Licensing, media, merchandising, branding and politics. Father of Esther and Harry, husband to Sarah... views definitely my own
Joined August 2009
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Rob Corney retweeted
Here we go again. Above inflation rise to the minimum wage which will cause even more pressure on businesses and feed into inflation. It will make life even less affordable for the lowest paid.
Cue the usual "your business isn't viable if you cant afford to pay a living wage" posts from the terminally thick that would struggle to run a bath, never mind a business or employ people.
Here, for anyone that can be bothered to educate themselves even in the slightest, is why the circa 50% rise in minimum wage in the last 6 years has made life less affordable and contributed to the cost of living crisis.
Minimum wage employee 2020:
Total cost to employer (wages + NI + pension): £18,460
Employee can make 18,460 widgets in a year.
Cost per widget (ignoring any other cost or profit): £1
Take-home pay: £15,202
Widgets the employee can afford: 15,202
2027 min wage of of £13.20:
Total cost to employer (wages + NI + pension): £29,436
Widgets made in a year (same productivity): 18,460
Cost per widget: £1.59
Take-home pay: £22,050
Widgets the employee can afford: 13,868
They’ve had a 45% increase in take-home pay but can afford 9% fewer widgets.
This is why you are worse off. Now factor in other business costs, higher corporation tax, higher energy costs, higher risk from new legislation, maintaining pay differential, etc. etc. etc..
Yet the thick "yOuR bUsInEsS iSnT ViAbLe iF yOu cAnT aFfoRd AnOtHeR 50p" brigade are out in force championing this.
Just increase the tax free allowance and reduce spending, for f***s sake. They are just driving businesses off a cliff in the UK.
Rob Corney retweeted
“I would be really concerned to lose them.” Prime Minister Andy Burnham on the possibility of Manchester City’s owners selling up. What?! These are owners found guilty of serial breaches of the Premier League rule-book by three judges on an independent commission after a lengthy investigation. Owners who outraged other clubs and countless fans by flouting the rules and inflating sponsorship income with the Disguised Funding Scheme.
Owners who misled auditors and regulators, who threaten to bring this Premier League season – and, potentially, future seasons - to a standstill by their appeal, deny, delay tactics. Owners who are patently not proper custodians of a famous, historic club. Owners who many hope will sell up and ship out after bringing such shame and sham contracts to the game.
So these are astonishing, alarming comments from the PM. “I do actually thank the City Football Group and the wider ownership for the money that they didn't just put into the Etihad and the campus around it but also into the city," Burnham told the BBC’s Chris Mason.
Come on, PM. Read the room. Read the commission’s report. Read the belligerent statements from the Abu Dhabi owners and their chief executive like Ferran Soriano. Rather than thank CFG, perhaps thank the diligence of the Premier League in seeking to enforce its rules and protect the national sport. Perhaps thank the three judges for their pain-staking work in sifting through reams of evidence and coming to their considered conclusion.
Burnham spoke as a politician seemingly with one eye on diplomatic and trade links. He spoke as a former mayor whose city benefited from investment in east Manchester by Abu Dhabi. “They've been such a huge partner in the building of modern Manchester and obviously the building of Manchester City into the global force that it is.” And how was that building financed?
Burnham spoke as a politician and not the football fan that he truly is. The lifelong Evertonian is usually pretty sound on football matters. He misread the mood of many fans not wanting the possible return of drinking in Premier League stands but that was a rare misstep. This is far worse. This makes him look out of touch with the prevailing mood. He was speaking at Hill Dickinson Stadium. Maybe he should head to Anfield on Sunday week and witness the anger felt towards City.
Burnham did add that he wasn’t getting involved in the process and that City had a right to appeal if they felt harshly treated. But how does the PM’s sympathetic words for controversial owners help the independent football regulator charged by Government with leading the fight against those who risk the credibility of their club, who play fast and loose with the rules and who damage the integrity of the national sport?
How frustrating if Burnham’s words embolden City's owners and Soriano further. Bit of an own goal by No 10.
Rob Corney retweeted
Literally no one has realised this but the 2017 Tory manifesto actually committed to replacing the pensions triple lock with a double lock.
This never happened because the DUP confidence and supply agreement committed to dropping the pledge.
So Andy Burnham has received a lot of praise this week from the Labour Party for *two* ideas he and his party vociferously campaigned against in 2017, to defeat Theresa May’s pensions spending restraint and social care reform… and make Jeremy Corbyn Prime Minister. lol.
