Your Tax Money At Work

Lead
Lawson Max ,Bignell Harry ,Solá Brown Carlos ,Kamande
.Stahl Møller Rune and
Bignell Harry :manager publication and Commissioning
,Bush Alex of assistance the acknowledges Oxfam
,Damle Ashish ,Hersi Amina ,Franck Anouk ,Court Alison
Ceren ,Mofya Brenda ,Musili Beverly ,Monnens Bart
,Duran-Fernandez Cristina ,Putaturo Chiara ,Topgul
Rio del Emilio ,Perez Efren ,Jacobs Didier ,Xavier Deepak
,Smetts Eva ,)consultant external (Seery Emma ,Castro
Grazielle ,Parra Garcia Isabel Gloria ,Hassane-Nzi Fati
,Saenz Hernan ,Nelson Hanna ,Ivanhoe Hana ,Custódio
Garton Jane ,Frye Isobel ,Tamir Irit ,Aymar Macias Inigo
Patricia Jenny ,Gandour Jackson ,)consultant external(
,Bustamante Robin Jon ,Makina John ,Munoz Gallego
,Noah-Odour Linda ,Boe Kira ,Donald Kate ,Saunders Joss
,Mdalla MacPherson ,)consultant external (Cowie Lucy
Maria ,Sultana Mahmuda ,Lagman Mai ,Busck Mads
,Dorssen van Mirjam ,Vega La De Miguel ,Luarca Eugenia
,Dabi Nafkote ,Ahmed Nabil ,Abdo Nabil ,Talpur Mustafa
Nizar ,Crawley Nina ,Vercken Nicholas ,McCarthy Neal
Rebecca ,Castellani Paola ,Vaart der van Nout ,Aouad
,McTernan Seán ,Khalil Abi Sally ,Goodbun Rod ,Riddell
,Ruiz Susana ,Thomas-Price Steve ,Hannoun Stanislas
Harnett Victoria ,Arauco Paz Veronica ,Hauschild Tobias
and Santiago Viviana

All of those people to produce a 69 page report. Wouldn’t poverty be reduced rather better by having the occasional competent person writing and the rest of the money spent on reducing actual poverty?

A “catastrophic” decision by the Ministry of Justice to sign a 10-year lease on a prison where high levels of a poisonous gas had been detected is expected to cost the UK taxpayer more than £100m, parliament’s spending watchdog has concluded.

The public accounts committee said the 2022 deal to rent HMP Dartmoor from the Duchy of Cornwall was signed “in a blind panic” by senior civil servants looking to guarantee prison places.

So the reason they stopped using it is the radon gas (not unusual in granite buildings built on granite). But still they leased it:

“Under the contract terms, the department cannot terminate the lease until at least December 2033. Overall, HMPPS is currently paying around £4m per year for an unusable prison. This includes rent, business rates and security costs.

“Additionally government must pay additional costs – around £68m – on fabric improvements to the Dartmoor site over the period of the lease,” the report said.

They’re renting it off the Duchy of Cornwall. And given those numbers I’d say the rent is pretty much nothing. It’s the fully repairable nature of the lease which is costing the money. But, you know, there we are.

So, given this performance, how likely are we to believe those who tell us that really, government should be doing the investing in hte economy? With ever yet more of our money untimely ripped etc?

Under the scheme, they will target families who are not signed up with a GP or who struggle with travel costs, childcare, language barriers or other issues stopping them seeing a doctor.
Children will be identified by the NHS using GP records, health visitor notes and local databases, sources said.

So we’re going to find the kiddies not on GP registers by looking at GP registers?

Yes, sounds like this government…..

The Department of Health and Human Services is freezing all childcare payments to all states, an official for Donald Trump’s administration told ABC News in a report published Wednesday. States’ funds will be released “only when states prove they are being spent legitimately”.

Of course, all such services should be paid for from state tax revenues anyway. Shrink the Feds back to being the State Dept and the military.

Make Washington DC a backwater again, not a swamp.

The Trump administration announced on Tuesday that it is freezing federal funding for childcare programs in Minnesota after allegations of fraud – first exposed and prosecuted during the Biden administration – recently became the focus of conservative influencers and media outlets.

Jim O’Neill, the deputy secretary of health and human services, said in a video statement that the funding freeze was in response to what he called “blatant fraud that appears to be rampant in Minnesota and across the country … We have turned off the money spigot and we are finding the fraud.”

