to.’
‘Ah, now we’ve got there,’ said Jack. ‘Well of course they bloody could if they wanted, but they don’t want to do they, and I’m a bit too befuddled at the moment to go into the detail. Vested interests. Old boys’ networks. Blind trusts. Wheels within wheels. Powerful interests in the city. Party funding and favours not forgot. All that sort of thing. Friends and families. Their sisters and their cousins whom they reckon up by dozens. That vast, self-serving, self-preserving, monied establishment with far too much to gain from preserving the status quo which serves them so well.’
He paused to light a cigarette, and seeing his own glass empty took a long swig from Jimmy’s with every intention of proceeding, but Jimmy, responding to a meaningful look from Larry, intervened.
‘Don’t you think that’s enough for tonight Jack?’
‘Enough? Enough? I haven’t bloody got started yet. People don’t know the half of what goes on.’
‘I know,’ said Jimmy, ‘but some other time eh?’ and with Larry to assist him they ushered Jack from his chair and towards the exit.
‘Goodnight Mr Manning, and sleep well,’ said Albert. ‘I think we all really enjoyed that. Not sure we understood much of the tax stuff, but it certainly made a change from Saturday dominoes.’
It was with the memory of those Saturday night’s excesses fresh in his mind that Jack turned to the business of the day. Some eighteen months earlier he had opened up an investigation into the operations of a Wol-verton travel agency whose proprietors had been less than frank and forthcoming about the true level of their profits for taxation purposes.
Unlike most travel agents who tend to favour a reference to the nature of their business in their trading name, the company whose affairs Jack had in hand traded under the curiously bland and uninformative title of Scott Stevens (Wolverton) Ltd. While this may have been purely a matter of chance in the first instance, it had clearly been found to provide a convenient anonymity as the business flourished, and the eccentric but highly illegal services it offered became known both within and beyond the bounds of Wolverton.
In the early stages the case seemed to promise nothing more than a routine cash settlement, and the investigation followed what Jack would have described as a bog-standard approach. The directors were called in to an interview when the company’s accounts were formally challenged and the directors shown the instruments of persuasion, or the Hansard Extract to give it its formal revenue title.
They responded with the traditional, ‘It’s a fair cop guv, you’ve got us bang to rights,’ or words to that effect, and instructed their accountants (a national firm with international affiliates and therefore of impeccable probity) to conduct an investigation, and in due course submit to Jack a full and comprehensive report into the affairs of the company and its directors.
After a delay of six months or so the reports had been received. They were, as is traditional, constructed in such a way as to employ every conceivable device to minimise the extent of the fraud and diminish the character of the offence whilst staying (just) on the windy side of the law. It was all part of the game.
Once the many inevitable but unwarranted assumptions made in the directors’ favour had been reversed, agreement had been reached on a hefty figure of understated profits representing business takings siphoned off over many years to feather the directors’ nests with a variety of private investments and assets. A few supplementary enquiries were dealt with, and then it was time for the usual revenue examination of the books and records of the business. As was customary revenue practice, this would in the first instance be carried out at the business premises.
In addition to the relatively simple and attractive proceeding of putting a hand in the till, there were also a whole range of
‘Ah, now we’ve got there,’ said Jack. ‘Well of course they bloody could if they wanted, but they don’t want to do they, and I’m a bit too befuddled at the moment to go into the detail. Vested interests. Old boys’ networks. Blind trusts. Wheels within wheels. Powerful interests in the city. Party funding and favours not forgot. All that sort of thing. Friends and families. Their sisters and their cousins whom they reckon up by dozens. That vast, self-serving, self-preserving, monied establishment with far too much to gain from preserving the status quo which serves them so well.’
He paused to light a cigarette, and seeing his own glass empty took a long swig from Jimmy’s with every intention of proceeding, but Jimmy, responding to a meaningful look from Larry, intervened.
‘Don’t you think that’s enough for tonight Jack?’
‘Enough? Enough? I haven’t bloody got started yet. People don’t know the half of what goes on.’
‘I know,’ said Jimmy, ‘but some other time eh?’ and with Larry to assist him they ushered Jack from his chair and towards the exit.
‘Goodnight Mr Manning, and sleep well,’ said Albert. ‘I think we all really enjoyed that. Not sure we understood much of the tax stuff, but it certainly made a change from Saturday dominoes.’
It was with the memory of those Saturday night’s excesses fresh in his mind that Jack turned to the business of the day. Some eighteen months earlier he had opened up an investigation into the operations of a Wol-verton travel agency whose proprietors had been less than frank and forthcoming about the true level of their profits for taxation purposes.
Unlike most travel agents who tend to favour a reference to the nature of their business in their trading name, the company whose affairs Jack had in hand traded under the curiously bland and uninformative title of Scott Stevens (Wolverton) Ltd. While this may have been purely a matter of chance in the first instance, it had clearly been found to provide a convenient anonymity as the business flourished, and the eccentric but highly illegal services it offered became known both within and beyond the bounds of Wolverton.
In the early stages the case seemed to promise nothing more than a routine cash settlement, and the investigation followed what Jack would have described as a bog-standard approach. The directors were called in to an interview when the company’s accounts were formally challenged and the directors shown the instruments of persuasion, or the Hansard Extract to give it its formal revenue title.
They responded with the traditional, ‘It’s a fair cop guv, you’ve got us bang to rights,’ or words to that effect, and instructed their accountants (a national firm with international affiliates and therefore of impeccable probity) to conduct an investigation, and in due course submit to Jack a full and comprehensive report into the affairs of the company and its directors.
After a delay of six months or so the reports had been received. They were, as is traditional, constructed in such a way as to employ every conceivable device to minimise the extent of the fraud and diminish the character of the offence whilst staying (just) on the windy side of the law. It was all part of the game.
Once the many inevitable but unwarranted assumptions made in the directors’ favour had been reversed, agreement had been reached on a hefty figure of understated profits representing business takings siphoned off over many years to feather the directors’ nests with a variety of private investments and assets. A few supplementary enquiries were dealt with, and then it was time for the usual revenue examination of the books and records of the business. As was customary revenue practice, this would in the first instance be carried out at the business premises.
In addition to the relatively simple and attractive proceeding of putting a hand in the till, there were also a whole range of
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