Tag Archives: Alok

Tory ministers have been burning public money on expensive luxuries, says Labour

Rich kid Rishi Sunak: if he wants to stay in five-star hotels, why not put some of his own fortune into it, rather than spending on himself the public cash he keeps telling us is in such short supply.

It’s bad enough when the Tories hire private planes at huge expense to visit foreign countries – often for climate crisis summit meetings – but this shows it’s habitual.

And Tory protests that the spending is all on the record do not defend their position.

Here it is:

Labour is launching a campaign accusing government ministers and officials of spending taxpayer-funded credit cards on luxury travel and hotels, claiming they are using public money “like a cash machine”.

It states that [Rishi] Sunak stayed in the five-star Hotel Danieli in Venice when attending the G20 meeting of finance ministers in July 2021 as chancellor, with more than £4,500 spent on accommodation for Sunak and his aides.

[Greg] Hands is also singled out for staying for two nights in the £318 per night five-star Grand Hotel Petersberg in Koenigswinter, Germany, in order to attend a private gathering of European policymakers. Alok Sharma is listed as staying in a series of five-star hotels in Berlin, Saigon, Tianjin and twice in Seoul – at costs of up to £255 per night – during the 66 trips he made as Cop26 president. Labour said it cost at least £220,817 for his travel and hotels.

Under Sunak, the Treasury also hired a £3,600 chauffeur service for ministers and officials visiting Cop26 in November 2021. The same chauffeur service was hired by Nadhim Zahawi’s department for £1,040 during his own trip to Cop26.

Former minister Nigel Adams is named as spending £9,289 on a visit to Japan in July 2022 in order to “confirm the UK’s commitment to the Osaka Expo”, which takes place in 2025. Adams announced he was leaving the government five and a half weeks after the trip. Labour said a late request for an official from the Department for International Trade to accompany him added an extra £8,110 flight to the costs of the trip.

In 2012, the public accounts committee (PAC) criticised the use of five-star hotels and expensive transport costs.

Yes.

This is your money the Tories are spending on themselves – at a time when living costs are tight for you.

Instead of tightening their own belts and sharing your ordeal, they are rubbing your nose in it.

Because these entitled, over-privileged rich kids think they deserve it just for existing – and that you don’t, for the same reason.

Source: Tory ministers accused of five-star lifestyle and using public money ‘like a cash machine’ | Conservatives | The Guardian

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COP-26 will be cop-OUT as politicians ramp up hypocrisy in the face of climate catastrophe

Heat death: this was Siberia – LAST YEAR. The far north had experienced its hottest temperatures ever, with fires breaking out across the world. But the Tories saw no need to adapt to climate change and Keir Starmer had abandoned Labour’s policies to deal with it.

Our planet will burn because we elected selfish, greed-driven hypocrites who are in league with the fossil-fuel moguls.

That is the message conveyed by Alok Sharma, and he should know because he is one of the principal selfish, greed-driven hypocrites behind it.

Don’t believe his guff about “this” being “the moment” to stop a climate change catastrophe – he has admitted that he supports the start of more fossil fuel projects in the UK and funded by UK cash.

This is the man who will host COP-26, this year’s climate change summit. He’ll merrily tell all the other politicians that they must switch to green energy immediately; they’ll say, “Oh, but we’ve got this multi-billion [name the money unit of your choice] project on the go, it’s a huge investment that will create jobs for the plebs and MASSIVE PROFITS for us,” and he’ll say: “Oh, that’s all right then, You go ahead.”

See if I’m right.

And it’s not just the Tories of this world. Nicola Sturgeon just met a climate change protester and said to her face that she would not oppose a new oilfield in the North Sea.

She’s got issues (to consider). Truer words were never spoken – in defence of the indefensible.

The reason for this hypocrisy is well-known. These politicians are capitalists in a capitalist system that demands – no, requires – more and more of the planet must be exploited, and more of it used as a rubbish dump for pollution, in order to ensure that fewer and fewer people can have the very best of everything.

Here’s environmental journalist George Monbiot to explain:

You won’t hear that from Alok Sharma! The reason is clear: he is a part of the problem.

What’s the result of all this doubletalk and dithering?

Stress.

People are getting increasingly concerned about this – to the point where it is becoming too much for them to handle, so they’re switching off.

Isn’t that exactly what unscrupulous political operators like Sharma (certainly) and Sturgeon (possibly) want?

Over the last few years – decades, possibly – we have seen the political atmosphere in the UK heated to a point where people have been breaking.

Benefit claimants – particularly the long-term sick and disabled – have been driven to despair and suicide by conditions that the Tories in government created (people like Iain Duncan Smith, David Cameron, Stephen Crabb, Damian Green, Theresa May, David Gauke, Esther McVey, Amber Rudd, Boris Johnson and Therese Coffey, along with all their deputies) – not because they had to, but because they wanted to.

Brexit was an invented stressor.

Covid-19? The Tories had spent years weakening the UK’s defence against a pandemic, and when it hit, we were stuck with the most pathetically inept prime minister in the UK’s history, using the crisis not as an opportunity for excellence but as a chance to funnel huge amounts of public money to his personal friends and donors who provided nothing in return, and to pile on the stress for the rest of us by telling us we have to pay for it.

There are many more examples – including climate change.

For millions of people, it is too much. They are switching off – not just their TVs and radios, but their minds. They can’t face it. They want somebody else to come along and make it better.

But nobody will. What these people are really doing is handing the planet over to people like Alok Sharma.

And he’s handing it over to people who’ll happily watch the rest of us burn if it makes them an extra farthing in the short-term.

The message is clear, and it will be hugely unwelcome to those who are switching off. It is this:

Nothing will get better if you walk away.

