TreeFrame
349 posts
This is encouraging. UK third in the G7 for cumulative growth
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@RollingHedge @DamianPudner That will be fixed when PM Burnham bans foreign entities from buying gilts 👍
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@DamianPudner Spot on. Marginal buyer of gilts no longer institutions, it’s an activist HF 🎯
Try explaining that to Labour, once of course you have explained what “the bond market is” 😂
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Flighty hedge funds. And therein lies the problem for the Government. Bond traders don't care about politicians feelings.
Izabella Kaminska@izakaminska
Who owns the gilts? Mysterious "non-residents" (possibly suspicious hedge funds from across the seas).
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@RollingHedge Tax issue sorted. Leaving behind the bigger issues of Rayner (1) buying an £800K flat (2) way outside her constituency (3) by selling her share in her disabled son’s home to the trust set up to provide for his care.
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sYsTeM wOrKiNg aS iNtEndED
Steven Swinford@Steven_Swinford
BREAKING: Angela Rayner tells @PaulBrandITV she has been cleared by HMRC of any wrongdoing over the purchase of her flat in Hove. She has now paid the outstanding £40,000 in stamp duty in full, with no additional financial penalty She tells ITV HMRC found that she had taken ‘reasonable care’ in the purchase of the flat and did not deliberately avoid paying tax It potentially clears the way for her to stand in the Labour leadership contest. She has ruled out a pact with Andy Burnham. “No... I’m not doing deals or anything like that.” “Well, I welcome HMRC's conclusion. And they've said that there wasn't any wrongdoing and that I didn't try to avoid paying tax or I wasn't careless in the way in which I conducted myself at the time when I was in government … I've accepted HMRC's finding and I've never wanted to avoid paying my tax. “And for me, that was the most distressing thing, is that people felt that I was tax dodging or trying to set up trusts to avoid tax or being careless by not taking the appropriate advice. And HMRC have concluded that that isn't the case. “I’ve chosen not to tackle HMRC on the ambiguity of the law. I think that's the correct thing to do. I've chosen to pay that additional tax because I never want to not pay my taxes.”
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🚨NEW: The three women who were found dead on Brighton beach attended a nightclub the night before and are in their late teens or early twenties
[@DailyMail]
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@GBPolitcs @DailyMail Why doesn't your post state that they drowned?
Or is it that you deliberately want to stoke the disgusting debate about immigrants the ghouls are having in the comments?
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@iagos_monster It reads as though she used dictation software and spoke off the top of her head. Really hard to read.
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Even beyond the completely mad "wHy dOwn'T we jOOst mOniTaH evErBoday's PHOWNES" paragraph, this reads like it was written by a complete spastic. How are you not even proof reading your resignation letter ffs.
Politics UK@PolitlcsUK
🚨 BREAKING: Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips has resigned from Keir Starmer's Government
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@TheOldMan2003 @AlanJLSmith Special rules for property though, whereby the liability can be paid in instalments over 10 years (with interest).
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@AlanJLSmith No different than current rules to pay IHT estimate within 6 months including a property that may not have sold tho tbf?
Good morning Alan
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New guidance on Inheritance Tax on Pensions:
- Family members (beneficiaries) and personal representatives are jointly and severally liable for paying IHT from pension fund.
- They have 6 months to pay.
- Interest and late payment fees apply after that.
- Property held in pensions will often have to be sold to pay the IHT.
- The short timeline is likely to create ‘fire sale’ reduced valuations.
- Yet IHT is payable on the gross property value pre death/property sale.
- Pension providers, trustees, administrators, solicitors, personal representatives and family - all have to liaise and work through the admin - a logistical nightmare.
- In a tight window whilst the family is grieving.
- And then family beneficiaries pay income tax on income from the net fund - after deduction of inheritance tax. Double tax.
- All this to possibly raise £1.5 billion - or about 48 hours of annual NHS spending.
Thanks Rachel.
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@DanNeidle @John_Stepek “White supremacist” is unique. Maybe they think you’re a skinhead?
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When I reported on Zahawi I got a handful of abusive messages. When he apologised & it turned out I was right, they all stopped.
