IS REALLY IN CHARGE OF BRITAIN?

BANK JOB by Liz Truss.

Published by Free Speech Press.

@toadmeister @LD_Sceptics
@lensiseethrough
@thecoastguy @Iromg @CMorrisonEsq
@EJWoolf @alanvibe @beverleyturner
@sophielouisecc @danwootton @Artemisfornow
@lembitopik @trussliz @Beck_Sall @georgegalloway
@anika_climate @JamesMelville @RickArmstrong11
@Jenniferarcuri @thecoastguy

[Dia Chakravarty @DiaChakravarty]

The Foreign Secretary of a country whose public debt has surpassed £3 trillion flew halfway across the globe to lecture the world on the perils of unsustainable debt and climate change.
Irony died twice last week.

My latest @Telegraph column:
https://t.co/QXGdOm84hx

[stephen middleton @stevemiddi1]

Completely right Hester.

@TheFCA should not investigate itself & no one should support it in doing so.

Just like the IRHP Review, the Griggs Review, the Foskett Panel etc. @TheFCA will be trying to line up their 'Useful Idiots' to try & get away with this.

But we are watching it all carefully...
@BankConfidenti1 @MLorrM @BomberMorgan @efgbricklayer @ArturNadol7566

[Mike Fairclough @1MikeFairclough]

The new book BANK JOB by former Prime Minister Liz Truss has just been mentioned by the current PRIME MINISTER at PMQs.

Yes, really.

Andy Burnham thinks he is having a dig at Liz Truss. In reality, he has just given BANK JOB a massive plug. He will probably do an Instagram post for us next!

BANK JOB is Liz Truss’s explosive insider account of what REALLY happened during her 49 days as Prime Minister. It challenges the establishment narrative surrounding the 2022 Mini-Budget and asks how much power is really wielded by unelected institutions including the Bank of England.

The Prime Minister might think he has landed a punch. Instead, he has just told the country about the book EVERYONE should read.

By the end of the week, Burnham might be wishing he had stuck to buses.

Published by Free Speech Press.

Get your copy via the link in the thread.

@toadmeister @LD_Sceptics
@lensiseethrough @thecoastguy
@Iromg @CMorrisonEsq @EJWoolf
@alanvibe @beverleyturner
@sophielouisecc @danwootton
@Artemisfornow @lembitopik @trussliz
@Beck_Sall @georgegalloway @anika_climate
@JamesMelville @RickArmstrong11
@Jenniferarcuri @thecoastguy

[Jerry Giles @offtobendspoons]

@banthebbc @GuidoFawkes It’s now a pantomime with third rate actors.

[Max @banthebbc]

@GuidoFawkes Didn't someone ever tell this fool what we've known for years: Parliament is irrelevant. 🤷‍♂️

[Guido Fawkes @GuidoFawkes]

Lindsay Hoyle absolutely erupting at the Labour benches over the Jackdaw decision appearing in the media before being announced in the Commons.

https://t.co/wBTrH5kRpT

[MikeD @mjdaly57]

During the Covid-19 Inquiry a civil servant described the number of COVID-related deaths of elderly people as ‘“a generational slaughter within care homes.”’ This is a terrible indictment of Boris Johnson, Matt Hancock, Helen Whately, Michael Gove and everyone who allowed it to happen.

@BorisJohnson @MattHancock @Helen_Whately @michaelgove @Conservatives @SkyNews @BBCNews @Channel4News @GBNEWS

[Have I Got News For You @haveigotnews]

A Covid enquiry has criticised Matt Hancock’s protection of care homes. To be fair, he had a lot to handle at the time, from an unprecedented pandemic to his adviser’s arse cheeks

[Ragged Trousered Philanderer @RaggedTP]

In 1979, the British people owned the energy companies, production of electricity and gas... and the natural resources to produce the fuel.
Then Thatcher gave it all away to international swindlers, which is why we're now at the mercy of global markets profiting from our misery.

[Baa Ram Ewe 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿🐑🐷🦃🚜 @ShepherdWales]

The parents were offered £50 total if they had one or more children killed in the disaster. One month’s salary for their loss. No one was ever prosecuted.

The worldwide public raised money for the community and the charity board decided to pay out depending on whether they were ‘close’ to their lost kids.

As if all of that wasn’t enough the Government then made the community use the money raised by the world to clear the remaining dangerous tips!

A traumatised community shafted at every turn.

It took a Government 30 YEARS later to recognise the travesty and to give the money back to the community.

[Jerry Giles @offtobendspoons]

I watched this weeks PMQs. The PM is indeed a bumbling incompetent. Great work Labour. You have replaced a narcissistic liar for the Mayor of Trumpton.

[English Gentleman 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿🇬🇧🇺🇸 @EngGentleman7]

Bumbling Burnham and the Mystery of the Missing Answer

Andy Burnham approached these questions (from Kemi Badenoch) with the confidence of a man who had mastered the answers, provided nobody insisted on asking the corresponding questions.

