Cont: Luton Airport Car Park Fire III

[W.D.Clinger]

Point me to the news article that confirms the model make and year of the vehicle concerned.

Please point me to evidence that it is unusual for the press not to report these particular details of car fires.

The 'red Vauxhall Corsa' that burnt down t'other day after colliding with another car to avoid a swan on the motorway (that mistook it for a river).

Based on that, only mentioning the model of car 50% of the time is normal.

What year was the Corsa? Are you suspicious they didn't tell you? What make, model and year was the other car? What colour was the swan?

One example, only mentioning make and model.

Still waiting for evidence it's unusual not to report make model and year.

Let's not forget the more important questions:

Was the Corsa electric, hybrid, petrol, or (like the vehicle in which the Luton car park fire began) diesel?

Was the other car electric, hybrid, petrol, or (like the vehicle in which the Luton car park fire began) diesel?

Was the swan electric, hybrid, petrol, or (like the vehicle in which the Luton car park fire began) diesel?

Has the swan's driver been identified? Did the swan catch fire?

The only way to answer those questions is to allege the ruling lizard people are protecting their blind registries of Anatidae by forbidding press coverage of these critical concerns.

 

[smartcooky]

Please tell us what constituency she represented.

She won't be able to.

 

[smartcooky]

Soz, she was the SECOND PERMANENT SECRETARY.

That doesn't answer Mojo's question

 

[smartcooky]

Yes, that is correct.

wiki

I erred when I labelled her an 'MP'.

Somebody put a frame around this post to mark this momentous day in the history of this forum.

Vixen admitted she was wrong!

 

[junkshop]

...I erred when I labelled her an 'MP'.

Everyone is well aware of that, and that it is not your first obvious error, nor even the most egregious.

 

[smartcooky]

Stop telling lies, I said no such thing. What I said was minister could cloak their affairs by labelling them 'blind', meaning they should step away from stewardship of their company/ financial interests whilst in office to obviate any concerns about conflicts of interest. This means, on the Ministerial Register, it has to be registered as being 'blind'. A blind arrangement still has to be registered.

As this arrangement is not supervised by anybody, we only have Sunak's word that his secretive company in the Caymans is no longer under his stewardship whilst he is PM. Likewise any other interests.

But he wasn't obliged to. He could have just as easily declared ALL of his financial interests, whilst at the same time still appointing a steward to take over his affairs whilst in office.

That is a bare faced lie. It is NOT what you claimed at all.

 

[Vixen]

That is a bare faced lie. It is NOT what you claimed at all.

Really? So how come I received an email from Good Law Project (to which I am subscribed) in March last year that starts:

Back in March, Rishi Sunak finally published a summary of his tax returns. It disclosed that he has a purportedly “blind management arrangement in place” which was run by a “single US-based investment fund.”

<snip>

This is why we put in a Freedom of Information (FOI) request to ask who this US-based fund manager is. Remarkably, the Cabinet Office has refused to provide answers, claiming that “the balance of the public interest favours withholding this information”.

It links to this article here: https://goodlawproject.org/rishi-sunak-transparency/

The claim that no way would Sunak conceal personal financial interests, 'as that would be criminal' is laughable, when Sunak recently 'wrote off' £10bn of public money.

Under explicit pressure from Rishi Sunak, judges have closed the door on legal challenges. They have said, remarkably, that there is no public interest in how public money gets spent.

Good Law Project email 9.9.23

So the ridiculous claim that I have no idea what a blind arrangements is your fiction to prop up your shaky hypothesis of a conspiracy theory. As you can see above Sunak can and does withhold information from the public and he is not at all answerable for doing so.

He is a businessman first and foremost and as such, of course he is protecting the Tata JLR brand. He doesn't want the public to identify JLR vehicles as being problematic because he is launching a massive JLR battery factory and plant with a multi-million pound taxpayer hand out to Tata. Not a conspiracy, a likely dead cert probability.

 

[JayUtah]

Really?

Really. Your reproduction of that message does not address your shifting claims as to what Sunak's financial arrangements are.

eSo the ridiculous claim that I have no idea what a blind arrangements is your fiction to prop up your shaky hypothesis of a conspiracy theory.

The claim that you have no idea what a blind trust is comes from evidence provided by you in the form of shifting, contradictory claims, consistent misuse of terms, and consistent conflation of concepts. That you can point to outside sources that do understand those concepts does not establish that you do.

You are clearly proposing that Sunak's interests are not truly blind and that he used his office improperly to benefit them.

 

[Vixen]

It's kind of interesting, then, that no one has objected to the announced license plate. I wonder if the owner of that plate has been contacted. If so, surely he would have reacted to the false identification -- unless he's the real owner.

