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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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| Of course there could be a link via Surrey CID. If they were corrupt on the scale of, say, the Met's Vice Squad who practically operated the London porn market of the 1970's single-handedly, then they could be keeping a watching brief for all sorts of mid-level criminality. By, for example, putting away the soldiers of one gang on trumped up charges to allow another firm free rein. As well as massaging the clear-up rate. But now I am doing what Borry suggests, writing a Mickey Spillane novel. |
The point was that with Shippey (thanks to the auditor) going to be police interviewed and after the M 25 three trial ( police informant who had stolen, and disposed of the cars, got away scot free with a £10,000 reward in return for made up evidence), any serious criminal folks knew that Shippey would likely do a deal, and the Guildford police would then be planting additional evidence on them to ensure guilty verdicts. The only way out of this unfortunate scenario for those that were involved in crimnality was to knock off Shippey with a sign function (Umberto Eco) that would be widely understood (cf Roberto Calvi) to all others involved in the car ringing, cut shop world. It appears that this was why they selected a tortured body with face slashed in a car that they then set alight. This did in fact work, until Cousins' arrest. Once Cousins was arrested he copied the same tactic as the main informant on the M25 three, he cut a deal with the police to help frame a third party.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| Borry wrote: | | Hello, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, can you hear us? You seem to be on mute? |
He's the elephant in the woodpile. After making all the early peacetalks-hoster running, he has allowed chief rival Saudi to take over. Why? According to a chance remark I heard on Al-Jazeera--but which I trust--Turkey is now pro-Ukraine and anti-Russia.
| Keep calm and carry on kicking the can down the road. |
This is often the best strategy. Especially when all around you are losing their heads.
| It's all about the deal. Both Sugar and Trump have a rough unsettling way of haggling, but like all street traders, they most respect those that haggle back. Step forward a few decades, and both can call it diplomacy. |
Something different is required when one era is passing into the next.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| Wiley wrote: | | The point was that with Shippey (thanks to the auditor) going to be police interviewed and after the M 25 three trial ( police informant who had stolen, and disposed of the cars, got away scot free with a £10,000 reward in return for made up evidence), any serious criminal folks knew that Shippey would likely do a deal, and the Guildford police would then be planting additional evidence on them to ensure guilty verdicts. |
A most ingenious thesis. I would enter two practical objections:
1. There is no reason to suppose that 'serious criminal folks' in general would know anything about Shippey's dealings with Surrey CID. Why would they? Only the serious criminal folk at Dove Motors knew this.
2. Which of the many 'serious criminal folk' of the southern Home Counties would be able to predict it would be them that Surrey CID would choose to be put in the frame?
| The only way out of this unfortunate scenario for those that were involved in crimnality was to knock off Shippey with a sign function (Umberto Eco) that would be widely understood (cf Roberto Calvi) to all others involved in the car ringing, cut shop world. |
I accept that if your hypothesis is true, this might follow.
| It appears that this was why they selected a tortured body with face slashed in a car that they then set alight. This did in fact work, until Cousins' arrest. Once Cousins was arrested he copied the same tactic as the main informant on the M25 three, he cut a deal with the police to help frame a third party. |
I accept that if your hypothesis is true, this might follow.
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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| Mick Harper wrote: |
A most ingenious thesis. I would enter two practical objections:
1. There is no reason to suppose that 'serious criminal folks' in general would know anything about Shippey's dealings with Surrey CID. Why would they? Only the serious criminal folk at Dove Motors knew this.
2. Which of the many 'serious criminal folk' of the southern Home Counties would be able to predict it would be them that Surrey CID would choose to be put in the frame?
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Not sure, my imagination is that Shippey was most likely (err, not sure) maximising his gains by acting as a sort of co-ordinator of the car ringing, cut shops and dealership, ie very hot motors they would cut and reuse the spares, on less hot vehicles they would do the car ringing?
| A chop shop is a business, often mimicking a body shop, that illicitly disassembles stolen motor vehicles and sells their parts. Chop shops are often linked to car-theft rings as part of a broader organized crime enterprise.[1] |
Cousins was of course in the spare parts business, had the police contatcted a number of businesses who provided the spares to Dove before finally seeking to arrest Shippey.
Last seen 14th December, he goes missing on 15th December, was due to be arrested 16th December 1991.
Surely he has been abducted before arrest......
