SammyLeeWasOffside wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 11:02 am
I don't know if there were established firms who couldn't sell their wares, I would doubt it tbh, but if the stuff ordered was supplied I don't really see it matters who exactly got rich off it.
I remember interviews in the media at the time with established companies offering their services who had been told thanks but no thanks. Just like the Brexit ferry contracts.
I think I can accept a degree of panic, I can even accept overpaying given the conditions they were working in but new companies with zero experience getting very large contracts outside the normal process stinks of corruption. Shock horror some of that corruption is now coming to light thanks to the media and the courts.
It does matter who got rich if they are connected to the people making the decisions. Especially on contracts not fit for purpose. There is waste from over ordering and there is contracts being signed off for PPE which should have been identified at the time as being inadequate.
And if there is nothing to hide, why did the government fight tooth and nail to not release the documents?
Tenbury wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 12:38 pm
Sammy, I understand the point you make, but what you're really saying is fraud is only illegal if it 's small scale.
Integrity has become just another commodity.
Not at all.
If a firm doesn't supply as promised there are legal routes open (as I am finding at the moment they aren't worth the paper they are written on but that's a different matter), the govt is following those routes with medpro. I believe they are currently stuck at the mediation phase.
bubbles1966 wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 1:35 pm
Not as rare as Impartiality, nor having the patience to wait for fair and due process before jumping to judgement.
So Sunak, as chancellor, didn't write of billions in Covid relief fraud then?.... or maybe they're still working on it?..
Tenbury wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 12:38 pm
Sammy, I understand the point you make, but what you're really saying is fraud is only illegal if it 's small scale.
"1.1 billion items that cannot be used in health and social care settings, such as face visors that met the Department’s specification, but ultimately required assembly, which was considered too time-consuming. The initial cost of these items was £1.8 billion"
followed by
"Front-line services prefer alternative items, for example face visors that require some self-assembly, or aprons that are flat packed rather than being on a roll. "
So, they ordered £1.8bn in visors, told the companies what to do, the companies did it, and then staff said, "Nah, don't like it"
I was reading on the Gov website about the procurement process and the firms involved (including who referred them to the high priority pile along with the actual source of the referral).
I completely understand that at a time of needs must it makes sense to 'fast track' firms you know can provide, but wasn't this Medpro just a couple of weeks old at the time with no order history?
The high priority list is filled with MPs as referrals and others (Lord Agnew in the Medpro example) being the actual referrer, but it does kind of make sense.
According to the Gov website, there were a team of around 400 doing the vetting and processing side of it all so there might be a few more in line for a b*llocking if it was a case of systemic abuse of due diligence.
Tenbury wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 2:13 pm
So Sunak, as chancellor, didn't write of billions in Covid relief fraud then?.... or maybe they're still working on it?..
"Mr Harra (HMRC CEO) said the more than 1,250 staff allocated to the taskforce would be redeployed, and while the taskforce will come to an end, compliance work on Covid error and fraud will continue."
chelmsfordhammer91 wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 2:25 pm
The high priority list is filled with MPs as referrals and others (Lord Agnew in the Medpro example) being the actual referrer, but it does kind of make sense.
Around 90% of the 'High Priority" referrals were never given any contracts.
They "were suggested by government officials, ministers’ offices, members of Parliament, senior NHS staff and other health professionals "
Just over 100 out of nearly 10,000 contracts went to these type of suppliers.
"The revival of modern conservatism over the next decade will I suspect take place as much outside of parliament as in it". Nice to agree with him for once. If he's right, we're still lumbered for two years with a party in government that is in such a poor state that it needs ten years worth of "revival". And that ten years only starts once enough of the party understand what Hancock has finally come to understand. Personally I don't think that decade starts until 2024 at least.
bubbles1966 wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 2:27 pm
"Mr Harra (HMRC CEO) said the more than 1,250 staff allocated to the taskforce would be redeployed, and while the taskforce will come to an end, compliance work on Covid error and fraud will continue."
Tenbury wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 2:13 pm
So Sunak, as chancellor, didn't write of billions in Covid relief fraud then?.... or maybe they're still working on it?..
No he wrote it off but that largely was the small stuff (lots and lots of small stuff I accept) which you were saying I considered was illegal (and it is and I do). Essentially it shows they have done the opposite of what you said, the small stuff has been ignored and the big stuff pursued (which if fraud is also illegal).
Not many I would imagine. We spent hours (probably days in total) on the phone to hmrc making sure we (and the companies we were working for) were compliant. Nobody we spoke to seemed to understand the rules. Guidance changed at some points daily, lots of it (like lots of HMRC stuff) was so vague as to be almost impossible to stand up in court if it ever came to that.
SEISS for example had no checks at all as to whether you needed money, you just typed in a claim and it gave you money based on previous tax returns. Due to the speed of getting it up and running it was initially based entirely on trusting people to be honest, as time went on they started trying to close loopholes as they came to light but often one fix contradicted something else. My other half is a bookkeeper and we sat up loads of nights to 3am trying to figure out grants and furlough for her clients, the next month the system would change and she had to figure it all out again. She had to leave one client in the end as they were getting very close to what she considered fraud, 2 directors took 100k+ each out of the company from grants they got. They didn't even have to apply after the first one, the local council just sent them money. It was in the business about 10 minutes. Is that fraud or council incompetence. She thought they should pay it back, the owners thought it was free money that they deserved so she left.
Sammy, I didn't mean to infer that the overwhelming number of loans/grants/etc were anything other entirely kosher, and as someone whom at times has relied on tax credits, I have no misconceptions as to the workings of HMRC..
It doesn't seem that ridiculous, however, when you're bunging around a hundred grand here or there, to make a note of the name and NI number of the person you're chucking it to.
YGNB wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 1:18 pm
He's shocked quite a lot isn't he? Shocked at Gavin Williamsons bullying, shocked at Dominic Raabs bullying and shocked at blatant corruption that occurred whilst *checks notes* he was the chancellor
MB wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 1:34 pmI remember interviews in the media at the time with established companies offering their services who had been told thanks but no thanks. Just like the Brexit ferry contracts.
I very much remember that, MB.
One guy who phoned in on the radio who the Govt wouldn't even get back to.
It seemed so strange at the time..
York Ham(mer) wrote: ↑Wed Dec 07, 2022 6:24 pm
Michael Gove has granted planning permission for a new coal mine in Cumbria. It will be used in the production of steel.