It's a cute story you've worked up, but I think it's a wee bit fanciful that an EV afficionado, activist or lobbyist would have the wherewithal to create a video matching the vehicle shown in the other video, matching the car park and location of the vehicle and the extinguisher, all just to pick a random diesel model of the right make and publicize the plate number of that model. It does not seem probable to me.

I think the best strategy is not to take the video as weak-ass evidence for the coverup nor evidence for the identification of the vehicle -- since we don't really need to know what vehicle it was because we know that the investigators say the vehicle in question is a diesel ICE. Rather, the second video is simply irrelevant to the whole shebang.

Plenty of people expressed scepticism. The general consensus seems to be it was an Evoque. The thing about the numberplate could just be that the guy simply copied the video from instagram and thought he'd make a good guess as to what the numberplate read, cross-referencing it to DVLA. Problem is, look what happened in the case of the Australian mall knifer, someone erroneously identified the perp as completely the wrong person by trying to match google images to the media pictures coming out. I really don't understand why Foster Zygote, catsmate and Smart Cooky are absolutely convinced that the estimated numberplate is correct when none of them are able to provide a proper citation.

 

[junkshop]

The vehicle involved was diesel-powered – it was not a mild hybrid, plug-in hybrid or electric vehicle.

This statement is either true or not true.

Vixen: is this statement made by BF&RS true or not?

 

[JayUtah]

That is a bare faced lie. It is NOT what you claimed at all.

Not at all. First it was "their blind registers and tax havens." Then when corrected, she used "blind interests" for a while. Finally after enough people had told her what a blind trust actually is, she started using the correct word—although it's still not clear she knows what it means. She's still using "steward" when the proper term (even in the UK) is "trustee." Again, if you work with things professionally for very long before you start habitually using the correct language because your brain just doesn't easily think any other way.

Vixen makes a lot of hay about the notion that Sunak is the first PM to register a blind trust. Her interpretation is that all other ministers and MPs declared all their interests up front (first, that has never been required—only relevant interests), and that no blind trusts were used. The interpretation more in line with the facts is that members just started registering blind trusts after the Jonathan Djanogly fiasco last year. There was no requirement to register blind trusts, and there still is not. There is no evidence that blind trusts were previously unused. In fact, all the documentation regarding them insists that blind trusts are "longstanding" mechanisms used to manage conflicts of interest. If Sunak has chosen to register one—and sources seem to differ—that errs more on the side of disclosure than of concealment.

 

[GlennB]

...
and Smart Cooky
...

You've got his username wrong so many times - and been corrected - that I'm coming to the conclusion that it's deliberate. Why? Yet another way of seeking attention? Oh ... I just gave you some.

 

[JayUtah]

Problem is, look what happened in the case of the Australian mall knifer, someone erroneously identified the perp as completely the wrong person by trying to match google images to the media pictures coming out.

That's a very good argument for advising Internet armchair detectives to mind their own business.

 

[Foster Zygote]

I really don't understand why Foster Zygote, catsmate and Smart Cooky are absolutely convinced that the estimated numberplate is correct when none of them are able to provide a proper citation.

What's it like to be such a liar, with pants constantly on fire?

I'd ask you to show us any posts where we make any such claim to certainty, but you've already been challenged to do so. You would have if you could, but you know you can't, so you just pretend no one pointed out your lie and you continue making it. This is why you're arguments on this forum are regarded as a joke. You pretend to be knowledgeable of subjects about which you are actually ignorant and unqualified, you display a poor grasp of logic and evidence, and you regularly engage in dishonesty to avoid admitting that you're wrong.

 

[Vixen]

Not at all. First it was "their blind registers and tax havens." Then when corrected, she used "blind interests" for a while. Finally after enough people had told her what a blind trust actually is, she started using the correct word—although it's still not clear she knows what it means. She's still using "steward" when the proper term (even in the UK) is "trustee." Again, if you work with things professionally for very long before you start habitually using the correct language because your brain just doesn't easily think any other way.

Vixen makes a lot of hay about the notion that Sunak is the first PM to register a blind trust. Her interpretation is that all other ministers and MPs declared all their interests up front (first, that has never been required—only relevant interests), and that no blind trusts were used. The interpretation more in line with the facts is that members just started registering blind trusts after the Jonathan Djanogly fiasco last year. There was no requirement to register blind trusts, and there still is not. There is no evidence that blind trusts were previously unused. In fact, all the documentation regarding them insists that blind trusts are "longstanding" mechanisms used to manage conflicts of interest. If Sunak has chosen to register one—and sources seem to differ—that errs more on the side of disclosure than of concealment.