Well, OK, it’s become politically salient, it matches up with a political stance, sure, it’s going to be political.

A federal prosecutor alleged earlier in December that half or more of the roughly $18bn in federal funds that supported 14 programs in Minnesota since 2018 may have been stolen. Most of the defendants are Somali Americans, they said.

Seems a pretty useful thing to get political about too.

Shirley’s video, which was widely viewed online, has been criticized for falsely presenting as new revelations allegations of fraud schemes that were extensively reported on in the local and national media during the Biden administration.

O’Neill said he has demanded that Minnesota’s governor, Tim Walz, submit an audit of day care centers that includes attendance records, licenses, complaints, investigations and inspections.

“This is Trump’s long game,” Walz wrote on social media in response to the announcement from O’Neill, “We’ve spent years cracking down on fraudsters. It’s a serious issue – but this has been his plan all along. He’s politicizing the issue to defund programs that help Minnesotans.”

As a defence that does seem weak, no? We’ve been trying to deal with this for years and yet not really got anywhere?

More than half a million pounds has been spent since 2024 on using social media influencers to promote UK government campaigns on subjects ranging from the environment to welfare.

The spending has included hiring 215 influencers since 2024, of which there were 126 in 2025 – an increase on the 89 hired in 2024 – and is seen as an attempt to use platforms such as TikTok to reach younger people.

After all, it’s said he’s got an audience and he’s very influential with it….

Monica Harding, the Liberal Democrats’ international development spokesperson, said even existing cuts to aid had resulted in a loss of UK influence

Everybody has to pay taxes so that foreigners look at Monica with respect, eh?

A Labour party spokesperson…. risks Britain losing influence and seats at the table

Think of the conferences apparatchiki won’t be able to go to. They’re all held in nice warm places during the Northern Hemisphere winter as well.

Zia Yusuf, Reform’s head of policy….The Conservatives spent £230bn in real terms on foreign aid

Hell of a figure, ain’t it?

Plans by Reform UK to slash the aid budget by 90%

An excellent idea.

Gideon Rabinowitz, the director of policy at Bond, the umbrella group for development NGOs

When we’ve a bureaucracy for the bureaucracy of the aid leeches it is about time we swinged with an axe, no?

Keir Starmer has no coherent strategy to tackle entrenched inequalities harming the life chances of millions of people, the government’s social mobility commissioner has said.

“I am a bureaucrat. No one is paying enough attention to the thing I am a bureaucrat of. This must change.”

Spain’s socialist-led government is to launch a national public transport pass that will allow people to travel anywhere in the country by bus or train for a flat monthly fee of €60 (£52.70).

Imagine the lossses from someone using that on packed commuter trains…..which is, of course, the point of having different prices for different trips and times.

News of the pass – which has yet to be publicly costed – came as Sánchez’s coalition minority government struggles to survive a series of corruption and sexual harassment allegations that have engulfed his inner circle, his Spanish Socialist Workers’ party (PSOE) and his administration.

But they’re not doing it for economic reasons now, are they?

Conservative governments spent £325m creating 67 free schools that subsequently failed or disappeared, many through lack of demand, according to data revealed by a freedom of information request.

The figures from the Department for Education (DfE) show that the government committed more than £10bn to building new schools between 2014-15 and 2023-24, compared with £6.8bn for rebuilding existing schools, which critics say left England with a backlog of crumbling and decaying buildings.

So the claim is 3% of the budget was wasted. Given the norm in government spending that’s pissant, isn’t it, trivia.

One of the reasons the global rich rather liked living in London – you know, big, civilised sort of place as long as you’ve got money – was the non-dom scheme. One of the reasons those same global rich didn’t use the US in the same way was that global income would be subject to US taxes if you lived there. So, we abolish non-doms, or worsen the terms at least. And Trumpie?

A “Trump Platinum Card” is also “coming soon”, according to the official website. This card will allow holders to spend up to 270 days in the US without being subject to US taxes on non-US income. It will cost $5m.

He’s creating a non-dom regime for the US.

Now, my personal belief is that the moment the lefties get in again that’ll be rescinded. And the global rich will assume that too so there won’t be that much effect. But say that doesn’t happen? Won;t that be fun, real and direct competition for the non-doms?

And yet:

Local authorities in England and Wales have warned their finances are at “breaking point” with more councils expected to fall into bankruptcy in future, as they face a nervous wait to discover their government funding this month.

