News from the opposition

How desperate must Mrs May be that she feels she has to appear on This Morning. It wasn't a resounding success was it?

www.theneweuropean.co.uk/top-stories/lib-dems-react-to-new-anti-brexit-party-remain-1-5401646

The new party for remain.

petition.parliament.uk/petitions/206722

Grenfell petition.

It just seems to be growing and growing doesn’t it? dj

This is not "from the opposition" exactly but I am sure we are all aware that the opposition are looking at how they can run to economy so all benefit rather than just some this sort of fits in to what they may be looking at.
How an Alternative Minimum Corporation tax might work for Google in the UK

The comments on that article say everything.

Interesting link gracegrain

In my career I was well aware that audited accounts were fallible, which is why accountants always put a disclaimer on them. So I can quite see Murphy’s point. Accounts for the biggest companies rarely reflect the true position of a company and those pursuing the end of year accounts must always bear that in mind.

They seem to be having a splendid day in Wandsworth, helping to unseat the current seat holder.

Momentum has announced an increase of 487 in its membership this week.

Labour candidate for Wandsworth is Sonya Ward, who has given a speech to standing room only plus many who couldn’t get in.

All organised by Momentum.

Momentum are organising a meeting in Coventry 27th Feb. to discuss and feed into the democratic review. All are welcome.

Thinking about Corbyns speech. On reflection I do wonder if he will nail his colours to the mast. I don’t think I would yet.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2018/feb/24/ken-livingstone-hitler-suspension-end-no-further-action?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

Perhaps Ken will help him make his mind up.

The comments on that article say everything.

Do you have to descend to this level Primrose. The article puts on point of view and the comments another. It is as simple as that.

But the whole point of the article is that the accounts are incorrect. The comments seem incredulous that this would happen.

Welcome to the real world.

The commentators do seem to start out by assuming he cannot be right and by being unnecessarily rude. It's a shame because the discussion actually clarifies the originally points which is useful.

Richard Murphy is so discredited that even John Mc Donnell said he doubted his judgement. (Hansard, July 20th 2016) He lost a libel case because of his inability to understand tax.

But keep defending him. No one else does.

eazybee Having often alleged those on the left on Gransnet are aggressive, it seems to me that you are doing what you accuse others of (with primrose and petra, applauding your efforts). Rather than make a sweeping and nasty characterisation of those whose views and political leanings are not in accord with your own, why not address the actual issues raised?

Primrose I don't pretend to understand much about the subject of economics but I do know that it is not an exact science. Many economists have different views and have come up with significantly different forecasts - with the prevailing view often proved to be wildly inaccurate. Only one or two economists, for instance, foresaw the likelihood of the 2008 financial crash, even though common sense would seem to indicate that lending money to people and businesses who would never be able to pay it back, and then packaging the debt up and selling it to some other financial entity, was irrational and dangerous. Richard Murphy did at least respond courteously and in some detail to those who questioned or ridiculed his analysis, rather than resorting to personal abuse.

Accounting and tax are pretty exact though, which is why people ridiculed his analysis.
If you fill out a tax return, you can't really say according to xyz theory, I owe nothing. You do it in the way you believe is correct and if you're wrong, you're given a penalty. It's no different for any company.

I have no problem with a party saying we're going to change tax law - it happens all the time. That's a different argument than having a pop at companies who operate within the current law because you disagree with the law.

The main roles of the HoC are examining and challenging the work of the government, debating and passing all laws and enabling the Government to raise taxes. Disagreeing with a law and wanting to change it is generally called politics.

Using a large company as an example of how different laws might affect it is commonplace.

In December 2017 the ICAS the professional body of Chartered Accountants listed the top 30 accountancy firms:

Deloitte
PwC
EY
KPMG
BDO
Grant Thornton etc etc

In June 2017 The Financial Times reported:

"FRC finds audit shortcoming at three big accountancy firms

"KPMG, Deloitte and Grant Thornton are lagging behind their professional services peers in terms of the quality of their audits, according to an annual review by the UK’s accounting watchdog.

"The Financial Reporting Council said on Thursday that of the 23 individual KPMG audits it reviewed between February 2016 and January 2017, two required “significant improvements”, while for Deloitte, another of the Big Four accountancy firms, that figure was also two out of 23. Deloitte had a higher proportion of audits that the FRC deemed “good”, however.

Smaller rival Grant Thornton received the worst results; out of only eight audits reviewed, three were said to need significant improvements. For BDO, this was one out of eight.

By contrast, none of the EY or PwC audits reviewed by the watchdog fell into that category.

"Recent high-profile accounting scandals at UK companies such as Rolls-Royce and BT — which have involved KPMG and PwC, respectively — have raised questions over whether auditors inspect company accounts with appropriate scepticism. Toughening its approach to accounting misconduct, the FRC recently fined PwC a record £5m for “misconduct” relating to its audit of social housing group Connaught, and in November imposed a £4m penalty on Deloitte for its audits of Aim-listed Aero."

More recently, in January this year the Guardian reported:

"Calls for more scrutiny of top accounting firms after Carillion collapse

"Head of industry’s watchdog says competition authorities should examine the sector

"MPs on the work and pensions select committee were told auditors and Carillion were ‘all mates’.

"Britain’s four biggest accountancy companies are facing fresh scrutiny, with the head of the industry watchdog calling for the competition regulator to investigate their auditing activities following the collapse of Carillion.

"Stephen Haddrill, the chief executive of the Financial Reporting Council (FRC), told MPs at a joint select committee hearing on Tuesday that “there should be more competition in the major accounting and audit area”.

This suggests to me that not everything is quite as cut and dried and above board as you say primrose.

You are absolutely right eloethan to doubt the veracity of company accounts.

If you know that company accounts are wrong, report the company!
So what if accountancy firms are rubbish, corrupt, unethical, unable to add 2 numbers together and get the right answer.
The quality of Richard Murphy's work seems to be in line with most other accountants then Eloethan. You pointing out that they're all useless doesn't make him any better.

Useful insight. Thanks Eloethan.

eloethan I’ve had cause many times in my working life to question company accounts and the way they have been drawn up, so I know first hand exactly what your post is saying.