His finest moment came when he explained:

“That is why the decision the government has made is a decision that is the right decision.”

Three decisions in one sentence. An explanation is apparently coming in the next Parliament.

This is what makes the performance so ripe for ridicule. He repeatedly announces his decisiveness, lectures his opponent about understanding the issues, then struggles to supply the detail that would justify either.

Take Jackdaw. The original approval had a genuine legal defect: the assessment omitted the emissions from burning the extracted fuel. That explains why the decision needed reconsideration. It does not answer the separate question about his government’s policy on new exploration licences. Repeating that the Conservatives mishandled the process cannot do both jobs.

Burnham then acknowledges that domestic gas strengthens energy security and supplies British homes and industry. His government also accepts that Britain will need oil and gas for decades. That leaves an obvious question: what is the quantified case for maintaining the exploration ban while domestic production declines?

Show the expected demand, supply, imports and emissions. Explain the trade-offs. He has already supplied the argument for domestic production; he owes an explanation of where, and why, he draws the line.

Instead, we get a “bridge to a renewable future”.

Splendid. Households awaiting affordable heating will be delighted to hear that the metaphor is progressing.

Which projects will the revenues fund? How much of that money is additional to existing plans? When will the generating capacity and grid connections arrive? What reduction in household bills is expected, and when?

“Substantially delink” gas and electricity prices sounds impressive at the dispatch box. It needs a timetable, a mechanism and some figures before it becomes useful beside a direct debit.

Then comes his announcement about removing gas standing charges. Listen carefully to what he actually announces: he has asked the Chancellor and Energy Secretary to look at whether they can do it.

He has commissioned some homework. Naturally, he presents this with the flourish normally reserved for opening a hospital.

Removing a charge from the bill does not automatically remove the costs it pays for. Unless those costs are reduced or funded elsewhere, they must be recovered another way, potentially through higher unit prices. Ofgem has explicitly discussed that trade-off. Who benefits, who pays more, and who funds any subsidy?

Before celebrating the disappearance of the charge, establish whether the cost has merely changed its address.

On the economy, Burnham reaches for the IMF with the air of a headmaster catching someone who has not done the reading.

Unfortunately, invoking a report is an invitation to examine it.

The IMF’s praise for Britain’s deficit-reduction plans concerns a programme that still has to be delivered. Meanwhile, the ONS estimates April–September borrowing at £97.8 billion: lower than the same period last year, but £6 billion above the forecast.

That is the question requiring an answer. What accounts for the overshoot, and what will he do about it? A favourable assessment of future intentions does not explain away a present shortfall against the plan.

Then comes the magnificent mid-sentence adjustment:

“The fastest growing, joint fastest growing in the G7.”

Britain had scarcely reached the podium before the Prime Minister discovered it needed to share the medal.

Which period is he describing? The IMF’s annual forecast for 2026 puts UK growth at 1.3%, against 2.3% for the United States. A claim about a particular quarter requires that qualification. Dropping the period while waving an IMF report leaves the audience to supply a flattering interpretation.

He also celebrates falling unemployment. That improvement appears in the figures. So do falling vacancies and a quarterly decline in payrolled employment. Those deserve an explanation alongside the applause. A labour-market briefing should survive contact with more than its most convenient line.

And when challenged, he tells his opponent to “talk the country up”.

How convenient. Ask the Prime Minister to explain his economic claims and suddenly you have offended Britain.

The country is perfectly entitled to expect competent answers from its government. Burnham’s press operation does not hold the national copyright on optimism.

When asked about spending, he points to cancelling digital ID and funding the electricity VAT cut.

The tax cut is real. The unanswered question is its net effect on borrowing. The government’s own announcement describes redirecting resources towards a measure estimated to cost £850 million this financial year, with longer-term funding left to the Budget.

Cancelling one commitment to finance another may be a worthwhile choice. It still requires an explanation of how much borrowing falls, over which years. He supplied the announcement and left the arithmetic backstage.

Then, asked about the welfare bill, he announces:

“Let me go directly to one. Directly to one. Social care.”

“Directly” is doing heroic work there.

Burnham treats the promise of a national care service as evidence that he has resolved the difficult spending question. But the funding deserves considerably more scrutiny than his indignation allows.

The Institute for Fiscal Studies has identified a fundamental problem with the triple-lock argument: preventing unfunded future pension increases does not, by itself, provide funding for a new care commitment. Its analysis says additional taxes or other spending cuts would still be needed. The projected savings are also uncertain.

That is a specific challenge to his financial case. He should answer it.

Invoking the suffering exposed by the Covid inquiry makes the need for a workable care system more urgent. It does not settle who pays for one. People who need care deserve a funded service, with staff and capacity, rather than another opportunity for a politician to announce that he has “grasped the nettle”.

