Genie Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 14 minutes ago, bickster said: Sunak to be investigated by commons oversight committee over failure to declare an interest in a childcare company his wife has shares in. Alok Sharma also facing accusations of bullying from senior civil servants, this on the back of the Dominic Raab claims which should be published soon Just another day in Tory paradise How many millions of public funds has Mrs Sunak’s childcare company received, do we know yet? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted April 17, 2023 Moderator Share Posted April 17, 2023 7 minutes ago, KentVillan said: I wonder if we could introduce a system where elected representatives, senior civil servants, and their immediate families are only allowed to invest in a selection of approved UK tracker funds. Means they can still hold stocks, and gives them some skin in the game in terms of the overall performance of the UK economy, while not having any special interest in specific companies winning govt contracts. Would this be workable? Turkeys and Christmas methinks Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 2 minutes ago, Genie said: How many millions of public funds has Mrs Sunak’s childcare company received, do we know yet? actually I didn’t twig until just now when I googled the news, the big new vote winner they’ve announced is government funded childcare places isn’t it They are shameless aren’t they. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 I’m a bit confused on the Sunak story. Quote Last month, Mr Sunak faced questions over shares his wife holds in Koru Kids, a childcare agency that could benefit from a new policy unveiled in the spring Budget. Chancellor Jeremy Hunt announced a pilot of payments for new childminders, with more for those who sign up through agencies. Mr Sunak's wife, Akshata Murty, was listed as a shareholder in one of those agencies, Koru Kids, as recently as 6 March. When MPs questioned Mr Sunak on childcare providers last month, Mr Sunak said "all my disclosures are declared in the normal way". If he’s already been quizzed and says it’s declared then what’s the issue/story? link Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KentVillan Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 14 minutes ago, bickster said: Turkeys and Christmas methinks Normally I'd agree, but unlike in the US where they're all playing the stock market with insider info, in the UK it still seems to be a minority of MPs doing this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted April 17, 2023 Moderator Share Posted April 17, 2023 Just now, KentVillan said: Normally I'd agree, but unlike in the US where they're all playing the stock market with insider info, in the UK it still seems to be a minority of MPs doing this. It maybe a minority doing it but is it a minority that own shares? Your solution would affect them all, regardless of if they were up to anything or not Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KentVillan Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 3 minutes ago, bickster said: It maybe a minority doing it but is it a minority that own shares? Your solution would affect them all, regardless of if they were up to anything or not Pretty much everyone owns shares of some variety, but I'd imagine most are already investing in tracker funds rather than individual stocks. If MPs were obliged to only invest in diversified index funds, they'd still make money from stock market moves, but wouldn't have any specific interest in specific companies. Seems like quite a neat solution to the corruption problem, which shouldn't get in the way of honest MPs having investments. Like I have no problem with Rishi Sunak having say £100m invested in the stock market, but if £10m of it is invested in a specific healthcare company that is competing for govt contracts... that's where it starts to stink, and just "declaring the interest" doesn't really help. It should be banned. We really want to avoid getting towards the US situation, where representatives buy / sell enormous values of big tech / defence stocks ahead of govt contract announcements, seemingly with impunity. The financialisation of the British economy and the British political class will take us in a similar direction if we don't block it early. Definitely something Labour could take a look at, as they're much less exposed than the Tories. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted April 17, 2023 Author Moderator Share Posted April 17, 2023 31 minutes ago, KentVillan said: I wonder if we could introduce a system where elected representatives, senior civil servants, and their immediate families are only allowed to invest in a selection of approved UK tracker funds. Means they can still hold stocks, and gives them some skin in the game in terms of the overall performance of the UK economy, while not having any special interest in specific companies winning govt contracts. Would this be workable? I'm unconvinced it's necessary. I don't think (though I haven't given it a lot of thought) that it's a problem if an MP, or whoever, owns shares in (say) a bank, or a Pharma company or whichever. As long as they recuse themselves from any decisions that will impact those companies and shares, and they declare openly that they have that interest. I mean people own houses, and cars and stuff and have kids and so on - and decisions MPs take affect those things, and it's all fine. So why essentially ban them from owning shares in Barclays or Boots the Chemist or Rolls Royce? