Will #PanamaFrank be discussed on #drivetimerte, or are the heads in the bunker still trying to come up with some cover story.?
— Ger Mccann (@ger_mccann) April 4, 2016
Frank ‘Panama Frank‘ Flannery (top), Fine Gael strategist and constant presence on RTÉ, currently silent on his tax position.
Frank Flannery unable to explain documents on £250,000 deposit (Irish Times)
Previously: Frank Flannery on Broadsheet
Earlier: Selective
I’d say RTE is frantically working out how to ignore or spin this story because sure as hell won’t upset any Irish big wigs mixed up in it.
It’s almost expected these days that RTE will smokescreen news of corruption unless it involves the Shinners.
Will there be a Special Criminal Court trial for white collar criminals who are just as likely to intimidate jurors as any gangland type. They just use the state to do it, friends in the cops pulling you over and threatening you.
Reel in the conspiracy bits, you were doing so well.
It IS true though. You just don’t like the Shinners but you can’t deny the state sponsored campaign against them.
We must meet fire with fire!
We must campaign against the Sta… wait no, never mind.
Against the Shinners or against the IRA?
You really should avoid the tribalism. You help the likes of Flannery (obv making no judgement on the Panama case until full facts emerge) when you bring up SF in this context.
White collar crime investigation should be far better resourced & the system should pursue tax evaders hard – whether they are FG, SF or anything else.
The cover story he’s come up with.. goes a little something like Manuel’s from Barcelona.. ‘I know noooo-ting’.
More like Frank was only resting the sick kids money somewhere warm.
Yeah, the internet. If you don’t have the full news story the day a story breaks, you are failing…. pfffft!
I’ll give RTE a bit of credit, and all the other news providers who did not have the inside story to this, like the Irish Times has had.
They’ll get to the story, I’m sure, but I would prefer if they didn’t just rush into it, and if doinjg a piece on any individual, I’d prefer to see a researched piece rather than something that was crammed together since this story broke, less than 24 hrs ago, and the time of Claire Byrne Live tonight.
Shurrrrrrrrrrrup Ger
Precisely. Anyone who has evaded tax should rightly be taken to task. But you need to be prudent and ensure a crime has actually occured, e.g. it is not illegal to have offshore accounts or own shell companies – what is illegal is using these to evade tax.
So lets wait before we throw the rotten fruit
Yeah, it’s not a criminal investigation they’re expecting from RTÉ, surely reporting this is in the public interest? And counterpoint the smokescreen of non-shinner corruption is surely the excellent exposé on the councillors late last year
It’s not the first time the Frankster has been involved in funny business. http://www.irishtimes.com/news/politics/rehab-paid-frank-flannery-company-351-000-in-fees-1.1848194
” e.g. it is not illegal to have offshore accounts ”
It isn’t illegal to have wads of cash stuffed under your mattress either.. but if someone finds it, we’re entitled to ask, where’d it come from.
absolutely
Great we’re in agreement Harold.
When you don’t have enough mattresses, and the wads are too big.. what do you think the purpose of an offshore account is Harold?
I don’t know, that’s my point :) Good law assumes nothing
Why are you entitled to know where the cash someone has stuffed down their mattress has come from?
I suppose it depends on the amount and the suspicion but maybe it’s no ones business.
But to integrate large quantities of cash into the financial system, e.g. large purchases, bank lodgement can require source of funds confirmation – worked in AML for some time and it tends to make you suspicious of large lumps of cash!
“Why are you entitled to know where the cash someone has stuffed down their mattress has come from? ”
Why is tax evasion and bribes bad Rotsey?
The fact you assume money in a matress or a tea cosy equals bribes and tax evasion illustrates harrys point.
Offshore accounts Rotsey.. the comparison of a mattress is an analogy.
How do you think the likes of Putin would acquire wealth in the region of 2 billion?
Does his salary pay that much?
Won it at the horses perhaps? A few dig outs maybe?
Here you go – how to hide a billion..
http://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/03/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-panama-papers
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/dec/21/russia.topstories3
Makes our many corrupt politicians look small time
Isle of man – escrow account..
http://www.irishtimes.com/business/commercial-property/frank-cushnahan-claims-he-was-owed-7-7m-over-nama-sale-1.2554864
On a recording broadcast on BBC Northern Ireland’s Spotlight programme last night, Mr Cushnahan is heard saying about Mr Coulter: “He actually moved £6 million of it into an escrow account.”
One of the businessmen replies, “Do you know his biggest mistake? He put it into an account in his own name.”
When you have officials in Nama taking bribes – as claimed by Mick Wallace and you have these huge fixer fees to insiders, these greedy fuppsh*tes have to hide their money somewhere..
There you have Frank Cushnahan saying Coulter made a mistake by putting the account in his own name.
http://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/03/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-panama-papers
Where is it based?
The firm is Panamanian but runs a worldwide operation. Its website boasts of a global network with 600 people working in 42 countries. It has franchises around the world, where separately owned affiliates sign up new customers and have exclusive rights to use its brand. Mossack Fonseca operates in tax havens including Switzerland, Cyprus and the British Virgin Islands, and in the British crown dependencies Guernsey, Jersey and the Isle of Man.
As Franky said, Coulter made a big mistake putting the account in his own name. Anyone trying to hide money doesn’t do this apparently.
http://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/03/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-panama-papers
The hidden owners
Where does the money flowing offshore come from? The information is hard to discover because real owners usually hide behind nominees, people with no real control and no assets in the company who simply lend their signature.
Yeah Harry, like you’d say that if this was a Shinner.
One of the old boys club, must be protected at all costs!!
