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Stephen_Hunts

Listed below are comments made by Stephen_Hunts between Wednesday, 3rd June 2009 and Friday, 19th June 2009.

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Censored: From pergola to dishwasher 10:28pm on 19 Jun 2009 Dear Tony,
I remember when we used to share that office and plan how one day we would get our mate Pete "things can only get better" Mandelson to reinvent that nasty left wing party.
Well we did it didn't we? We made friends with all the right people like Oasis and Ross Kemp and we showed those Tories we could be more like them than they were!
Then you let me run the economy and get rid of that boom and bust thing and you made friends with George Bush cos he's a cowboy and he's got loads of guns. We even started a war and not many people can say that can they?
A few years ago I remembered that you said you would let me have a go at being the manager but you said I was too miserable and didn't smile all the time like you and I could only do it if I went to smiley school. So I did and I got really good at it, even if it is jolly hard work! Then you said you wouldn't let me be manager because nobody liked me. Well I got all my friends together and they showed you Mr Teflon (what is that?)
Well now I have had my turn and things have really gone well so far. I knew that by not telling people things or just pretending then doing something else was much better than being hon....hon... hon... no I can't say it.
You will never guess what has happened at our house though? Some naughty boys have been buying things by pinching the money that was supposed to be used for really useful things like hospitals. We tried to blame it on the head boy but he just left in a moody.
Anyway I have decided that the best thing to do is hang on till next year because we had some elections and 15% of people want me to. That's good isn't it? Then I might give you another turn if you want.
Your best friend
Gordon
MPs' expenses: Your e-mails 7:48pm on 19 Jun 2009 Dear Tony,
I remember when we used to share that office and plan how one day we would get our mate Pete "things can only get better" Mandelson to reinvent that nasty left wing party.
Well we did it didn't we? We made friends with all the right people like Oasis and Ross Kemp and we showed those Tories we could be more like them than they were!
Then you let me run the economy and get rid of that boom and bust thing and you made friends with George Bush cos he's a cowboy and he's got loads of guns. We even started a war and not many people can say that can they?
A few years ago I remembered that you said you would let me have a go at being the manager but you said I was too miserable and didn't smile all the time like you and I could only do it if I went to smiley school. So I did and I got really good at it, even if it is jolly hard work! Then you said you wouldn't let me be manager because nobody liked me. Well I got all my friends together and they showed you Mr Teflon (what is that?)
Well now I have had my turn and things have really gone well so far. I knew that by not telling people things or just pretending then doing something else was much better than being hon....hon... hon... no I can't say it.
You will never guess what has happened at our house though? Some naughty boys have been buying things by pinching the money that was supposed to be used for really useful things like hospitals. We tried to blame it on the head boy but he just left in a moody.
Anyway I have decided that the best thing to do is hang on till next year because we had some elections and 15% of people want me to. That's good isn't it? Then I might give you another turn if you want.
Your best friend
Gordon
MPs: The missing information 11:58am on 19 Jun 2009 Leading by example.
There is milking the system and there is blatant dishonesty. A government which keeps telling us we are all on the database, being watched, about to be on ID cards and DNA databases in order to control our lives more and more can't be surprised when we want to know about them.

If only they applied some of the rules they set for others to themselves they might go some way towards gaining our respect.

Copied from the DWP Website:

How the government is tackling benefit theft
Other things the government is doing to stamp out benefit theft include:

setting standards for checking Housing Benefit and Council Tax Benefit claims and giving Local Authorities access to government information
requiring more evidence when people apply for a National Insurance number or claim benefits
cross checking benefit and HM Revenue & Customs (HMRC) records to find benefit cheats.
Censored: From pergola to dishwasher 11:28am on 19 Jun 2009 Incidentally, has anybody calculated what percentage of claims are made during March in order to use up as much of their allowances as they can before the end of the financial year? I've got a funny feeling I might know the answer to that one.
Censored: From pergola to dishwasher 11:25am on 19 Jun 2009 Remember that the food claims (unreceipted)relate only to an MPs time spent at their second home. ie. the one they need to have to carry out Parliamentary duties. They mostly argue that their second home is the one where they spend the least time (Jackie Smiths main home is her Sisters spare room, for instance)
We should therefore conclude that we are paying for food for the days of the week when they are NOT in Parliament in a large number of cases. Political logic at its finest.
MPs' expenses: Your e-mails 10:57am on 19 Jun 2009 I love Boilerplated. He's top Beelzebub in the Devils Advocates Club.