But Polanski? Wild levels of abuse, which just ramped up when Polanski apologised & it turned out I was right.
Does the Green Party have a problem?
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It's only 8am but I've already seen the stupidest insult of the day:
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@DanNeidle @empireburlesque “like Trump” 🤣
That’s the least serious insult I’ve seen in this saga
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@empireburlesque You haven’t even bothered to read our report, which sets out the law in detail. Feel free to point out any errors.
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Ah yes, the 'any fact that makes me look bad is propaganda' ploy. Why not call it 'fake news' like Trump, @DanNeidle? The not-very-complicated reality is you didn't research or report the whole story in your rush to dig up dirt on the enemy du jour of the media-political class.
Dan Neidle@DanNeidle
Latest propaganda line dropped. The not-very-complicated reality: - people should pay the correct council tax - councils should do a better job catching those who don’t.
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Second ministerial resignation.
Of course Jess Phillips has a photo of herself on her resignation letter.
Politics UK@PolitlcsUK
🚨 BREAKING: Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips has resigned from Keir Starmer's Government
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@PolitlcsUK @ramonagusta Not written by AI, but also no spellchecking, grammar, punctuation, or proofreading.
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🚨 BREAKING: Safeguarding Minister Jess Phillips has resigned from Keir Starmer's Government
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@joemichalczuk Devils advocate - why would she need an ambulance for a broken and cut foot? And if you were able to wait 10 hours an then leave emergency care, was it a true emergency?
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A shower screen shattered all over my wife this week.
Over the next 72 hours, the NHS got almost everything wrong.
A cautionary tale of a system that is broken (with the usual caveat that everyone working in it is doing their best) 👇
I called an ambulance.
All good at first: “It’s on its way.”
Ten minutes later: “Actually, there are no ambulances for hours - can you get her to hospital?”
So I loaded my bleeding wife into the car, along with the kids and the dog, and drove to A&E.
Ten hours later, she came home - having given up after not even being offered a plaster.
The next morning, we called our GP: “Any chance she could see a nurse?”
“No - as the ambulance referred her to hospital, we can’t see her.”
So I went to the pharmacy and bought a first aid kit.
Because apparently that’s where we are now - me and a pack of plasters, in one of the richest countries in the world.
This morning, still in pain, still untreated, and with a ballooning foot, we went to an urgent treatment centre.
At first, smooth. She was seen in under two hours. X-ray done.
“Nasty cut, but nothing broken.”
Relief.
Two hours later, the phone rang.
It was the hospital.
“Sorry - we got that completely wrong. Your foot is broken and the wound needs antibiotics.”
If it wasn’t so serious, it would be laughable.
And the truth is - anyone who uses the system has a story like this.
We need to stop clinging to an idealised version of the NHS and have a grown-up conversation about how to fix it.
Free healthcare for all should remain a principle - but pretending the current model works isn’t helping anyone.
Almost every other developed country combines public healthcare with some level of private provision - and all deliver better outcomes as a result.
Yet in the UK, even suggesting that tends to get shut down before the conversation starts.
That’s not protecting the NHS. It’s protecting a cult.
We don’t need ideology. We need honesty about what works.
We need a brilliant NHS in practice for all of us - not one we’re told to revere while it quietly crumbles, and where anyone who speaks up is dismissed or discredited.
When are we going to get serious about the things that actually matter - and have the difficult national conversations needed to fix them?
We don’t need to abandon the NHS.
We need to be honest about fixing it.
We shouldn’t just shrug our shoulders.
We have to be better.
We need to vote for real change.
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@CopperCation I think if we want Keir to resign we just need to allow the Chagos deal to complete
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Why the Holocaust happened in Europe is a mystery. A total mystery.
Jake Wallis Simons@JakeWSimons
Oh look it’s a medieval antisemitic play in Stockholm
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@an0n_Nic rlam.com/uk/institution…
mandg.com/wealth/adviser…
It’s certainly become a trend in the retail investors market
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The general illiteracy of personal finance and investment in the Britain is astounding, that’s the only way this happens.