So we should assume that it’s all being pissed away, right?

Right.

For if they’re taking ever more off us and yet still going bust then they’re spending even even more, right?

There’s a loophole being exploited!

Loophole, people driving coach and horses through it. Potential rents are uncapped for what are basically bedsits – with “support services”, natch – and rents are near entirely paid by central government.

Can you guess what happens next?

Someone in Brum has worked this out and the clan is cashing in, right?

The UK welfare system is not helping enough people into work and has significantly rising costs, and no one should think the government is backing away from reforming it, the work and pensions secretary has said.

Pat McFadden made the comments as the government published its new child poverty strategy on Friday.

He said the aim of the strategy was to improve young lives for the long term and that those lifted out of hardship are likely to have improved prospects for employment in the future.

“This is about more than the distribution of money. It’s an investment in the future of the children who are affected by poverty,” he said.

Throwing bennies at the idle poor is investment now. The word’s getting close to having no useful meaning, no?

Thousands of refugees are facing a growing homelessness crisis, according to a network of more than 100 organisations across the UK who say homelessness has more than doubled among refugees in the last two years.

Naccom, the national charity of 140 frontline refugee and migrant organisations, blames the increase on “near-constant government policy changes” and the introduction of eVisas, which some refugees have not been able to activate in order to access vital services and support.

Many such cases. Very sad.

That we’ve got 140 petty bureaucracies, 140 teams of NGO workers all making their nut, gives a good idea of what’s wrong with the country. 140 sets of ladles in the gravy…..

The 7am departure from Manchester Piccadilly to London Euston, a sought-after service that stops only in Stockport and takes less than two hours to reach the capital, will now run with only staff on board.
Arriving in London just before 9am, it’s a service that has proved popular among MPs, financiers and even pop stars — it is not unusual to witness one of the Gallagher brothers boarding the service, perhaps returning home to London after a heavy night out, so say some regular users. It is one of the most lucrative intercity trains, with passengers parting with hundreds of pounds for a seat.
Yet the Office of Rail and Road (ORR) has said no passengers will be allowed on board Avanti West Coast service when timetables change on December 15.
The farcical situation is a product of the need for the train, carriages and crew to travel south to fulfil the needs of subsequent services. Carrying passengers risks impacting the overall reliability of the service, so the logic goes. A failure to stick to the schedule would have adverse ramifications for services thereafter.

We cannot let passengers on because this might delay the train.

Shoot them, obviously.

While insisting she had avoided reckless borrowing and dangerous cuts, the budget will push the tax take to an all-time high of 38% of GDP in five years’ time.

Whoever comes next is going to have to cut abut 10% of GDP off the spending. The 5% deficit and another 5%.

Not easy but gotta be done.

If you’d just like to line up over here?

More than £700 million is being spent at Hinkley Point C nuclear power station on measures expected to save 0.083 salmon and 0.028 sea trout per year.

The plant in Somerset will have more “fish protection measures” than any other power station in the world when it opens because of strict planning conditions agreed by ministers.

Yes, you’re right, it is a long queue and no, there’re no refreshements. But then you’ll not need them. Might take a day or two but we will get there in the end, you all will have your personal appointment with the hangman.

Private dentists’ fees and practices should be investigated by the competition watchdog, the chancellor has said.

Rachel Reeves has written to the Competition and Markets Authority urging it to launch a market study into private providers as there are concerns that patients are paying over the odds.

Since NHS dentistry now pretty much doesn’t exist for adults therefore we need to blame private dentists.

The OBR, in fairness, has one good excuse. Britain is a £3tn economy. Government spending runs at £1.3tn and government revenues at some £1.15tn. These are very large numbers, and the number the fiscal rules targets – the hoped-for surplus between revenue and spending to lower debt in year five of the forecast – is tiny by comparison. The OBR is obliged to accept that the government’s spending plans are written in stone; its pro-active job is to forecast expected growth in the economy and the resulting tax receipts, and then come to a judgment about whether, in five years’ time, revenues will be buoyant enough to exceed spending by a sufficient margin to lower the national debt. An adverse movement of a mere 0.3% five years hence can eliminate any surplus. In economic forecasting terms, this is like identifying a pin in a haystack.

We’re looking for the nett between two large and highly variable numbers. We’re not going to find it 5 years out. So, don’t pretend.