Now, must be off, Jonathan Djanogly (Conservative maj. 12,847)has made me some jam.
MPs' expenses: Your e-mails 5:37pm on 18 Jun 2009 I've just been looking a local MPs expenses Jonathan Djanogly the MP for Huntingdon. The more I read, the angrier I'm getting. The claim form clearly states that expenses should be wholly, exclusively and necessarily incurred to enable you to stay away overnight away from your only or main home for the purpose of performing your Parliamentary duties.That's plain to me and makes sense.Mr Djanogly is a Solicitor by profession and therefore cannot claim to have not understood the meaning of those words.

The fact that one claim includes £3000 for backdated food without receipts and £800 for 8 weeks cleaning (now that is a well paid cleaner) without receipts is bad enough. The same claim however includes dusters (if I was being paid £100 a week for a bit of cleaning I'd supply my own pigging dusters)candles (wholly, exclusively and necessarily?) and £47 worth of jam making equipment!! Add to that over £550 on saucepans that I assume are never used by the rest of the family who happen to live in his second home (exclusively)

When MPs say they were acting within the rules THEY ARE LYING. They only have to read their own bloody claim form to know they were breaking the rules.

Mr Djanogly, please tell us who you were paying £100 a week to without a receipt for cleaning your house. Any hand written scrap would have done. You managed to get receipts for the (wholly, exclusively and necessarily) removal of leaves.
Censored: From pergola to dishwasher 5:18pm on 18 Jun 2009 I've just been looking a local MPs expenses Jonathan Djanogly the MP for Huntingdon. The more I read, the angrier I'm getting. The claim form clearly states that expenses should be wholly, exclusively and necessarily incurred to enable you to stay away overnight away from your only or main home for the purpose of performing your Parliamentary duties. That's plain to me and makes sense. Mr Djanogly is a Solicitor by profession and therefore cannot claim to have not understood the meaning of those words.

The fact that one claim includes £3000 for backdated food without receipts and £800 for 8 weeks cleaning (now that is a well paid cleaner) without receipts is bad enough. The same claim however includes dusters (if I was being paid £100 a week for a bit of cleaning I'd supply my own pigging dusters. Candles (wholly, exclusively and necessarily?) and £47 worth of jam making equipment!! Add to that over £550 on saucepans that I assume are never used by the rest of the family who happen to live in his second home (exclusively)

When MPs say they were acting within the rules THEY ARE LYING. They only have to read their own bloody claim form to know they were breaking the rules.

Mr Djanogly, please tell us who you were paying £100 a week to without a receipt for cleaning your house. Any hand written scrap would have done.
Last chance 3:39pm on 03 Jun 2009 Ref #358
"telling us that Cameron doesn't have any polices whilst he doesn't tell us any of his own"

Oh this government has a truckload of policies.
Borrow more money in 12 months than the previous 300 years put together.
Spend more money on advisers, quangos and spin doctors.
Refuse to even contemplate cuts in the morbidly obese public sector
Ringfence and protect the huge (and unfunded)commitment to public sector pensions
Continue to pretend that we are still the planet's policemen
Procrastinate for years about renewable energy to the point where we have no option but to build nuclear power stations
Snoop into every aspect of peoples lives and keep the details on insecure databases.
And of course all of this, plus god knows how much more, whilst stealing from the people who put them in power.
Lead by example they say. Come on all you benefit cheats, fill your boots. If cabinet ministers can get away with it so can you!
Last chance 10:00am on 03 Jun 2009 Governments always leave the country in a mess, that's why they get voted out. I know this is stating the obvious but there seem to be so many comments on blogs saying "you can't let them get in because look what they did last time" That's party politics and like it or loathe it, that's what we've got.
The alternative is to vote a government back in we know to be doing a bad job.
Replace it with a swathe of independents? With 10% of the vote between all of the rest in 2005, not very likely.

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