Rob Corney retweeted
Seems like decades ago when we had the Makerfield by-election and Burnham pledged not to revisit the Brexit debate and stated that he was not proposing for Britain to consider rejoining the European Union
It's tough to understand why people hold the political class in such contempt
Rob Corney retweeted
Andy Burnham's speech on Friday promised voters 'the return of the Labour they once knew' - to undo not just Thatcher, but Blair. But the economics underpinning that claim are, frankly, garbage. (1/?)
Rob Corney retweeted
If anyone is feeling good about this shitshow, they're up there with the lads who nail their bollocks to planks for kicks
Rob Corney retweeted
Clare lives in a south London apartment with a mortgage which she’ll be paying off for decades.
It’s small, but she’s decorated it to her taste. She couldn’t afford the full second bedroom but there’s just enough room for a single bed when mum comes to stay.
It’s not Clare’s fault that London’s supply of new homes is at a post-war low pushing the price of flats like hers to the point it may exceed £1.5 million.
As she gets up at dawn, Clare looks out the window at the social housing estate next door. Her taxes pay for many of its tenants to live in Zone 1. It’s quiet now but when she comes home in the dark, the smell of cannabis catches in her throat.
She sees many of them have cars she can’t afford herself. Clare would like to live further away, but she needs to get to work for 7.30 am, and the state-run railway is unreliable. She feels unsafe travelling and walking home at night.
It’s been another busy week at work, so she hasn’t seen the detail, but friends have messaged her about whopping rises in her council tax next year. She dreads to think.
Clare thinks it’s a ‘f***ing joke’ that Andy Burnham wants to slap a mansion tax on top of everything else she pays. She doesn’t live in a mansion - just a tiny flat.
Clare is right.
I’ll be a Chancellor for hard-working people like Clare.
Rob Corney retweeted
This man paid the equivalent of the entire Mansion Tax revenue in one tax bill. And he’s off. So what happens next? You. You fill the gap. @JohnHealey_MP talks about tough choices - I say stupid ones. Flutter your way out of this @andyburnham
Rob Corney retweeted
It is mad to think that the UK 10-year gilt yield was below 4% as recently as the middle of 2024.
This morning, it is higher than 5.2%.
Choices made by this Government are intensifying a cost of living crisis for struggling families up & down the country.
Rob Corney retweeted
The idea that we now have a government that is actively discouraging people from improving their homes blows my mind. It seems care for your home, your street & your community is no longer regarded as a positive. You cannot tax people for improving their environment, it is wrong.
Rob Corney retweeted
In the 24 months since Labour came to power, we've seen;
• Employer National Insurance increased from 13.8% to 15%.
• The employer NI threshold cut from £9,100 to £5,000.
• Income Tax and National Insurance thresholds frozen until 2031.
• Capital Gains Tax increased from 10% and 20% to 18% and 24%.
• Business Asset Disposal Relief increased from 10% to 14%, then 18%.
• Investors’ Relief increased and its lifetime allowance cut from £10 million to £1 million.
• Carried interest taxation increased and moved towards the Income Tax regime.
• Dividend tax rates increased by two percentage points.
• Savings-income tax rates increased by two percentage points.
• Property-income tax rates increased by two percentage points.
• Most unused pension funds brought into the Inheritance Tax net.
• Agricultural Property Relief restricted.
• Business Property Relief restricted.
• Inheritance Tax thresholds frozen for longer.
• The non-dom regime replaced with a more extensive residence-based system.
• VAT imposed on private school fees.
• Business-rates relief removed from private schools.
• Stamp Duty increased on second homes and buy-to-let properties.
• The Furnished Holiday Lettings tax regime abolished.
• Pension salary-sacrifice benefits capped at £2,000 before National Insurance applies.
• The Cash ISA allowance cut to £12,000 for most under-65s.
• A 22% charge introduced on interest from cash held inside non-cash ISAs.
• Restrictions introduced on transfers and cash-like holdings within ISAs.
• The Energy Profits Levy increased and extended.
• Investment allowances for oil and gas producers reduced.
• A new Vaping Products Duty introduced.
• Tobacco duties increased above inflation.
• Vehicle Excise Duty increased for many new cars.
• Electric vehicles brought into the Vehicle Excise Duty system.
• A new mileage tax announced for electric and plug-in hybrid cars.
