The image Craig Oliver was complaining about at length was perhaps a bit more Hammer House of Horror than BBC News, no worse however than anything produced on this blog. ‘Mad’ Frankie Maude’s people told us he was actually quite pleased with his sinister image. Gordon Brown’s fans bitterly hated the Prime Mentalist image, megawatts of pixels were wasted decrying that hugely successful meme.  The Treasury once balked a bit at one of Guido’s portraits of George Osborne. Though admittedly, unlike the BBC, we don’t pretend to be impartial. On balance Guido thinks we saw Craig Oliver and Norman Smith doing their respective jobs…

UPDATE:

Here is the full clip that caused all the trouble:

Video via ConservativeHome

With a u-turn announced last night on the Pasty Tax and the watering down of caravan taxes and secret courts, Guido thought he’d put together the comprehensive one stop guide to Coalition u-turns:

• Rape anonymity
• Selling off the forests
• Vanity photographer on the public payroll
• Scrapping school milk for under-5s
• Scrapping Bookstart
• Scrapping  the Financial Inclusion Fund
• Cutting Housing Benefit for long-term jobseekers
• Immigration target policy reduced to an “ambition”
• Coastguard cuts
• Circus animals ban
• Reduction in BBC World Service cuts
• Cutting support for disabled people in care homes
• Scrapping the Office of the Chief Coroner
• Automatic prison sentences for carrying a knife
• 50% sentence reductions for an early guilty plea
• Scrapping the Youth Justice Board
• Scrapping Domestic Violence Protection Orders
• Plans to introduce unannounced Ofsted inspections
• Watering down of Child Benefit cuts
• Video games tax relief kept after all
• Scrapping NHS targets
• Joint Strike Fighter mess
• Watering down plans to recall MPs
• Rowing back on Secret Courts
• Pasty Tax scrapped
• Caravan Tax watered down

No Plan B though…

News of Craig Oliver’s spinning has reached the Scottish salmon fishing retreat of Charlie Whelan:

https://twitter.com/#!/charliewhelan/status/207122389975306240

Spoken like a true pro…

Tomorrow is Tax Freedom Day – the first day of the calendar year that you stop working for the state and start working for yourself.  One of the better received parts of the budget was the pledge of tax transparency – soon tax statements will come with a break down of how our money is spent.

If you can’t wait until then to see how your money is squandered, the Treasury have made a nifty app.

You can now keep a handy reminder in your pocket of how much of your hard earned cash is given to people who won’t work…

Warning to BBC lawyers: You’re wasting the public’s money trying to suppress video of two public servants discussing a matter of public interest.

UPDATE:

@GuidoFawkes Downing Street say that no one there asked for the YouTube video to be removed.

— Andy McSmith (@andymcsmith) May 28, 2012

Well someone did…

It all began with another Tory using a dodgy business card. When Guido started digging into the Conservative Arab Network back in November, it soon became clear it was going to end in tears. One of their directors, a lobbyist, came to Guido’s attention when his card had the Tory logo on it, despite the group not being officially affiliated to party. Complaints were made and the Party seemed to realise something was up…

Sources within the group seemed confident that CAN would be given official status, not least because its Chairman Dr Wafik Moustafa was a close friend of Warsi who was proud that she had lived in his house. Issues around Warsi’s expense claims were well-known in the network and voiced to Guido before Christmas and again in January. CCHQ’s rejection of CAN’s affiliation in March meant there was a risk of Moustafa going rogue…