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted April 17, 2023 Moderator Share Posted April 17, 2023 18 minutes ago, KentVillan said: Pretty much everyone owns shares of some variety, but I'd imagine most are already investing in tracker funds rather than individual stocks. If MPs were obliged to only invest in diversified index funds, they'd still make money from stock market moves, but wouldn't have any specific interest in specific companies. Seems like quite a neat solution to the corruption problem, which shouldn't get in the way of honest MPs having investments. Like I have no problem with Rishi Sunak having say £100m invested in the stock market, but if £10m of it is invested in a specific healthcare company that is competing for govt contracts... that's where it starts to stink, and just "declaring the interest" doesn't really help. It should be banned. We really want to avoid getting towards the US situation, where representatives buy / sell enormous values of big tech / defence stocks ahead of govt contract announcements, seemingly with impunity. The financialisation of the British economy and the British political class will take us in a similar direction if we don't block it early. Definitely something Labour could take a look at, as they're much less exposed than the Tories. I suspect it's a much higher percentage than you imagine. There will be quite a lot of MPs that will own companies they founded. They may be up to absolutely nothing but your rule would force them to sell their company Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 Just now, bickster said: I suspect it's a much higher percentage than you imagine. There will be quite a lot of MPs that will own companies they founded. They may be up to absolutely nothing but your rule would force them to sell their company Or try and hide it under their wife’s name… Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted April 17, 2023 Moderator Share Posted April 17, 2023 4 minutes ago, Genie said: Or try and hide it under their wife’s name… Still an interest as the Sunak case shows 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VILLAMARV Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 Isn't there a yougov poll somewhere showing that you don't have to sell the shares if you never own them? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 The Beeb have updated their story with more detail now Quote Mr Sunak did not mention Ms Murthy's links to Koru Kids when he was questioned by MPs over the childcare policy at a parliamentary committee hearing on 28 March. Labour MP Catherine McKinnell asked Mr Sunak whether he had any interest to declare, and in reply he said: "No, all my disclosures are declared in the normal way." In a letter to the committee, sent a few days after the hearing, Mr Sunak said his wife's interest was declared to the Cabinet Office and that an updated statement of ministers' interests would be due out shortly. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KentVillan Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 (edited) 1 hour ago, bickster said: I suspect it's a much higher percentage than you imagine. There will be quite a lot of MPs that will own companies they founded. They may be up to absolutely nothing but your rule would force them to sell their company How many MPs own businesses? It's hard to find the figures, but it would definitely be a fairly small minority, even in the Conservative Party. Tangentially, Open Democracy reckons 115 MPs are landlords (of which 90 are Conservatives!). I get that we want MPs to come from all walks of life, and having businesspeople in parliament is a good thing, but you could probably make an exception for certain types of share holdings where it's clearly a legitimate interest as a company director. I'm talking more about publicly listed companies, where govt decisions can move share prices and create significant profits for shareholders. The current system clearly isn't strong enough, as loads of interests aren't properly declared, and even the declared interests aren't easily searchable. The whole thing relies too much on a vaguely defined sense of "fair play". Edited April 17, 2023 by KentVillan 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted April 17, 2023 Moderator Share Posted April 17, 2023 9 minutes ago, KentVillan said: I'm talking more about publicly listed companies It's distinguishing one type of share from another that is the issue. I get what you are saying but I just don't see how it can be practically legislated or enforced Also, if you extend this to the Lords, which you must surely have to, there will be f***tons Then you have people like Nadim Zahawi and his shares in YouGov... It's as murky as a murky thing 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 13 minutes ago, bickster said: It's as murky as a Ms Murthy thing FTFY 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted April 17, 2023 Moderator Share Posted April 17, 2023 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 1 hour ago, bickster said: Or money Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjmooney Posted April 17, 2023 VT Supporter Share Posted April 17, 2023 1 hour ago, bickster said: Is it OK to be bad at ethics? 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Genie Posted April 17, 2023 Share Posted April 17, 2023 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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