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| Not sure, my imagination is that Shippey was most likely (err, not sure) maximising his gains by acting as a sort of co-ordinator of the car ringing, cut shops and dealership, ie very hot motors they would cut and reuse the spares, on less hot vehicles they would do the car ringing? |
This cannot be correct. Shippey was an accountant. It stretches credibility to assume he is the Mr Big, using his position at a legit Dove Motors, to operate a wide-ranging and highly profitable (remember the £800,000) parallel motor trade. However, there is the fact that he is living with the mother of a known car-crim to take into account. He is clearly not 'just a mob book-keeper'.
| Cousins was of couse in the spare parts business, had the police contatcted a number of businesses who provided the spares to Dove before finally seeking to arrest Shippey. |
This is indeed at the heart of the matter. A legit Surrey CID would have either (a) begun to uncover the whole Dove criminal nexus in total secrecy or failing that (b) charged Cousins and his employer, Karl Watson, with car ringing etc. Instead, they let Cousins go, ignored Watson, and told Dove their name had come up in an investigation. Some time later (we don't know why and at whose prompting) they decided to interview Shippey (we don't know what about).
| Last seen 14th December, he goes missing on 15th December, was due to be arrested 16th December 1991. Surely he has been abducted before arrest...... |
That is my assumption. I have laid it out in my account. The coincidence is so stark, even Inspector Clouseau couldn't have missed it. But neither Cousins nor Watson have any reason to abduct Shippey because he's going to be interviewed by the police. Quite the reverse. Dove Motors do, in spades.
The earlier visit of the two hoodlums to Shippey's home is apparently a recorded fact but nothing much was made of it. This is pretty astounding. It cannot have been Cousins and Watson, and gun-toting 'Avon-calling' is not exactly common in Sevenoaks. If it is followed by the abduction, torture and disposal of the home-owner, even Inspector Clouseau would have assumed the two events must be linked. Which would put Cousins and Watson completely out of the picture.
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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I am not saying Shippey is Mr Big, he is the guy that shields criminality by hiding it within a legal structure. Once he is unable to do this he does not have any further use.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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OK, that's a runner. In fact that is what I had assumed his general role was in the Dove Crime Machine. Let us assume that once the Shippey/Watson/Cousins connection has come to police attention [i.e. Cousins works for Watson, Shippey is living with Watson's mother] the gangmasters conclude that Shippey's usefulness has come to an end.
| You are a Crime Lord with a minion surplus to requirements. Do you |
(a) Give him an ex gratia payment and wish him well with his future career, reminding him there is a clause in his contract of employment not to discuss the company's affairs with third parties?
(b) Abduct him, torture him for three days, put him in the boot of his car, drive the car to a quiet spot in the country, put some gas canisters in the car and apply a match to the entire shooting match?
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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| Boreades wrote: | It still surprises me how few people recognise or understand Trump's background. It's no coincidence that both Trump and Alan Sugar were chosen for The Apprentice. Both started out as traders, haggling over deals and making quick money, just a few steps ahead of the rozzers.
Both also recognise the value of making what might seem like loud and outrageous offers and demands. Are they just trolling the other players? No, it's a deliberate and sound strategy. Unsettle the opponent, make them unsure of what's happening or why, shift them out of their comfort zone. That outrageous offer is just an opening bid, to get things moving.
In the case of Canada, the UK and the EU, all the bluster of slapping punitive tariffs on them is a ploy. To achieve the opposite, a reduction in the tariffs that we charge on American imports to protect our weaker domestic industries. |
It looks to me the opposite, ie US like UK manufacturing is not particularly competitive whereas German is. That is why the EU has a trade surplus with US, both sides were imposing tariffs at roughly the same level, pre Trump. It's essntially a protectionist move by Trump to give his manufacturers a window to improve and expand. Trump isn't concerned with us as our manufacturing is not a threat to the US, we are as bad as they are.........
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| It looks to me the opposite, ie US like UK manufacturing is not particularly competitive whereas German is. |
It was only a matter of time, but Germany has now joined the USA, as the USA previously joined the UK, in finding that manufacturing things is no longer competitive with cheaper countries who have all the requisite technology to hand.
| That is why the EU has a trade surplus with US, both sides were imposing tariffs at roughly the same level, pre Trump. |
This is true. The EU is slightly behind the US in terms of cheap manufacturing (and subsidises primary products even more generously).
| It's essntially a protectionist move by Trump |
This is true. The EU has recently introduced the same sort of tariffs against Chinese manufactures.
| to give his manufacturers a window to improve and expand. |
This is not true. There is no way, either in America or Europe, that their manufacturing sector can ever improve by the scale necessary to compete with poorer, cheaper manufacturing countries. It is just a temporary wheeze to put off the evil hour.
| Trump isn't concerned with us as our manufacturing is not a threat to the US, we are as bad as they are......... |
Quite.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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Big news just in from America. Pollsters asked the question
Is the Republican Party's views too extreme?
