David Laws - corrupt hypocrite?

Somerset

tomterm8 wrote: »

Here's the thing: if he had declared the fact his 'partner' as a partner*, he would have been entitled to the full rent of the house, rather than just a share. Just like a married MP. So he could have claimed substantially more money.

Curious about what he could have claimed.

So are you sure, that had he been legit, both his partner's and his mortgage payments would have been covered by expenses ? (Btw there was no rent, he essentially claimed his 'landlord' charged him rent & utilities)

Carrying on that thought, if an MP buys a house for say 2 million in London, all of the interest expense is allowable ? ie no limit to interest or mortgage size ?

Carrying on again, if an MP (or partner) already had a second home in London with no mortgage for argument's sake. They can raise a mortgage on that previously unmortgaged property, for any reason ie fund a business, stick in a savings account, and the taxpayer will still fund the new mortgage interest, even though the mortgage is funding personal choices ?

So essentially having an MP for a partner is a ticket for a free ride ?

If the answer's are 'yes' there's something screwy in the system.

Jennifer_Jane

We don't know the reasons why he wanted his homosexuality to be secret, although that should be his own business anyway, but aren't most people thinking that it was because of family reasons (either his or his partner's) rather than anything to do with the British public or the LibDems, or his political career?

Has there been more about this in the news?

I feel sorry for him and for the Country as he seemed to be the right man for the job. But sadly made an error in judgement in claiming for rent in a partner's house. I read somewhere (here?) that people in his constituency knew he was gay.

Is anyone else wondering if he didn't appear on QuestionTime on Thursday was because this was going to hit the press the next day? Not that I think that the Lib Cons should feel compelled to field a cabinet minister to be up against Alastair Campbell, of course.

Somerset

Jennifer_Jane wrote: »

I read somewhere (here?) that people in his constituency knew he was gay.

Didn't know and couldn't care less.

Read something on his constituency website that stunned me. He got a double first, assume he left university at 21/22. He 'retired' from banking aged 28, as a multi-millionaire. He made that much money in 6-7 years in banking? that's obscene. Or was it family money?

Gorgeous_George

FWIW, I have homosexual friends. I don't have thieves as friends.

If he paid £40K in rent, I trust his partner completed his tax returns properly.

GG

Jennifer_Jane

Somerset wrote: »

Didn't know and couldn't care less.

Read something on his constituency website that stunned me. He got a double first, assume he left university at 21/22. He 'retired' from banking aged 28, as a multi-millionaire. He made that much money in 6-7 years in banking? that's obscene. Or was it family money?

Your first line of this is a little harsh. I was making the point that the big 'secret' appears to be widely known, putting his reason for hiding things even less justifiable.

I understood he made his money from banking too. In addition it seems his partner was also a millionaire, no shortage of money on either side. So the whole thing appears to be about greed.

lvader

Jennifer_Jane wrote: »

Your first line of this is a little harsh. I was making the point that the big 'secret' appears to be widely known, putting his reason for hiding things even less justifiable.

I understood he made his money from banking too. In addition it seems his partner was also a millionaire, no shortage of money on either side. So the whole thing appears to be about greed.

Although he technically was breaking the rules, he could have made more money and not have broken the rules, that tells me it wasn't greed. To me it should be about value for money, I'd like to see a league table of expenses paid to MPs and top civil servants. If they are wasting money, I really don't care if it's legit or not, it's still wasting money.

tomterm8

Somerset wrote: »

Curious about what he could have claimed.

So are you sure, that had he been legit, both his partner's and his mortgage payments would have been covered by expenses ? (Btw there was no rent, he essentially claimed his 'landlord' charged him rent & utilities)

Carrying on that thought, if an MP buys a house for say 2 million in London, all of the interest expense is allowable ? ie no limit to interest or mortgage size ?

Carrying on again, if an MP (or partner) already had a second home in London with no mortgage for argument's sake. They can raise a mortgage on that previously unmortgaged property, for any reason ie fund a business, stick in a savings account, and the taxpayer will still fund the new mortgage interest, even though the mortgage is funding personal choices ?

So essentially having an MP for a partner is a ticket for a free ride ?

If the answer's are 'yes' there's something screwy in the system.

For the first set of questions, he could have nominated the flat as the primary residence, (not getting any expences for the flat), and then nominated pretty much any house he owns in his constituancy, where the mortgage would be paid. The fact he owns other houses would be irrelevant.

The partner would be entitled to live in that house rent free.

For the second set of questions, you do realise this is largely what the expenses scandle was about. MPs were buying very large, expensive homes, using public funds to redecorate them and refurbish them, and selling them on. The mortgage was paid by the public. They then sold the house, after a couple of years, and used tax loopholes so it was nearly tax free. They bought a new house, and repeated the process.

Many MPs made hundreds of thousands of pounds doing this.

drc

tomterm8 wrote: »

Well, there are very good reasons for not disclosing that you are gay in this country. I've seen gay men shouted at and screamed at in the street. And my own cousin had her house broken into and wrecked with gay hate slogans written on the wall in something disgusing. People who say the UK is tolerant are idiots. In large parts of the UK, you can still be assaulted, abused. or even killed for being gay.

I totally agree. The point I was making was that he was more afraid of being outed as gay than of being accused of theft. Ergo, being gay or being accused or being gay in vast sections of this country is still stigmatised which is really very sad in this day and age.

dealsearcher

Let's face it when the rules changed in 2006 he probably didn't look too closely at it. No questions had ever been asked before and so why should anything change? What's more just how probable was it that he would get into such an important position in government as a Lib Dem MP? He almost certainly didn't think it would ever be an issue.

Then of course everything changed ...

Somerset

tomterm8 wrote: »

For the first set of questions, he could have nominated the flat as the primary residence, (not getting any expences for the flat), and then nominated pretty much any house he owns in his constituancy, where the mortgage would be paid. The fact he owns other houses would be irrelevant.

Yep, I already knew that, but that argument only works if there's a large mortgage on the Yeovil property. We don't know that it even had a mortgage initially and when he raised money on it to contribute to his partner's later larger London property, the implication is it wasn't a huge contribution. So the interest he could claim wasn't neccessarily higher than the rent he did charge. Lots of people are saying he could have claimed more - specifically how ? Nobody knows what he could have claimed in practice (ie the size of his mortgage) but the statement keeps being bandied about.

The partner would be entitled to live in that house rent free.

For the second set of questions, you do realise this is largely what the expenses scandle was about. MPs were buying very large, expensive homes, using public funds to redecorate them and refurbish them, and selling them on. The mortgage was paid by the public. They then sold the house, after a couple of years, and used tax loopholes so it was nearly tax free. They bought a new house, and repeated the process.Many MPs made hundreds of thousands of pounds doing this.

Yep, I knew that but I thought there had been changes as a result of the expenses scandal ? Aren't these in the pipeline ?

On the last point, I cannot believe Ed Balls is even being allowed to stand in the Labour election after what he did.