Baroness Scotland

[bigbadwolf]

"BBW - I can assue you that I have never had any domestic staff."

You disappoint me Sean, you disappoint me deeply. I thought that as a moderator you'd be relying on the enforced services of an enslaved typist to convey your authoritarian addresses in your capacity as a helper elf to the administrator.

[EDKiwi]

SeanMacGabhann Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> BBW - I can assue you that I have never had any

> domestic staff, Any empathy with the Barnoness is

> entirely due to a distaste for mobs, coupled with

> a "sacking for everything" culture which seems to

> be afoot

Unless you happen to be a member of the RMT....running red lights, boozing on the job, opening doors on the wrong side of the train...no worries.

[womanofdulwich]

I have a professional job and must not bring myself or profession into disrepute. I do everything legit and if I am not sure I take professional advice to make sure I am doing things legally or erronthe side of caution.I do not have the resources of Lady Scotland but I do follow procedures. I think it stinks. What happened with David Blunkett and others that employed those they should not have?

[*Bob*]

If you're the minister for transport and you get caught for speeding, what should happen?

A. Fine / Ban (as appropriate) - like everyone else.

B. Sacked, stripped and publicly flogged on live television

The notion that someone should face and entirely different punishment - for a civil offence - other than that which the law requires, is complete nonsense.

[Peckhamgatecrasher]

So you don't think the judge who has just fallen on his sword for two drink-driving offences should have done so?

[Brendan]

Responsibility for not brining the office you hold and/or your profession into disrepute is completely different to the civil punishment you receive for breaking the law.

EDIT: To remove unnecessarily abrasive comment.

[*Bob*]

I think Baroness Scotland should have resigned - if there was any possibility of her accidental employment of a Tongan housekeeper leading to someone dying and a criminal conviction.

Sadly, this is about accidentally employing a Tongan housekeeper without the right to work, not stacking-up on booze and wielding a potentially lethal weapon on a public highway.

[*Bob*]

Perhaps you're right Brendan.

She probably deserves to be brought down by this. Echoes of Watergate and all that. No doubt the stink goes all the way to the very top.

[Brendan]

Missing the point completely.

[*Bob*]

The current fashion for demanding resignations over the most inconsequential of issues has led to a digging-in amongst politicians, civil servants and industry bigwigs, to the point that hardly anyone will go - ever - unless someone literally trusses them up and carries them out of the door.

It's part of the reason why when there is an actual scandal - like a real proper scandal (remember them?) - no-one goes.

[HonaloochieB]

I make you right on that one *Bob*.

And as for getting Joanna Whalley to star in a film on the matter, I should bleedin' cocoa.

And as for the Pet Shop Boys writing the theme song, you're havin' a Turkish, aincha?

And as for getting a singer of Dusty Springfield's calibre to perform said song, fackorfaahtoutofit.

[SeanMacGabhann]

It's a bit like the reverse of when someone, maybe your uncle, usually restricts himself to dry and pithy observations, to the extent that you almost think they don't have an opinion, and then *BAM* out of nowhere they start talking all serious-like about a subject. It makes you pay more attention....

[*Bob*]

Incidentally, Scotland is also being investigated for ?170,000 of expenses for which she might not have been entitled to.

But naturally the Tongan Housekeeper incident (from which she was set to profit ZILCH) is a tastier tabloid morsel.

And anyway.. expenses.. been there.. boo-ring, eh?