• Air Passenger Duty increased.
• Climate Change Levy rates increased.
• Plastic Packaging Tax increased.
• A new Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism introduced.
• Making Tax Digital extended to more landlords and self-employed people.
Together they represent one of the biggest transfers of wealth from households and businesses to the Treasury in decades - with no noticeable improvement in public services.
Whether you're a business owner employing staff, a parent paying school fees, a farmer planning succession, an entrepreneur building wealth or simply someone trying to save for retirement...
You keep less of what you earn.
You keep less of what you invest.
You leave less to your family.
Death by a thousand cuts is becoming tax policy.
Rob Corney retweeted
First, the Government got its VAT on school fees forecasts wrong.
When we pointed that out, Ministers reached for a new stock response:
"The latest school census data, as at June 2026, reveals pupil numbers remain firmly within historical patterns seen for over the last 20 years."
So we did what Ministers apparently hadn't done.
We checked.
Using 20 years of Dept Ed data, we found that since VAT was introduced:
📉 The lowest independent-school pupil numbers in the published 20-year series.
📉 The largest annual fall in the series.
📉 The largest rolling two-year decline in the series.
The Government's own statistics don't support its latest excuse either.
@UKLabour, instead of recycling the same boilerplate response to justify this unjust tax, why not look properly at your own data?
Your own evidence shows this policy has already exceeded the forecasts you asked Parliament to accept.
It's time to stop making excuses, accept the evidence and scrap VAT on school fees.
@AndyBurnhamMP @OliviaBailey @LauraTrottMP @CarolineVoaden @educationgovuk @CommonsEd
📄 Want the full data? You'll find it on our website.
#EducationNotTaxation #ScrapVAT
🤖 Made with AI
Hi @pettore some time ago, I mentioned my Dad’s cousin Sonny Riseley whose Blenheim was shot down over France, so he nicked the plans for V1 bombers and made it back to Blighty. You asked for the articles I had… apologies I completely forgot until now
Rob Corney retweeted
It's not the spivvery of Rayner that grates so much as the hypocrisy. While in opposition Rayner tabled and voted for a motion that would have prevent outgoing ministers from receiving severance if they'd breached the ministerial code – which Rayner accepted she did at the time
Rob Corney retweeted
A reminder, Andy, of the Thatcher era:
• Income tax: 83% → 40%
• Basic rate: 33% → 25%
• Inflation: 21.9% peak (1980) → 2.4% (1986)
• Days lost to strikes: 29.5 million (1979) → 1.9 million (1990)
• Real pay for the average earner: up by a third
Rob Corney retweeted
Labour: “We want to do whatever we can to help parents with the cost of living.”
So, instead of cutting taxes, ending overseas aid, stopping the small boats, reducing energy costs, scrapping the jobs tax, reversing VAT on private school fees, stopping the assault on family businesses, and abandoning the policies driving up inflation…
…they’re boasting about shaving a bit of VAT off a trip to Alton Towers and dishing out taxpayer-funded “free” breakfasts.
Rob Corney retweeted
Dim grifter Gary Stevenson has made an idiot of himself in a Times interview, declaring that “I’ll be totally honest with you, I think I am one of the best, if not the best, inequality economists in the world."
Further evidence that dopey Gary is self-obsessed & divorced from reality is his claim that his Youtube programme is "the biggest political show in the country." He claims that in his third year at the LSE "I didn’t even have to study and I still got a straight first,” and describes himself as the "most famous" person in the far-left so-called patriotic millionaires group.
Gary says that threats to leave the country if a wealth tax is introduced are "just scaremongering.”
The Times pointed out that "Statistics from the recent Sunday Times Rich List suggest they’re not: one in six people on the Rich List just two years ago do not appear in the 2026 list; almost a third (111) of the UK citizens who appear in the main list of 350 individuals no longer live on the British mainland, and at least 15 foreign nationals who appeared in last year’s Rich List have been removed because they now live elsewhere".
Asked if he gives away some of his wealth, Gary admits “I don’t, no".
He argues that his contribution to humanity is producing videos calling for the state to confiscate other people's money.
So sad.
Rob Corney retweeted
In 1960, newly independent African leaders had a choice: capitalism or socialism.
Almost all of them picked socialism.
A Ghanaian economist named George Ayittey spent forty years documenting what happened next.
His findings are in print, and almost nobody outside Africa wants to hear them. 🧵