In Company Law a steward is anyone who runs a company or other legal entity but is not the owner of it, for example you might hire a CEO or other directors to run your business for you. That is what is meant by stewards.

Sunak didn't register as 'blind' because he was required to, he registered as 'blind' because he WANTED to: he didn't want people to know of his financial affairs so he took advantage of the 1799 Act of Parliament that enabled him to claim he was stepping away from any oversight or day to day handling of his business affairs. The act was intended to enable very wealthy and influential types to show their hands in front of them and say, hey, I no longer have a conflict of interest because I have stepped away. However, the converse is also true: it can be used to CLOAK conflicts of interest. Sunak only registered affairs as blind just before he became Chancellor of the Exchequer and around the same time a whole load of Moderna shares were bought up by the US steward of his firm. So the public therefore, knows nothing about the obvious conflicts of interest.

Do you really believe Sunak handing over his Infosys shares to his wife means he no longer has any interest in Infosys?

But what he does is legal and it will be up to Parliament to implement better transparency.

 

[JayUtah]

In Company Law a steward is anyone who runs a company or other legal entity but is not the owner of it...

Irrelevant. The proper term is still "trustee." A blind trust involves a trustee who manages an interest for a beneficiary while not disclosing the composition of the aggregated interest or the transactions involved. Those are the proper terms, even in the UK. Terms related to company governance are not relevant.

Sunak didn't register as 'blind' because he was required to, he registered as 'blind' because he WANTED to...

Agreed. He could have not reported it at all. This undermines your accusation that he must be hiding something.

So the public therefore, knows nothing about the obvious conflicts of interest.

You still don't seem to understand what a blind trust is.

Do you really believe Sunak handing over his Infosys shares to his wife means he no longer has any interest in Infosys?

Begging the question.

But what he does is legal and it will be up to Parliament to implement better transparency.

In the meantime, Sunak has taken steps himself to attain greater transparency. He could have not reported the blind trust at all. As Phiwum frequently notes, you don't seem to understand when evidence argues against your claims.

 

[phiwum]

Plenty of people expressed scepticism. The general consensus seems to be it was an Evoque. The thing about the numberplate could just be that the guy simply copied the video from instagram and thought he'd make a good guess as to what the numberplate read, cross-referencing it to DVLA. Problem is, look what happened in the case of the Australian mall knifer, someone erroneously identified the perp as completely the wrong person by trying to match google images to the media pictures coming out. I really don't understand why Foster Zygote, catsmate and Smart Cooky are absolutely convinced that the estimated numberplate is correct when none of them are able to provide a proper citation.

I don't recall any of them saying the reported license plate is correct. Do you have some citations of this?

As I said, the second video isn't particularly relevant. I'd wager that it's legitimate, just because it's so similar to the first video and while (publicly available) AI can do a lot, I don't think it can match a scene so well. I could be wrong about the capabilities of AI, but I doubt it.

But none of that matters. Our central question is not "Which car was it?" but rather "Was it an EV or hybrid?" Now, for this question, I'd say the relevant information comes from the fire investigators. Already, they have unequivocally stated that it is not a hybrid or EV.

You don't trust official press releases? Fine. You said you'd wait for the final report. Shouldn't you be withholding judgment rather than giving a toss about this video?

 

[welshdean]

Sorry, I am not sure our US, Aussie, Canuk and Kiwi friends understand how British politics work. Parliament is a gentleman's club and any errant MP is 'investigated' by another member or 'Select Committee' made up of same. Just look up the VIP fast lane scandal or google Mone and Barrowman, for examples. The only reason owing to 'Partygate', Boris Johnson and Sunak (plus re not wearing a seat belt in a political broadcast in a car) received a Fixed Penalty Notice was as a result of a lengthy investigation by fellow MP Sue Gray, who then advised the Met Police to do its thing, which it VERY reluctantly did a couple of years later.

1. the PM embargoing information is not a 'criminal conspiracy' as it within his remit to do so.

2. the PM hiding his business interests on the Ministerial Register as 'blind' is within the rules, so again, not a crime or a breach of rules.

3. none of this adds up to 'corruption', more a cynical taking advantage of the rules of the Gentleman's Club, in which Old Etonians and Wykehamists are considered to be inherently honourable and decent, old chap.

Have you been on the sherry?

 

[smartcooky]

You've got his username wrong so many times - and been corrected - that I'm coming to the conclusion that it's deliberate. Why? Yet another way of seeking attention? Oh ... I just gave you some.

I've 'ad worse!

 

[Mojo]

So the public therefore, knows nothing about the obvious conflicts of interest.

Note that Vixen is now accusing Sunak of lying in his entry on the parliamentary register.