An overdue and welcome storm is building, it seems, over the issues of company and executive greed.

The first loud and frightening rumble of thunder was the near collapse of the economy by greedy bankers, many of whom are still behaving just as greedily, unethically and in some cases illegally as they always have done, with Fred Goodwin (RBS) and Bob Diamond (Barclays) as the UK’s most uninspiring role models. Then some flashes of lightning with the realisation that big fat firms like Google and Amazon were helped to get that way by tax avoidance schemes that our big-business-friendly HMRC is failing to stop as it concentrates on screwing tax out of the smaller companies that cant afford very expensive accountants. Continue reading →

Reviled payday lender Wonga has removed its branding from football club Newcastle United’s children’s replica kit after concern from MP’s that the association was targeting children with the wrong messages. The company claim that the U-turn is consistent with their being “a responsible lender” It is thought that football clubs are not always too ethically fussy about where their sponsorship money comes from.

Part of Wonga’s “responsible lending” was the recent sending of fake legal letters to its customers, to encourage them to pay interest rates of more than 5,000% APR. A succession of bosses at the firm have failed to clean up its image and in December the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) belatedly clamped down on all payday lenders with tough new rules expected to drive most of them out of business. Continue reading →

More than £90 has to be added to car insurance premiums to cover the increase in fraudulent whiplash claims, which insurer Aviva say surged by 51% in 2013 and another 21% in 2014 for their company.

The dangerous “crash for cash” scam, which costs the insurance industry up to £2 billion, involves gangs who suddenly brake their vehicles in front of innocent drivers, forcing them to crash and be liable, as well as exposing them to serious injury or worse. The gangs then file fraudulent claims for whiplash injury with their victim’s insurers. Aviva say they currently have 6,500 suspicious claims on their books from known fraud gangs. Continue reading →

Ofcom have fined two companies £20,000 each for making excessive numbers of silent and/or abandoned calls to consumers.

Both types of call occur when automatic dialling machines are set to dial up more numbers than sales or call centre staff can deal with, a deliberate policy to ensure that staff work at full economic capacity When the victim picks up the telephone there is no-one on the line (silent call), or there is no-one on the line but a recorded message advises which company has called and gives a phone number to call back on (abandoned call) Ofcom set maximum limits for both types of call and impose fines for those it catches exceeding the limits. Continue reading →

Britain’s new food policing unit, set up in the wake of last years horsemeat scandal is to focus on the growing trade in fake wine.

One of the signs that Food Standards Agency inspectors will be looking for is the presence of spelling mistakes on the bottle label – one sample seized featured “shardonnay”, and a Sauvignon Blanc was apparently from “Austrlia”. Continue reading →

As gourmet readers will know Waitrose does not sell foie gras – traditionally made in France from the unhealthily swollen livers of force-fed geese or ducks – and launched an ethical alternative a few years back.

Faux Gras is a Waitrose Christmas product made from the livers of normally-fed birds blended with duck, goose and chicken fat, and cream, to give the final product the creamy, fatty liverishness much prized by fans of the cruel stuff, many of whom will love the taste but not the guilt, like the author. Continue reading →

A student in Valencia has invented a board game that features the corruption rife in the ruling classes of Spanish society.

With business and government types in Spain being exposed for graft on a regular basis Marina Belda has been inspired to launch Corruptopolis, a game where players start by giving a convincing explanation as to how large caches of corrupt cash have ended up in their bank accounts.

Rumours that her next game project will feature the ethical world of international football should be dismissed as jolly likely.

“EGO, PR SPIN AND A DISASTER WAITING TO HAPPEN” is how the Daily Mail headlined the feelings of many over the fourth person to be killed in Sir Richard Branson’s race, looking increasingly insane and pointless, for Virgin Galactic to be the first to offer very expensive space tourism to the rich.

Following the deaths of three engineers in 2007 when a rocket engine exploded, Branson’s test pilot, Michael Alsbury, was killed and his co-pilot badly injured when SpaceShipTwo broke up and crashed on a test flight on October 31. The cause of the crash may not be known for 12 months, but what is emerging are claims that Virgin Galactic have had, and ignored multiple warnings about the dangers. Continue reading →

British consumers are at risk of having to fund huge compensation payments to large US firms suing governments for damaging their profits with legislation that protects consumers.

Examples are governments freezing energy prices, nationalising industries such as our health service and requiring prominent health warnings to be printed on packets of cigarettes, something the giant tobacco firm Philip Morris is currently suing the government of Uruguay for, claiming more than £15 million in compensation. This is something it has tried twice before, once in Australia where it lost and once in Thailand where it won. Continue reading →