It will only get worse.

If you run away and hide from it because you’re afraid that bad things will happen to you in the short term, then just you remember – always – that you are making sure that bad things will happen to you in the long term. And that future is accelerating towards you at a terrifying pace.

So you have to ask yourself a question:

Are you really such a craven coward?

Do you really think you will be happier – you, personally; this isn’t about other people. They’ll be affected but you will as well, and it’s you that you’re worried about if you’re running away from this – to leave the big decisions to those who have ushered in the floods, fires and heatwaves that have already caused so much harm, with worse to follow?

Yes, you are right to be terrified by this.

But if you do nothing, then you are contributing to it. You are supporting it. You are saying you want it.

Think about it.

Then do the right thing.

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Let’s do the Brexit ‘hokey-cokey’: supermarkets told to stockpile food after Sharma said no

Remember this? It won’t be toilet roll that’s missing from supermarket shelves in January if they follow Alok Sharma’s advice – it will be food.

I had not realised how badly business minister Alok Sharma embarrassed himself on Monday’s breakfast media round.

Only a few hours ago, as I type this, he told the nation – well, see for yourself:

It turns out he was directly contradicting the government of which he is the business minister! See:

The UK government is reported to have warned supermarkets to stockpile food and other essential supplies amid increasing fears of a no-deal Brexit in less than three weeks’ time.

And in anticipation of shortages prompted by a no-deal, ministers have told supermarkets to start stockpiling goods.

Food producers have warned supplies of fresh vegetables will be worst hit if tariffs were imposed on goods in the event of a no-deal. They say shortages could last for at least three months.

If that is accurate, then Sharma’s advice is borderline criminal.

He was telling supermarkets not to stock up on vital food, despite having been warned of a shortage in the very near future.

He was telling the nation’s grocers to starve the people of the UK.

Source: Supermarkets ‘told to stockpile food’ as fears grow of no-deal Brexit | Brexit | The Guardian

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Sharma bid to BORE us all into ‘no deal’ Brexit fails miserably

Alok Sharma: I’ve cartoonised the pic of him and he’s STILL wearing a sneer on his face!

What kind of preparation do Tory ministers undergo before appearing on the morning media round, spouting their nonsense? Preparation H?

As a friend said to me after Alok Sharma’s humiliation today (December 14): “He’s got to be buttsore after that!”*

Sharma had appeared on BBC Radio 4’s Today programme, where presenter Nick Robinson listened to his claims that the UK could end up with an Australia-style trade deal with the EU, then delivered a comprehensive shafting:

Now, it is bad enough when a politician fails to answer a question that they could reasonably have expected to come their way.

But when that person then traipses to other studios and fails to answer other questions in the same way, it is a calamity.

So, for example, we had this:

And this:

And this:

(Anybody remember trying to find toilet rolls in supermarkets, back in March and April? That was a fun game, wasn’t it?)

And, indeed, this:

Some have suggested that perhaps Sharma was hoping to send us off to sleep by droning at us…

Despite the fact that Sharma was sent out with a message that all is well and no matter what happens in the trade negotiations with the EU, people here in the UK will be able to get on with their lives as normal, we came away with the following information:

Boris Johnson’s Conservative government is still lying to us about the threat of trading with the EU on WTO rules, by saying it will be an “Australia-style” deal. The Aussies don’t have a deal with the EU.

Business will face the imposition of huge import/export tariffs and Johnson’s Cons are not providing the information they need, if they are to be prepared.

Shoppers can expect the price of their groceries to rise by five per cent and this will be a disaster for people who have a limited budget.

There will be shortages of some products, meaning shops – and shoppers – will try to stockpile them… and this will make the shortages of these products worse.

And…

Alok Sharma is an imbecile.

Some Twitter wits have enjoyed themselves at his expense:

But it’s cold comfort. We all know that, in the end, it is the public who will suffer as a result of Sharma’s incompetence.

* Preparation H is a well-known treatment for haemorrhoids.

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Sharma joins the ranks of MPs who’ve shamed themselves over football

Alok Sharma: this is the only image I have of him and he’s not worth the bother of making another.

Why do they do it?

MPs – especially Tory MPs – seem to think they have to pretend to be “of the people” – and that the best way to establish this pretence is by saying they like, follow and support their local football teams – even though they don’t.

David Cameron tried it and got the name of his team wrong.

Now Alok Sharma:

It was bad enough he tried to cover up Boris Johnson’s “no deal” Brexit by calling it an “Australia-style” deal in the same interview.

This blew any credibility he had left.

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

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‘Australia deal’ or ‘no deal’? It’s all semantics, says Sharma

Alok Sharma: I’ve cartoonised the pic of him so he doesn’t look too contagious. The alternative would have been an image of a pilchard.

Alok Sharma – what a gift to satire.

Today (October 19) he was on the radio, gifting us with his interpretation of the kind of Brexit trade deal Boris Johnson is likely to hand British businesses:

No deal. But he tried to dress it up by calling it an “Australia-style” deal.

How did he think he’d get away with it?

Nick Ferrari on LBC made him look the fool he is:

“It’s a question of semantics”!

For those who are unfamiliar with the term, semantics is the branch of language and logic concerned with meaning; Sharma was admitting that an “Australia-type” deal and “no deal” are the same.

He was just – desperately – trying to dress it up to pretend that it wasn’t; a last-ditch bid to fool the less attentive or less well-read among the radio audience.

I don’t think it worked:

You’d probably get a better answer from a pilchard.

Have YOU donated to my crowdfunding appeal, raising funds to fight false libel claims by TV celebrities who should know better? These court cases cost a lot of money so every penny will help ensure that wealth doesn’t beat justice.

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