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Jo Maugham

@JolyonMaugham

Mar 8

If you want to know how much £££ the favoured few were making from PPE contracts, and you do, then buckle up. 🧵

This judgment concerns the purchase by Uniserve Limited of 80 million IIR masks from a company called Hitex. The contract was dated 21 April 2020.
bailii.org/ew/cases/EWHC/…

Uniserve was a VIP (gov.uk/government/new…) and was introduced by Lord Agnew (a Tory Peer who quit after complaining about pandemic fraud). It also had links to Health Minister Julia Lopez (julialopez.co.uk/news/visiting-…) and they share the same address.

Read 14 tweets

Jo Maugham

@JolyonMaugham

Mar 8

Back in the day, I used to argue tax avoidance cases in court. Those cases were about making 'investments', usually in films, which would generate a loss (of eg 100) for accounting purposes which you would match against your income (of eg 100) so you paid tax on 0 not on 100.

These arrangements, which were politely called 'structured finance', were put together by clever financial engineers for a cut of the total investment of, maybe 5%, which they shared with the IFAs of the individuals who had those 100s of income they didn't want to pay tax on.

Anyway, they made some strange film choices - I saw a scheme where the poorer the box office of the film the better off the individual because he* got more losses for the same money - but the films they chose always had one thing in common.

Read 7 tweets

Jo Maugham

@JolyonMaugham

Mar 5

I usually ignore the lawyers who po-facedly complain about being blocked by me. But, illustratively, let's look at Joe Rich. I'm not aware I've ever been impolite to him but in the last year alone...

Read 8 tweets

Jo Maugham

@JolyonMaugham

Mar 5

Two hard truths about lawyers and Oligarchs. 🧵

First hard truth. It's generally fine to criticise lawyers - barristers and solicitors - for acting for Oligarchs.

Solicitors always get to choose who they act for. Some barristers do (nobly) abide by the cab rank rule - but many do not. They act for who will pay their fees.

Yes, criticising lawyers for acting for Oligarchs theoretically undermines access to justice and equality before the law which is a genuinely important foundation of the law.

Read 12 tweets

Jo Maugham

@JolyonMaugham

Mar 5

We've done a pretty thorough sweep of Tory Russian donors declared with the Electoral Commission and, we believe, not even one is on the Government's sanctions list.

Wouldn't want to bite the hand that feeds, I guess.

Still enjoying this splendid self-own from the firm founded by a Chair of the Tories.

Anyone care to venture a theory as to why none of his clients have been sanctioned?

The sanctions list is here (gov.uk/government/pub…) and then you cross check names against Tory donors here (search.electoralcommission.org.uk/?currentPage=1…).

Read 4 tweets

Jo Maugham

@JolyonMaugham

Mar 2

The sheer mendacity of this Government is quite breath-taking.

Back in June last year we revealed the existence of the VIP lane for test and trace. Government said the claims were "completely false" and there was "no separate fast track process."

Heather Wheeler has now confirmed that £6bn of Test and Trace money was spent on "priority referrals for covid testing."

And as the Guardian has reported, internal emails talked about test and trace offers getting the "VIP treatment." theguardian.com/world/2021/jul…

Read 6 tweets

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