Eventually, he reaches welfare:

“I don’t want to see anybody in their twenties on benefits in this country.”

Anybody?

Universal Credit can support people who are working, as well as people unable to work through illness or disability. If he means young people who could work but are unemployed, he should say so. A Prime Minister proposing welfare reform ought to distinguish the people already working from the people he wants to help into work.

Then come the practical questions. Which benefits? Which claimants? What employment or training provision? What implementation date? What savings after the programme’s costs?

Wanting young people in work is an aspiration shared by millions. Delivering it requires rather more than discovering the ambition at the dispatch box.

On inflation, Burnham points to the Middle East. International energy pressures are real, and motor fuels were the biggest contributor to September’s increase. But the ONS also recorded rising core and services inflation. Those figures leave plenty for him to explain about domestic conditions and his government’s response.

In this performance, favourable figures are presented as evidence of his government’s strengthening fundamentals. Unfavourable figures prompt a reminder of events beyond its control.

A remarkably comfortable arrangement for the man taking the credit.

Finally, we are told to wait for the Budget.

By this point, the Budget deserves its own seat in the Commons. It is being asked to answer rather a lot of the questions addressed to the Prime Minister.

The bumbling matters because it accompanies such conspicuous self-congratulation. He repeats himself, repairs his boasts mid-sentence and announces direct answers before taking a detour. All the while, he speaks as though the real difficulty is everyone else’s failure to appreciate his leadership.

Burnham is exceptionally pleased with his decisions.

Perhaps next time he could explain the costs, the dates and the results with half as much enthusiasm.

Three decisions in one sentence. A straight answer would still be a useful first.

Yours, still awaiting the answer,
A Gentleman from the Old School. 🎩

[Jacob Rees-Mogg @Jacob_Rees_Mogg]

Failing to make important announcements in Parliament is discourteous to voters.

[Ragged Trousered Philanderer @RaggedTP]

1979: UK was sitting on a revenue bonanza from North Sea Oil, had National Debt of just £80Bn & owned all it's utilities, transport, infrastructure & millions of social homes.

2026: UK has £3Trillion national debt & virtually no assets.

Capitalism has destroyed our kids' future

[Cut My Tax @CutMyTaxUK]

Inflation is now 3.5% but you can't protect your savings from being debased in value because the government will tax any interest that you receive.

That's completely unfair.

There should be no tax on investment returns below the rate of inflation.

[Ragged Trousered Philanderer @RaggedTP]

While thousands of elderly people died unnecessarily in old folks homes, Matt Hancock was dishing out multi-£Million taxpayer funded contracts to...
➡️his pub landlord mate,
➡️his horsey friend,
➡️his sister's company
➡️and the brother of his mistress.
Why isn't he in the jail?

[Artur Nadolny @ArturNadol7566]

UK GOVERNMENT SACKED ITS OWN BORDER WATCHDOG

David Neal was the man the government hired to inspect UK borders and make sure they actually worked. He did exactly that. What he found was not good. He wrote it all up in official reports. The Home Office locked those reports in a drawer.

When he finally went to a newspaper to warn the public that private planes were landing in the UK with almost nobody checking who was on them, the Home Secretary James Cleverly @JamesCleverly fired him.

Here is what Neal actually found.

At London City Airport, only 21% of flights flagged as high risk were checked by immigration officers.

Not some of the time. As a yearly average.

He said it was a scandal and dangerous for the country.

The Home Office said he had the numbers wrong. Then they fired him.

At the moment he was sacked, the @HomeOffice was holding back 15 of his finished inspection reports. Some had been sitting there for 18 months without being shown to the public.

The agreed deadline for publishing them was eight weeks. Not one report met that deadline across his entire three years in the job.

When they finally released 13 of the reports, they chose to do it on the same afternoon that a separate major inquiry published its findings... Draw your own conclusions.

What was actually in those reports? Border control posts left with nobody manning them. Officers at e-passport gates described as distracted and without basic radios. The whole airport border operation rated as neither effective nor efficient.

Neal told MPs directly: I have been sacked for doing my job.

He also told @BBC the Home Office is dysfunctional and described senior officials rolling their eyes when he brought them his findings.

He said the government contacted him three separate times warning him not to speak publicly about the unpublished reports.

He had almost no other way to get the information out.

The people who fired him for raising border security concerns were the same people who spent years promising the public they had taken back control of the borders.

Sources: @BBCNews @guardian @DailyMail @CommonsHomeAffs

[John Ganges @dunstablian]

Ed Miliband now jetting around the world on dirty fuel guzzling high emission planes, not a care or worry in the world about the climate crisis, he used to worship. The same man who wanted to stop you taking an annual holiday in Spain, now flying long haul first class weekly, like the Don of Doncaster.