Asset Stripper.

 

                                           Sir Philip Green's £100 million wee boat.

      He's back in the news, and for all the usual reasons, spiv, tax evader, assets stripper, Philip Green, luxury yacht owner. Remember how he sucked BHS dry by huge share bonuses, paid no tax because the company was registered in his wife's name and she lives in Monaco, then left it to die with a massive multi-million pound hole in its pension fund. Well it looks like lightening does strike twice in the same place, Arcadia, another of his wives little assets that they sucked dry and now it dies, again leaving a £350 million hole in its pension fund.
       This arrogant privileged pampered duo are said to be worth £930 million, their nice little nest-egg was somewhat enhanced in 2005 when Sir Philip Green paid his wife a nice little dividend payment of £1.2 billion from Arcadia. Of course no tax paid as she lives in Monaco. He doesn't invest, he asset strips, piling the ill-gotten wealth into his dear wife's account, tax free of course.

A couple of views of the interior of Philip's wee boat.

       So while Sir Philip mucks about in his wee boat in Monaco, no doubt preparing for a wee holiday in the Caribbean, after the stress of milking Arcadia dry, because of his actions, thousands of ordinary people are preparing to face the dole.
      We tolerate this, it is not an isolated case of wealth plundering by those arrogant wealthy parasites, it is part and parcel of this system of exploitation and greed. The world is awash with untold wealth slushing around in a labyrinth of tax havens, while millions go hungry, exist homeless and struggle to feed their kids. The question is why do we tolerate this? Every pound in their little secret boxes, was produced by you and I, we create the wealth, they plunder and stash it away for their own greed driven personal gratification. We must be insane to tolerate this continuing two fingers at us, the wealth creators, by a clique of arrogant parasites, who are laughing all the way to Monaco, the Caribbean etc..

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Vanishing Money!!

         In this capitalist world where money is quality of life, what could we do with $6.5 trillion? How many schools, teachers, doctors, nurses, could we add to strained parts of our society, how many libraries, how much social housing, how many kids nurseries could we create? It is by all measure of things, a massive amount of money. Yet it appears that the Pentagon in USA, has somehow misplaced that amount and doesn’t know where it has gone. It just can’t account for that bundle of taxpayers money, I guess it must have fallen down the back of the till!! 

      Adding to the appearance of impropriety is the fact that thousands of documents that should be on file have been removed and disappeared without any reasonable explanation.
      A new Department of Defense Inspector General’s report, released last week, has left Americans stunned at the jaw-dropping lack of accountability and oversight. The glaring report revealed the Pentagon couldn’t account for $6.5 trillion dollars worth of Army general fund transactions and data, according to a report by the Fiscal Times.
       The Pentagon, which has been notoriously lax in its accounting practices, has never completed an audit, would reveal how the agency has specifically spent the trillions of dollars allocated for wars, equipment, personnel, housing, healthcare and procurement’s allotted to them by Congress. 

Philip Green's wife Tina, received the largest dividend in corporate history, from her husband's company.

  

     To you and I know this is not oversight, bad arithmetic, or sloppy bookkeeping, it is just another example of the endemic corruption in this system of capitalism. It happens on a gigantic scale when it comes to taxpayers money, but is not confined to that area. Over on this side of the Atlantic we have had the recent BHS money illusion, now you see, now you don’t, whoosh, and its gone. By recent assessments, the BHS pension fund deficit is running at close to a billion pounds, £717 million to quote the Guardian. 

 The pension fund seems to have disappeared, but I have a beautiful new yacht.

     Slush funds, bribery, backhanders, special “bonuses”, massive pension pay-offs, off-shore tax havens, corruption, all part and parcel of a stinking corrupt system that feeds an army of greedy parasites at our expense. This is capitalism, these are not anomalies, this is how the whole rotten system functions. Is there anybody out there that still has a shred of belief, that this is the best humanity can do with the finite resources of our planet? Is there anybody out there who believes that this festering cancer can work for the benefit of all the people of this planet?

       Let’s put all our petty differences aside, let’s concentrate on the one task that would eliminate poverty and war, let’s come together to work to bring down this edifice to greed that is the real burden on humanity’s shoulder. Let’s assign capitalism to the dustbin of history, under the label, “humanity’s darkest hour”.