I’m not stupid so I would say if you want to make a conviction you wouldn’t prejudice the case. And, call me old fashioned, but I believe in the presumption of innocence and the right to a good name that goes along with it. You may want to rely on it sometime in the future yourself :)
Think Tish, think
Here’s Brian Lucey talking about this this morning on RTE with Sean O’Rourke.
http://www.rte.ie/radio/utils/radioplayer/rteradioweb.html#!rii=b9_10552433_15036_04-04-2016_
The golden circle rolls on….
he need not worry .. which im sure he isnt .. there’s no punishment in place for him. in fact, he’ll be allowed continue doing as he does.
It’s almost like there is a shadow society above the rest of us to whom the law doesn’t apply, where a culture of omertà has created a criminally-actualized, extremely wealthy elite, composed of the very people we’ve entrusted to run things …almost, it’s almost like that.
It’s almost like this shadowy elite ARE the bondholders, who ought not be burned … almost, it’s almost like that.
post some random tweet from some random crustie about a a situation you have no facts on, hopefully you get sued.
It’s all over the news, you great big lummox!
Some don’t bother with the news anymore, to real, to slow. They skip the middle man and go directly to making asinine comments.
For?
Oh, get bent, Polaroid
Bit slow today, stuck in the old slow development phase.
Don’t move, I’ll go and get me pitchfork and firelighters
Can someone explain to me the major benefit of having a loan guaranteed for you? It seems to be a common occurrence, but not quite as good as getting money?
It wasn’t a shell company, it was a coffin company. And it was in China, not… oh right sorry, yes. That other thing.
A director elections always has the dirt on everyone, especially the media.
You just gotta love the Frankster (or do you if you aren’t a neocon.?) All is for the best in this best of all possible worlds – repeat after me, all is best in this……..
‘ere lads, how come my remarkably handsome avatar doesn’t appear on BS?
Frank had had a loan for the house he purchased in London, why was it needed
to have what seemed be an additional security, to support the loan from the BOI
as they had recourse to the asset in the event of default, would it ever be, that there was more than 250 K offshore, if so why was it there, and where did it originate from, it was hardly a win at races was it….maybe the Lotto….?
Was he not on RTE at the weekend spoofing, how come he’s on the media, but
he never answered the question’s the Dail Committee wanted put to him about
Rehab…….what if it was one of the Shinners, Paul Muphy, or Clare Daly, you’d
never hear the end of it.
well the shinners, paul murphy & clare daly are “subversive” they are a “threat” to “the state”…. “the state”, where children go homeless and the likes of blushirt flannery thrive..
“the state” which mirrors itself on a “septic tank principle” – all the big chunks of faeces rise to the top…..
http://www.forbes.com/sites/frederickallen/2012/07/23/super-rich-hide-21-trillion-offshore-study-says/#54e3997273d3
A new report finds that around the world the extremely wealthy have accumulated at least $21 trillion in secretive offshore accounts. That’s a sum equal to the gross domestic products of the United States and Japan added together. The number may sound unbelievable, but the study was conducted by James Henry, former chief economist at the consultancy McKinsey, an expert on tax havens and offshoring. It was commissioned by Tax Justice Network, a British activist group.
According to Henry’s research, the top 10 private banks, which include UBS and Credit Suisse in Switzerland, as well as the US investment bank Goldman Sachs, managed more than £4tn [$6.2 trillion] in 2010, a sharp rise from £1.5tn five years earlier….
The report’s analysis, based on data from many sources including the Bank of International Settlements and the International Monetary Fund, indicates that enough money has left some developing countries since the 1970s to pay off all their debts to the rest of the world. “The problem here is that the assets of these countries are held by a small number of wealthy individuals while the debts are shouldered by the ordinary people of these countries through their governments,”
None of our business I suppose Rotsey…
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2012/jul/21/global-elite-tax-offshore-economy
“These estimates reveal a staggering failure: inequality is much, much worse than official statistics show, but politicians are still relying on trickle-down to transfer wealth to poorer people,” said John Christensen of the Tax Justice Network. “People on the street have no illusions about how unfair the situation has become.”
“Closing down the tax loopholes exploited by multinationals and the super-rich to avoid paying their fair share will reduce the deficit. This way the government can focus on stimulating the economy, rather than squeezing the life out of it with cuts and tax rises for the 99% of people who aren’t rich enough to avoid paying their taxes.”
Greed greed and more f’in greed..
+1
Thanks for the links, saves me searchin’ for more readin’ later :)
No bother… I thought I was talking to meself.. :)
Here’s another one –
https://theintercept.com/2016/04/04/a-key-similarity-between-snowden-leak-and-panamapapers-scandal-is-whats-been-legalized/
Some of these documents undoubtedly reveal criminality: either monies that were illegally obtained (and are being hidden for that reason) or assets being concealed in order to criminally evade tax debts. But the crux of this activity — placing assets offshore in order to avoid incurring tax liability — has been legalized. That’s because Western democracies, along with overt tyrannies, are typically controlled by societies’ wealthiest, and laws are enacted to serve their interests. Vox’s Matt Yglesias this morning published a very good explainer of various aspects of this leak and he makes that point clear:
Even as the world’s wealthiest and most powerful nations have engaged in increasingly complex and intensive efforts at international cooperation to smooth the wheels of global commerce, they have willfully chosen to allow the wealthiest members of Western society to shield their financial assets from taxation (and in many cases divorce or bankruptcy settlement) by taking advantage of shell companies and tax havens.
If Panama or the Cayman Islands were acting to undermine the integrity of the global pharmaceutical patent system, the United States would stop them. But the political elite of powerful Western nations have not acted to stop relatively puny Caribbean nations from undermining the integrity of the global tax system — largely because Western economic elites don’t want them to. …
That’s for Harold and Rotsey above there..
The problem is not so much the illegality of it, the problem is that a lot of it is legal.