Damn. These are Eastern Europe levels of corruption. Has it only gotten this bad in the past few years or were Cameron/Blair/Major etc. just better at hiding it?
No, it got significantly worse for two reasons:
Trump showed that operating outside morals or regulations had no consequences, political or financial.
A kleptrocrat is now in the highest office, instead of just pulling strings.
I agree with the first point but Rishi definitely isn't the first kleptrocrat in the job (he might be the richest, but not the first), we have a glorious (/s) history of being ruled over by the rich and privileged (not only in parliament, but the rest of government and of course the royals).
You are correct in essence, I was taking a bit of a shortcut, but Rishi is definately unique in that he is a step up in wealth compared to the traditional Old Boys Network. Ironically that's the only level up the UK has accomplished since Boris XD
So yes, the rich and privileged have always been the ruling class, once the Millionaires get replaced by billionaires the rules, and playing field, changes dramatically.
I think probably a bit of both. The Conservatives seem to have done away with the concept of political embarrassment except as a political tool in itself.
I think we've been on a quick spiral towards seeing just how much the electorate would deal with.
There are deep parallels with Trumpists and Brexiteers in that their following is almost religious. Pair this with the fact that the UK doesn't have a constitution, and we've found that it doesn't actually matter if a PM is found to have misled parliament or have been charged by the police for an offence. Politicians can get away with whatever they want, including breaking the law, and people will still rather vote for them.
Is anybody really surprised that a billionaire politician abuses his office to make more money? That is the Number One reason why those people go into politics - to be able to distribute the pork barrels directly, without the need to pay other politicians like they normally do.
And this one didn't even need to get elected (tbf neither did the last 2, or is it 3?), they just sit there and wait their turn at playing leader, when they do their best to fill their pockets by picking apart public services.
What a happy coincidence.
What fortuitous luck!
the tories are so corrupt it'd be comical if it wasn't so sad
The UK populace is making a run at the throne for dumbest electorate in the world. USA has been the undisputed champ for years, but UK swinging!
To be fair its not like the public even voted Sunak in, they voted Boris in and we then got the Tory's hand me downs (not that Boris was any better, granted)
you don't vote for the prime minister, you vote for the party. no prime minister gets their position because the public wants them to. it's an actual illusion of choice
Very few people in the UK ever vote a PM into power, and even those people only vote them in as an MP, technically.
as bad as Truss was she at least fucked off before completely driving the country down the shitter
Bring back Theresa May!
Steady now
Can you imagine? She actually would be an improvement, it's ridiculous how bad the Tories are.
Of all the family values to export out of India, corruption and nepotism seem to be on top of Murthy family's list.
ps : Sunak's wife and Narayan Murthy's daughter had avoided paying taxes on her nearly $1-billion fortune. Infoys also has a history of tax issues in a number of jurisdictions, including UK.
Fuck Billionaires
with a spiny cactus
sideways
This is the main reason why millionaires/billionaires become politicians.
Please tell me this shit is illegal?!
It's illegal for the poor, not the rich.
Never mind
cries in capitalism
Let me put things this way: In the UK all investigation and prosecution of Corruption is the sole responsability of the Serious Fraud Office.
Ever since the 80s, almost every single year under governments of the 2 major parties and even a cohalition one with the 3rd largest party, the funding of the SFO has fallen in real terms, to the point that it's now at the level of the funding of a town council.
Just as recently as 2017 (if I remember the year correctly) the head of the SFO said they could only afford to prosecute a single large case per year.
By the way these are also the guys with responsability for prosecuting fraud, including Financial Fraud, in a country with over 50 million people, the 6th largest GDP in the World (last I checked) and were 17% of GDP comes from the Finance Industry (to give you a feeling of the size of it).
(Remember, they have the budged of a town council, maybe a small city one, to uphold the multiple areas of the Law, and do so for the whole country)
So of course there are no corrupt people in Britain, because nobody ever gets investigated for it much less prossecuted and convicted and if you ever point at anybody as corrupt there, they'll crack down on you using Libel Legislation (which is so broad I remember this one time not that long ago that an Ukranian Oligarch used British Courts - which took the case - to punish an Ukrainian website who had a post in ukranian accusing him of corruption in Ukraine and the British judges in a British High Court took the case because "it could be accessed from Britain").
yet another tory pm resigns in shame when?
If a Tory resigns every time they do something corrupt we'd get through them pretty quickly.
Modern Tories have no shame.
Wow. This is worse than George Bush Jr!
Does this qualify as Insider Trading?
In a literal theft from the people sense? Yes. In reality? No, he's rich so he can do what he wants. Laws are to keep us poor in check, not to be fair.
Of course not!
He is clearly just a master negotiator and very savvy businessman!
Anyone could do what he has done if they just worked harder, we’re born into wealth and married the daughter of a billionaire.
It also helps to have zero morals/ ethics.
Insider trade?
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