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Another Capitalist Success Story!!!

        So Mike Ashley, in front of a committee of MPs, admits he is a bit of a rascal. Accused of paying below the minimum wage, too many zero hours contracts, the vast majority of the warehouse staff are agency workers, running a climate of fear in his warehouse, involving the staff in long, time consuming searches, after their clocked off time, administering a, six strikes and you’re out regime. The strikes being, chatting too much, taking too long in the toilet, and other such vile crimes. Also being penalised if you are as much as one minute late. 

           The publicity has seen the price of the shares in his company, Sports Direct, take a tumble, down 45% on last year. Could this be the next capitalist success story after Philip Greens magnificent job at BHS? He has promised is accusers, the MPs, that he will put all these matters right, that of course could hit his profit margins, which in turn will keep pushing the price of his shares down. Could this be time to pull the plug and walk away with his millions, earned from all that below minimum wage, zero hours contracts, and agency workers, climate of fear, routine that he followed so faithfully. Of course, if so, we will get the usual, “difficult trading conditions” was the cause of the collapse. Whatever the outcome of this little exercise with the MPs, what I don’t expect is that Sports Direct will become a pleasant and well paid place to be employed.

 

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BHS, Capitalist Success Story.

 

       Our babbling brook of bullshit, the mainstream media, are reporting the recent BHS event as if something had gone wrong. As far as capitalism is concerned it worked out perfectly. A guy buys it, makes a fortune and bleeds it dry, then walks away, much richer than when he bought it, capitalism at its best. Is there any idiot out there who thinks that BHS was all about the employees and the customers? These latter two are just components, just the disposable ball-bearings that make the system function, but can be dumped and a replaced by a new set. The BHS can be registered as one of the UK's greatest capitalist success stories, all that effort by the people, creating all that wealth for a small bunch of parasites. Sure some shareholders might have lost some of their filthy loot, but they made a fortune over the life of the company, and the really big fish made a real killing.

 Philip with one of his buddies.

         Let's look at the facts, a guy, let's say Philip Green, buys this "enterprise" and over 15 years he pays his wife £400 million in dividends, that averages out at around £28 million a year, and to add some cream to their cake, it is channelled through a tax haven. No sense in giving any of it back to the people who created that wealth. There are other avenues where the shysters can make more money, that illusion known as the "pension fund". This is where the employee and the employer put money aside so that when the employee retires there will be something there to help them get by. In the case of this particular, "pension fund", when our friend Philip bought the company, its "pension fund" was in surplus to the extent of £5 million. After his 15 years of plundering, wheeling and dealing, slicing and dicing, "stewardship", that £5 million surplus, is now a whopping £571 million deficit. So having cleaned the pot out, and saddling the company with a massive £1.6 billion debt problem, our bold entrepreneur, sells the company to a serial bankrupter, for £1.

 Philip's wee boat, paid for by people like you.

        Meanwhile, Philip walks off into the sunset, with an estimated £3.6 billion bank balance, to take control of his new £100 million+ super yacht, with some serious Bahamas sailing to think about. Far from being a disaster, BHS is text book capitalism, for other "entrepreneurs" to follow. We have seen it in the past, and we will see it in the future, as long as we tolerate this stinking system of greed and plunder. So get used to it, capitalism, milk the masses and live happily ever after, Ah, the beauty of capitalism.

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When The Cash Fountain Is Sucked Dry----!!

Philip Green doesn't fly Easy Jet.

        So BHS looks like it could go into administration, sign of the times, just another ailing business, or-----? 

Philip and friends messing around in boats.

        BHS has proved itself to be a cash fountain for the one time owners, the Green family, and a bunch of cash crazy shareholders. After buying the business in 2000, the shareholders extracted more than £422 million in two years, 2002-2004. the vast majority of the loot went to the Green family. The Philip Green family also managed to collect another £151.4 million from BHS in rent for 12 stores which happen to be owned by Carmen properties, which just happened to be a Green family business. The cash fountain didn't stop there, the Green family also earned almost £10 million from £19.5 million bond issued to BHS, and then there was the the £3 million from ground rent on BHS head offices. This looks like the BHS, in a rather short period, earned the Green family £164.4 million plus the major share of another £422 million, a nice little earner if you can get it. So there you have it, a company that is now likely to go into administration poured the princely sum of £586.4 million into the coffers of a little bunch of city gents. Let's not forget all the perks that go with “owning” a company, travel expenses, wining and dining, etc. Now that the this gravy train was being sucked dry, the livelihood of thousands of ordinary people, hangs on a cliff edge. Ah, that's capitalism, when the cash fountain is sucked dry, it's time to go.