Yes 44% (Dec 2022)
Yes 51% (March 2024) |
That's a majority any way you look at it. No, wait. It was the Democratic Party. I'm always getting those two mixed up.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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| Wile E. Coyote wrote: | | It looks to me the opposite, ie US like UK manufacturing is not particularly competitive whereas German is. That is why the EU has a trade surplus with US, both sides were imposing tariffs at roughly the same level, pre Trump. It's essntially a protectionist move by Trump to give his manufacturers a window to improve and expand. Trump isn't concerned with us as our manufacturing is not a threat to the US, we are as bad as they are......... |
More details are required on the specific industries, and why.
What kicked it all off in the first place?
| Eurostat has published figures showing the EU exported €531.6 billion in goods to the US in 2024 and imported €333.4 billion, resulting in a €198.2 billion trade surplus. The biggest element of the EU’s export with the US were medicinal and pharmaceutical products, which accounted for 22.5 per cent. Car exports accounted for 9.6 per cent of EU exports to the US. |
So cars are a relatively minor part of the issue, but perhaps more often mentioned because they are more visible status symbols.
| Trade policy in the EU is what is known as an "exclusive competence" meaning that only the EU can negotiate trade deals and impose tariffs, rather than individual states. |
Obviously, the UK can now directly negotiate trade deals and tariffs with the US, but individual EU countries have to find other ways to get a national advantage. Ireland is a good example.
| The major reason for Ireland's trade surplus with the US is the presence of pharmaceutical manufacturers who export most of their Irish output to the US. The CSO said that in 2024 overall exports of medical and pharmaceutical products rose by 22.4bn or 29% to just under €100bn (£83.1bn). |
But note:
| US pharma companies are in Ireland partially because of the country's low corporation tax rate. |
and
| The world’s 10 largest drugmakers, including Johnson and Johnson, Pfizer and Merck, have large plants in Ireland. |
So, it's not just the hostile EU tariffs that Trump was complaining about, it's the corporation tax dodging that certain EU countries are encouraging.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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How Ireland managed to attract around 1,000 US tech companies.
| Ireland wasn’t always a rich country. In fact, it was one of Europe’s poorest countries for about 2 centuries, ... |
Well, we all knew that, didn't we. See the Potato Famine and the Irish Diaspora.
| ...before the period of its fast economic growth, which started in the 1990s |
So, what happened?
Low corporate tax (12.5%)
Ireland initially announced the reduction of the corporate tax in 1997 and implemented it over the next 6 years (reducing it by 4%, each year). The 12.5% corporate tax was launched in 2003 and is the same nowadays. |
This means less taxes paid by US companies, as the federal corporate tax in the US is currently 21%.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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Ireland is now, on some measures, second in wealth only to Luxembourg among EU countries. I often use the comparison
| pre-Castro: Cuba and Ireland equal GNP per head post-Castro: Cuba, second in poverty to Haiti in the Americas, Ireland second in wealth to Luxembourg in the Europas |
when trying unavailingly to persuade socialists of the possible shortcomings of socialism. Though it is no accident Ireland and Luxembourg are EU cheap chisellers, both allowed to get away with it for political reasons.
However, I would definitely exclude Corporation Tax from the list of Irish sins. If that is the way the Irish choose to spread the tax burden, more power to them. In this world of international competition, low tariffs and essentially nil transport costs, the whole idea of taxing business profits is crazee. It is similar to trying to soak the rich. Try too hard and they're off. Ideology doesn't come into it.
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Boreades
In: finity and beyond
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Some might wonder why the UK hasn't tried the same wheeze of reducing Corporation Tax to attract more multinationals.
Mainly because they fear it could become a "race to the bottom". Trying to undercut other countries that then respond with a lower rate, and so on.
The EU may well have chosen to ignore Ireland and Luxembourg doing it. They are only minor countries.
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Wile E. Coyote
In: Arizona
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Once you take out the tax haven distortion bit, which leads to a bit of extra income and a higher cost of living.
I really doubt this is any different to Luxembourg being broadly similar in wealth to Germany and France, South Korea to Japan, UK to Ireland etc etc.....there is no miracle as you would expect.....
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