What with the United Kingdom turning into a tax-haven, foreigners buying up swathes of London as investment-property, and Cameron & Co. seemingly determined to turn Britain into a banana republic.
The Government is reviewing the Bribery Act after business leaders claimed it was making it difficult for British firms to export goods.
The Business Secretary, Sajid Javid, is inviting companies to comment on whether the tough anti-corruption measures are “a problem”.
Critics fear it is a way of weakening the law at a time when the Government should be clamping down on existing loopholes, and supporters of the Act say they are surprised by the move.
They warn that any attempt to water down the Act will seriously damage the UK’s credibility on corruption. They also claim it is undermining David Cameron’s tough personal anti-bribery message, which he reinforced during his visit to South-east Asia to drum up business for Britain.
Simply shameless. Too difficult to do business without being able to more easily bribe people ? In Britain ? Oh, and what was that about a visit to South-east Asia ?
An investigation into alleged corruption worth hundreds of millions of pounds at Malaysia’s national investment company threatened to overshadow David Cameron’s arrival in Kuala Lumpur on 30 July.
Malaysia’s Prime Minister, Najib Razak, has been forced to deny allegations that he has personally benefited to the tune of $700m (£447.5m) from the investment fund that investigators have traced to what they allege are his own bank accounts.
...
Mr Cameron, whose stop in Malaysia is part of a tour of South-east Asia, during which he hopes to open new markets for British business, said recently that “the wind of economic change is blowing east. “We still do more trade with Belgium than we do with Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam combined,” he said.
The Sarawak Report, an investigative website run by the sister-in-law of Gordon Brown, Clare Rewcastle Brown, which has reported on the allegations, called on Mr Cameron to cancel his visit.
“The British Prime Minister has made the issue of rooting out global corruption one of his key platforms as a world leader,” the website said.
Doesn't sound like it to me. Well, maybe
that's why Cameron was so eager
to talk up the merits of doing business with countries with problems of corruption prior to the trip. So glad British voters voted in the grown-ups in the last election.