Philip's little 2006 purchase, valued at $150 million.

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GREAT BRITAIN -- FOR WHO??

         

             Millionaire Cameron wants to put the”GREAT” back into Great Britain. Well, Britain is "GREAT", it just depends on which side of the financial apathied wall you sit. It is “GREAT” if your are Sir Philip Green, owner of Arcadia/Topshop/Burtons/BHS, you earn all that money from that group of companies and you don't pay tax, a nice wee fiddle, you see the company is in his wife's name and surprise, surprise, she doesn't live in Britain, she is a resident of Monaco!! It is “GREAT” if your are one of Britain's too many millionaires. Since the “financial crisis” of 2008 the number of millionaires in Britain has grown from 528,000 to 619,000 an increase of 17%., Britain has the fourth most registered millionaires in the world coming in after USA, Japan and China. So millionaire Cameron has no worries there, Britain is “GREAT” for this bunch of parasites.

It's a GREAT country.

             However, what if you happen to be on the other side of that financial apathied wall? Well millionaire Cameron has a wee problem there. There is nothing “GREAT” about Britain if you are among the 4 million children growing up in poverty, more than 1 in 3, a figure that is amongst the worst in Europe. Nothing “GREAT” if you happen to be one of the 2 million pensioners living below the breadline and facing winter in fuel poverty. Again we are amongst the worst rates of pensioner poverty in Europe. I wonder if millionaire Cameron and his millionaire cabal, can even grasp an inkling of how “UN-GREAT” Britain is for the 20.2% of our young people who live a life on the dole? How “GREAT” is that, a fifth of all our young people unemployed, a waste of talent and resources, a destruction of the future.

          Sorry Mr. millionaire Cameron, you and your corporate cronies with policies of profit before people can never make Britain "GREAT" for the people of this country. You and the system you fight so viciously for, has to go, your greed driven corporate fascism has to be flushed down the toilet before this country can be "GREAT" for all of the people who live and work here.

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LEGAL FIDDLES AND ILLEGAL FIDDLES!!!

     

       A government department has issued what it calls the silliest excuse put forward by people caught cheating on benefit claims. All in an attempt to ridicule and shame those who try to fiddle the benefit system. Hoping to alienate them and scapegoat them as an excuse to introduce draconian measures against anybody who relies on benefit to survive. They have to be held up to ridicule and prosecuted for doing what a vast number of MPs have done and in some cases are still doing. In the case of the MPs all they have to say is that they were not involved in any wrong doing. They may be asked to pay it back or receive a slap on the wrist. Out of 600 odd MPS and about the same number in the Lords and a year or more of scandalous revelations of widespread fiddling, only about 6 have gone to court. One Lord how did end up in court stated, it wasn't an expense system as such, but more of an allowance system to top up their income, and he was doing nothing wrong as they were all doing the same. I hope the Met. were listening to that.

IF YOU DON'T PAY US PROPERLY, WE'LL LEAVE!

     We are told that benefit cheats cost the tax payer approximately £1.6 billion, shock, horror, that's about as much as the government is expected to spend destroying Libya over a 6 month period. It fades into insignificances when compared to Vodafone's £6 billion tax fiddle, then there is Philip Green with his nice little arrangement of having his wife as owner of BHS Group, claiming she is a resident of Monaco, so doesn't pay UK tax on the company's profits. Most of the big companies avoid paying there fair share of tax by what can only be described as phony overseas offices and other tax avoidance fiddles. However no government department sets out to ridicule and shame them, even although sorting that little lot out would put hundreds of billions into the tax revenue of this country. It seems that the powers that be want a monopoly on fiddling for their own class, and have no intentions of allowing to spread down to us minions.

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