One really important question remains unanswered
- Thread starter David Rose
- Start date
JoshW
Well-known member
mikem said:
fair enough. I guess perhaps naively I think that a system like that should be mostly able to be automated, and so an increase in number of people using the system, shouldn't require a proportionate increase in number of people running it. Maybe if we could get Serco to set the system up it'd run efficiently and effectively..
Stuart France
Active member
So none of you have yet heard of Making Tax Digital?
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/making-tax-digital/overview-of-making-tax-digital
This is HMRC?s latest wheeze to get you and business to do all the sums for them while Big Brother can poke around in your cloud accounts anytime it likes. The underlying big idea might be getting rid of swathes of HMRC staff whilst growing Big Government as it?s you that pays to rent the approved software to do things their way and file every little detail of it all for the delight of their algorithms.
It has already started with MTD for VAT, which as you might guess has been a cockup with goals abandoned or turned into some pretence of partially working, and in coming years MTD is moving on to MTD for income tax, MTD for company taxes?
But they won?t be able to get you to do ?MTD for Death Duties? after you?re dead, at least I don?t think so.
There might be an HMRC awaiting arrivals in hell, but there isn?t an HMRC in heaven surely?
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/making-tax-digital/overview-of-making-tax-digital
This is HMRC?s latest wheeze to get you and business to do all the sums for them while Big Brother can poke around in your cloud accounts anytime it likes. The underlying big idea might be getting rid of swathes of HMRC staff whilst growing Big Government as it?s you that pays to rent the approved software to do things their way and file every little detail of it all for the delight of their algorithms.
It has already started with MTD for VAT, which as you might guess has been a cockup with goals abandoned or turned into some pretence of partially working, and in coming years MTD is moving on to MTD for income tax, MTD for company taxes?
But they won?t be able to get you to do ?MTD for Death Duties? after you?re dead, at least I don?t think so.
There might be an HMRC awaiting arrivals in hell, but there isn?t an HMRC in heaven surely?
andrewmcleod
Well-known member
Stuart France said:
I have, but managed to avoid it. At one point it looked like I'd have to build a whole set of APIs for it for the open-source accounting software we use (which does a lot more as well, including stock control, the website, marketing stuff, staff timesheet - because massive monolithic systems are great, right?
). Fortunately it turned out there was some simple third-party software solution to push the output through. It probably involves spreadsheets or something equally horrific.
RobinGriffiths
Well-known member
Meanwhile it appears that the National Audit Office finds that the Tories have been awarding PPE contracts to their chums.
pwhole
Well-known member
That lugubrious creepy robot Alok Sharma was doing the breakfast TV rounds this morning doing his best to explain why it was really alright to give your mates the contracts, but sadly as he has the charisma and social appeal of an uncomfortable cushion, and the mendacity and overall intellectual sliminess of...well, Michael Gove, I was unable to stay on-message. Switching channels was no help, as he was on that one too. Oh, and that one too. Jeez! F*ck off! Kay Burley on Sky definitely doesn't like him, and I generally trust her judgement on character (especially after her speed-marathon doing the night-shift from Washington for the US elections - what a woman) - she just gave him the stony-face throughout like he'd pissed on her bathroom floor.
The trouble is, even when you want them to justify their corruption and confess their obvious and total guilt, they're such unbearable people that it's impossible to listen to them for more than two minutes - I think that's their plan. Most of my suggestions as to proper solutions to this 'problem' from now on will probably be judged controversial, if not illegal, so they'll have to remain unwritten on a public forum.
But I can state that some of them will involve voodoo, at least :halo:
Some more from Marina: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/nov/17/boris-johnson-saboteur-prime-minister-scottish-devolution
The trouble is, even when you want them to justify their corruption and confess their obvious and total guilt, they're such unbearable people that it's impossible to listen to them for more than two minutes - I think that's their plan. Most of my suggestions as to proper solutions to this 'problem' from now on will probably be judged controversial, if not illegal, so they'll have to remain unwritten on a public forum.
But I can state that some of them will involve voodoo, at least :halo:
Some more from Marina: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/nov/17/boris-johnson-saboteur-prime-minister-scottish-devolution
I actually read the report and it doesn?t say most of the things the media reported. What I read was a government department whose contracting capacity was overwhelmed (16 fold increase in contract value in a few weeks - no-one can do that). If you remember they asked to people to phone it in if they had a bright idea, so people did. Some having more go-getting spirit than others no doubt.
They used up all their pre-qualified suppliers capacity and had to run around the world. There will be mistakes.
As an aside, my brother-in-law is a senior manager at a large PPE company. He says it has been 24/7 from the get go and they are overwhelmed, as is every other company in the country. It?s not like there is spare capacity left lying around.
They used up all their pre-qualified suppliers capacity and had to run around the world. There will be mistakes.
As an aside, my brother-in-law is a senior manager at a large PPE company. He says it has been 24/7 from the get go and they are overwhelmed, as is every other company in the country. It?s not like there is spare capacity left lying around.
ZombieCake
Well-known member
Nothing too wrong with he dark arts. Had a friend into that stuff who was having unwanted attention from someone so I bought her a voodoo doll. She was well chuffed.
There does, however, seem to be more than sprinkling of cronyism and odd procurement processes. E.g. paying consultants ?7000 a day for flawed software seems incredibly irresponsible. This'll go on until the money finally runs out and the emperor has no new clothes.
pwhole
Well-known member
I couldn't say all politicians - there's plenty out there doing good work, but the system is so hopeless in terms of the public getting proper representation across each district that often any good work is prevented from even happening - because they couldn't get elected due to FPTP. I'm beginning that Labour are heading for an irrevocable split, which may be a good thing in the long-term. As long as PR is also delivered about the same time!
JoshW
Well-known member
mikem said:
That is open for gerrymandering still much like our existing system.
Agree with their policies or not Brexit party got 650,000 votes in 2019 (approx 2% of the vote) and have 0 representation. The greens got 870,000 (nearly 3% populations) and only have one seat out of 650. (0.15% population).
Proper proportional representation is needed to make votes actually matter