Alan Smith@AlanJLSmith
13.8 million UK employees are enrolled in @nestpensions. This is a very bad idea and will come back to bite. If your employer uses NEST for your company pension scheme, you should start asking questions.
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Did nobody at Number 10 or in the Cabinet ask themselves
"Mandy passed the vet? Really? you've got to be kidding. How?"
Pippa Crerar@PippaCrerar
EXCL: Keir Starmer would have blocked Peter Mandelson from serving as the UK’s ambassador to Washington had he known he failed security vetting, David Lammy tells me. The deputy PM also says: - it was “inexplicable” that Oliver Robbins opted to leave Downing Street in dark over outcome. - he was “shocked and surprised” when he first learned on Thursday what had happened. - neither he nor his advisers at time he was foreign sec had known about – or asked for information on – vetting process or its conclusions
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This feels spot on. Remember - Ollie Robbins was appointed Jan 8th. After Mandelson had already been “ announced “ a month earlier.
By Jan 14th Mandelson was wearing the DV lanyard ( lowest level) and conducting meetings in government. Robbins was brought in to “make it work” . So he did. And he kept the wall between ministers and civil servants to avoid interference - which is required.
Sam Coates Sky@SamCoatesSky
What do I think really happened with Mandelson and vetting? In October, November and December 2024, No10 indicated it wanted to appoint Peter Mandelson as Ambassador to Washington. It was presented with an array of people telling them not to: Cabinet ministers, spooks, officials in a vetting report. All raised major red flags. Starmer and McSweeny made clear they weren’t interested in any objection, and this must go ahead at all costs. So Mandelson’s appointment was announced mid December 2024. The vetting we are focussed on today came later, in January 2025. Vetting of ambassadors is the responsibility of the FCDO and Olly Robbins. One bit of the system said no - the UKSV agency said don’t appoint Mandelson. We don’t know on what grounds, but probably the grounds No10 had seen and rejected as a reason to block. Olly Robbins cleared Mandelson. Very quietly, Mandelson didn’t get the very highest level of clearance when he got the job, but he got the overall OK because of Robbins. Robbins did No10 a favour. This is because Olly Robbbins knew that going to No10 post announcement, and saying the Mandelson appointment can’t happen, was politically impossible. And civil servants want to deliver for their political masters. So Olly fixed it for Keir: and is now paying a price. Olly Robbins has - incidentally - done No10 a second massive political favour. The really really toxic claim doing the rounds last night was that surely someone - anyone - in No10 DID know the UKSV agency turned down the vetting Olly Robbins is making clear he didn’t tell people the UKSV verdict because that would be inappropriate as part of the process he followed. It’s not even clear he saw it. No10 don’t seem to realise he’s done them a favour, and are releasing documents to challenge alternative versions of events. Let’s see how it plays out. The bottom line is No10 wanted Mandelson come what may. They rammed it through. One quango; post appointment announcement, was never realistically going to be allowed to stop Mandelson taking the job because the top of Government had publicly committed to it. They hadn’t wanted to heed the warnings earlier; and were in too deep That’s where I think we are
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@John_Stepek @RollingHedge I hope Merryn is flying you to Paris for the next podcast recording.
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"If anyone in the office needs me, I'm just flying to Paris to do a Zoom call on a subject I have no influence over whatsoever" is now officially my new skiving jacket
Politics UK@PolitlcsUK
🚨 NEW: Keir Starmer is flying to Paris this morning to co-host a virtual meeting of the "Strait of Hormuz Maritime Freedom of Navigation Initiative"
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@ColeFusionHQ Pensions in inheritance tax.
Widening the scope of the most unpopular tax.
More complexity and cost for bereaved families.
Not in the manifesto.
Only affects the private sector.
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winter fuel payment cuts, handling of welfare reforms, record small boat crossings, appointing Peter Mandelson.
in his time as PM, what have been your favourite Keir Starmer moments ?
Politics UK@PolitlcsUK
🚨 NEW: No 10 sources say Keir Starmer is "absolutely furious" tonight
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