Last night Patrick Gower informed us on the six O'clock News that John Key had met with disgraced Conservative "Lord" Michael Ashcroft:
Ashcroft is corrupt because he avoids tax through political insider information. Last year The Guardian reported:
It was interesting to see John Key dismiss the meeting as a regular occurrence, like it's just a little lunchtime chat between friends. More like a couple of criminals plotting on how they're going to rip us off.
Now National propagandist Cameron Slater is trying to say the corrupt Ashcroft is A OK because he sometimes meets with his daddy:
Media doing job for once, $43 m not enough. Got any spare embezzled cash?
John Key also said that Ashcroft is the deputy chairman of the Conservative Party, when he is not... what an idiot!Mr Key says they just had a general discussion over lunch.
“We did talk about just generally how things are going in Europe, he's obviously a big businessman as well, and just generally about politics.”
Mr Ashcroft has popped in on Mr Key like this three years ago, before the last election.
Mr Ashcroft says he does not donate here.
And even though he is close to British PM David Cameron, Mr Key says he did not even really want any vote-catching tips.
“He gave me a summary of how things are going,” says Mr Key.
Mr Key is usually quite open when it comes to his meetings with the rich and famous. His critics will argue he kept this one on the quiet because of Lord Ashcroft's controversial baggage.
Ashcroft is corrupt because he avoids tax through political insider information. Last year The Guardian reported:
Lord Ashcroft, the Conservative donor and outgoing deputy party chairman, has been accused of avoiding more than £3m in tax by engaging in a financial manoeuvre the day before new legislation would have forced him to pay tax on all his income.
The BBC programme Panorama will report tonight that the peer, who steps down from his party role today, transferred the ownership of his main UK company, the Impellam Group, on 5 April. The 64-year-old peer transferred shares worth £17m in the company to a trust to benefit his children. The following day, a law came into force compelling all members of the Lords and Commons to be registered in the UK for tax purposes and pay tax on all their worldwide income. The law had been in large measure prompted by the controversy over his tax status.
Tax lawyer Richard Frimston is quoted telling the programme that Lord Ashcroft would have faced a large inheritance tax bill under the new legislation. Frimston said: "If that had been done on the following day, assets worth say £17m going into trust would have been subject to tax at 20%, which would have created an immediate inheritance tax charge of something in the region of £3.4m. So that was avoided by doing it on 5 April as opposed to waiting until 6 April."
Now National propagandist Cameron Slater is trying to say the corrupt Ashcroft is A OK because he sometimes meets with his daddy:
I think Patrick Gower is pretty uninterested in who Slaters irrelevant daddy meets with. Perhaps Slater should send Ashcroft a txt message:I should confess now before Patrick finds the conspiracy. My father is an office holder of the APDU, a constituent member of the IDU and has met Lord Ashcroft many times, I think he even has his cellphone number written down somewhere.
Media doing job for once, $43 m not enough. Got any spare embezzled cash?
