Don't be blind-sided by the dosh - that was the original investigation. The Tory's are after her for 'breaches' of electoral law (ISTR not 'declaring' her 'main' 'residence').
Well I'm wrong about that according to various reports, including on the front page of the Times today. Baffles me slightly why the police would want to get into that and, given their relative lack of expertise on the topic, it's likely to result in a massive bill for the taxpayer in them engaging experts and seeking other outside advice. Naturally the cost of this investigation will exceed the alleged tax dodge many, many times over.
This is going from the sublime to the ridiculous! Allegedly, GMP have assigned 12 officers to spend the next few weeks examining a range of allegations! As I understand it the deputy leader of the opposition (unlike the leader of the opposition) has no constitutional position, and is effectively just another MP. Unless she is in the pay of a foreign government or running a massive crime syndicate from her kitchen, I don't understand why the police and HMRC are devoting so much time and resource. Funny thing is - I don't think it will move the political needle at all - if anything, she (and indirectly the Labour party) might get an element of sympathy vote
@UEA_Hornet: if, and by all the rumours it isn't a big 'if', this farce ends wiyj doscovering SFA - can the Tory gobshyte be charged by the GMP with 'wasting police time'?
No chance. They’d have to believe he made it up, which he could easily deny by saying he just read it in the Mail and did his duty as an MP to report it to the police.
The Telegraph front pages Rayner again and claims that a dozen detectives are working on the case, which seems fanciful.
I think this could backfire on the Tory lovin' media. What they're picking at here is something tens of thousands of normal people do every year - divorce, have complicated lives, disentangle their affairs, sell up and move on. @Moose alluded to this earlier. We're not talking mansions and fast cars here or millions flowing around. It's chump change for the exchequer and frankly in the absence of any evidence of a concerted and deliberate scheme not to pay it, I don't think most people will care.
In any line of work, if you count IT, admin, legal, even the canteen staff, you can make a pretty big team out of something small. It’s written in a way to imply 12 front line officers or even detectives are working on it, but it’s simple facts gathering for a couple and the rest is legal saying what the rules are (or clarifying with HMRC).
Saw a good comment from someone saying that for a potential scandal to cut through it has to be something the public can easily understand. So sexual misconduct, spying, clear bribes, banging up a load of innocent postmasters etc. This is something so complicated that even tax commentators say there are numerous different interpretations or possibilities. The Tories and their papers are having to work overtime to try and keep this running. As an aside, the complexity probably explains why everything going on at Teesside isn't a bigger story when that looks like corruption involving eye watering sums.
