Press revelations of low ethical standards at Capita, the outsourcing firm the BBC pay to collect TV licenses have resulted in damage to the image of the BBC an undermining of public confidence and calls for the outdated fee to be abolished.

It is not known whether the BBC were aware that TV Licensing inspectors employed by Capita targeted elderly and vulnerable people to hit targets and earn substantial commissions. Director General Lord Hall was quick to distance his employer from Capita’s grubby ethos when the revelations that the BBC’s choice of outsourcing firm had hounded an ex-RAF officer with dementia and a young woman in a refuge.

Capita chief executive, Andy Parker will be leaving his employer this summer but denies that his moving on from his £2.7 million a year job is connected to the scandal.

It is said that those working on the editorial, as opposed to the advertising side of newspapers and magazines should not have any financial links with those they write about, and that this is to ensure editorial integrity.

On this basis the appointment of George Osborne as editor of London’s Evening Standard newspaper comes across as a ludicrous folly, given the former chancellor’s considerable income from speaking engagements with banks, income he has received because of his grooming of himself as the banker’s friend. Osborne sacked the head of the Financial Services Authority Martin Wheatley, reviled by the banks but admired by the public for his welcome and over-due tough stance, and Osborne has watered down a tough new legal responsibility regime that frightened senior bankers as well as altering the annual bank levy to make it more palatable for his good friends. Continue reading →

BT have been ordered to cut at least £5 a month off the £18.99 a month it charges customers who only buy a land line from them.

The cut, ordered by telephone watchdog Ofcom, will affect more than 2 million BT customers, who will see their bills drop by at least £60 a year. Ofcom say that many of these are elderly or vulnerable people who have remained loyal to BT for decades. Continue reading →

One positive aspect of travel in the 70’s was return flights to the USA for less than £100, courtesy of the pioneering Sir Freddie Laker, who took on BA and won, for a while.

Now, nearly 50 years on, Ryanair and BA owners IAG have both announced budget flights across the pond. Ryanair are teaming up with Norwegian to offer return flights from Edinburgh to Stewart International (60 miles from New York) for around £140 and IAG will have flights from Barcelona to Los Angeles and San Francisco for around £170 return, flying on its new airline, Level.

The price war has been triggered by the drop in demand for trips to the USA, which has become a lot more expensive with the current low value of the pound against the dollar.

Those who don’t have the time, or the inclination, to check their receipts in supermarkets are not always getting the attractive offers shown on the shelves. This is because the offers have expired and staff haven’t removed the promotional graphics, so shoppers who put things on promotion into their trolley are being charged the full price. Continue reading →

Asda have withdrawn a range of Slimzone diet meals they promoted as being suitable for one of Slimming World’s diet plans, after the weight loss organisation accused Asda of using their name to sell the products, which were 50 pence cheaper than Slimming World’s own products, sold in Iceland. Slimming World are seeking a legal injunction against Asda to stop the supermarket using its name. Continue reading →

The Advertising Standards Authority (AS) have banned an ad by Jaguar cars that promoted a vehicle’s hands-free mobile technology with the promise that its user could “stay in touch on the move” and “use the phone via the car”.

The AS ruled that the ad, placed in the Guardian newspaper was irresponsible as it was likely to encourage unsafe driving practices.

It will be interesting to see if the current travel misery deliberately being inflicted on London and its commuters, and the leaving of the union-friendly EU, triggers long overdue union reform., and perhaps some sensible new laws making the striking employees liable to compensation claims.

A proposed compensation claim against Southern Rail by a group of commuters would seem to have no merit at all, save for the unions who are doubtless delighted to see more pressure being put on their member’s employer, and the solicitor paid for bringing the claim.

Transport staff are eight times more likely to go on strike than the rest of the UK workforce, whether encouraged by their paid sponsor Jeremy Corbyn or not, official figures show.

Our press have brought their current woes on themselves, though sections such as Rupert Murdoch’s empire have arguably done more than most to bring newspapers down to their current level of disrepute.

Accordingly it has recently been revealed, following the 2011 scandal of phone-hacking, that only 18% of us trust our national press to tell the truth, half of the 37% recorded ten years ago in 2006. Calls for the press to be better regulated have been tempered by revelations that only 3% of us would trust the press to regulate itself, and only 8% would trust a regulator set up by the government, with 73% being in favour of a regulator with no connections to either, to avoid newspapers pronouncing themselves innocent when guilty or our government using its regulator to cover up its own misdeeds and failures. Continue reading →