Money Category
Money in the news and how you are going to pay and pay and pay
Carlos Slim Helu Beats Bill Gates
UBER-nerd Bill Gates can no longer claim to the richest man in the world after Mexican tycoon Carlos Slim Helu’s personal fortune was put at an estimated $67.8billion.
Mr Slim is the man behind Latin America’s mobile phone giant America Movil and according to the respected online publication Sentido Comun the company’s share price to June increased by a massive 27 per cent, thus giving Mr. Slim an $8.6billion lead on Microsoft king Gates.
Slim was recently placed at number two in the global wealth rankings behind Gates and one place above the US investor Warren Buffet. But the recent increase in America Movil’s share price has pushed the Mexican to the top of the pile.
Slim, in what is becoming the done thing for the uber-rich, recently pledged $100million to charity, in this case Bill Clinton’s anti-poverty campaign.
But feel free to hate him…
Posted: 3rd, July 2007 | In: Money | Comments (6)
Cremate The Blackburn Dead In Batches For Live Earth
COUNCIL bosses in Blackburn have decided to cremate bodies three at a time in a cost-cutting exercise that, not surprisingly, has shocked grieving relatives.
The Darwen Borough Council in Lancashire plans to store bodies for up to 24 hours after a funeral before cremating them in batches of three in order save money on staff overtime. And while the Council is following national guidelines, the radical plans have met with strong local opposition.
Tory MP, Nigel Evans, says: “If people aren’t cremated after the service it is quite undignified. They should have respect and diligence for the dead. If they don’t have enough furnaces they should invest in them. People pay enough for funerals these days. Leaving bodies hanging around is not dignified. There are ways to do these things. We can save money on all sorts of things – but not on the dead.”
However, service manager of the council-run Pleasington Crematorium, where the batch burning will take place, is adamant that he is doing the right thing. Says he: “The effect of this practice will be to improve our efficiency in terms of saving fuel costs, reducing our environmental impact and cutting down on staff overtime.
“Consultations have taken place with representatives of the Church of England, Roman Catholic, nonconformist, Hindu and Sikh faiths and also with non-religious representatives. No objections have been raised.”
Consent forms will, however, have to be signed by the grieving families. Which is just what you want to be asked when you’ve just said goodbye to a loved one – “Can we leave their body here overnight and burn them with another couple of stiffs tomorrow instead?
Please? Oh go on. It’s for the environment. Live Earth…”
Posted: 3rd, July 2007 | In: Money | Comments (4)
Barclay’s Saves With New Green Card
GREEN sells. If you want to increase sales of your product, simply maximise its eco-credentials and hey presto, you’re in business.
Barlcaycard’s new Breathe credit card is the latest green product to hit the market, with the company promising to donate half the profits from the new card to the war against climate change.
So what do consumers get for their money? Well, the card has a standard 14.9 per cent rate of interest but cardholders will pay an interest rate of 5.9 per cent on purchases of rail and bus tickets. Discounts on home insulation, green energy and holidays in the UK will also be available.
However, not everyone is impressed with the new card. Michelle Slade of Moneyfacts.co.uk highlights the fact that customers who pay their balance on time won’t be contributing to carbon reduction programmes.
Says she: “By paying no interest, these customers will be loss makers for Barclaycard, especially when you take into account the operational and administration costs of running a card. You could argue that it would be better to grab yourself the best deal, save money on interest and use this cost saving to donate to your own chosen cause.”
HSBC is also getting in on the act, with the bank set to offer a green option for its customers whereby they can opt out of receiving statements, cheque books, letters and other paper mail.
Customers can champion the banks’ cause by opting out of paying their bills over the internet or phone (wasting electricity) or via the post (that darn paper) and ending up in debtors prison saving the Earth with lights out, weeing in a bucket and shared showers…
Posted: 3rd, July 2007 | In: Money | Comment (1)
Britain Prospers No More In Global Prosperity Index
WHAT has happened to our once great nation? Where is it? Well, it’s at number 17 in a list of the planet’s most prosperous countries, that’s where.
The rankings, known as the Global Prosperity Index, were complied by the Global Development think-thank and used such factors as personal wealth, life satisfaction, healthcare and climate to calculate a top 50 chart, with Britain not even warranting a place in the top 15, or 16.
Topping the list is Norway, followed by the USA, Sweden, Austria and New Zealand with the Scandinavian nations applauded for economic growth, political and civil liberties, high levels of leisure time and equality of opportunity.
On the other hand, troubled African state of Zimbabwe props up the Top 50. Pakistan, Egypt, Bangladesh and India also feature towards the bottom of the list.
Martin Ellis, chief economist for the Halifax is rather surprised at the results. Says he: “In the World Bank rankings – which only measure economic prosperity – the UK was placed tenth. That seems to suggest that we are falling behind when it comes to factors associated with life satisfaction. An over-emphasis on economic growth can come at the expense of quality of life, as this survey appears to show.”
Gang violence, terror threats, crowded trains, massive mortgages, no smoking in pubs and Lord Sebastian Coe – what’s not to like about this country?
Posted: 3rd, July 2007 | In: Money | Comments (5)
Cheeky By Jowels: Sian Lloyd Sells Memories Of Lembit Opik
YOU would never think to look at him, that Lib Dem MP Lembit Opik was such a ladies man.
Yet, with a Cheeky Girl and a glamorous weathergirl Sian Lloyd to name but two who have fallen for his apparent charms, the man must have something.
Now, ex-girlfriend Lloyd is giving us all the chance to have something of Opik’s too, in the form of the engagement ring he gave her before running off with Transylvanian popster Gabriel Irimia, 24.
Lloyd, 42, is now planning to put the diamond ring on eBay with the money raised going to charity. After all, she won’t need it now she’s going out with racing millionaire Jonathan Ashman.
Catch up with the Libido Dems
Posted: 2nd, July 2007 | In: Money | Comments (12)
Recylcing Children: The £36million Council Child Catchers
WE all know the scene: the expectant mother in the last throes of labour, the nervous father trying desperately to be of some use, the doctors and nurses flitting in and out (if the parents are lucky) and the council staff, waiting in the background to pick up a reward from the Government.
Hang on, the council staff? A reward?
Well, that’s according to the Mail, which reveals that New Labour’s plans to lift more children out of the care system by rewarding councils who hit adoption targets, have seriously backfired.
With £36million in grants on offer, councils are targeting the most ‘adoptable’ babies, with children under the age of four being taken away in the biggest numbers. Indeed, over 900 newborn babies are now being removed from their mothers each year, an incredible 300 per cent increase in around a decade. The Mail also reports that in the past fortnight alone, eight newborn infants have been taken from their mothers in Newcastle and North Tyneside.
Indeed, it is alleged that social workers, eager to bag the bonuses, are even selecting babies before they are born.
Lib Dem MP John Hemming is concerned. Says he: “This smacks of social engineering on a grand scale. The offer of monetary rewards for meeting the targets has created a frenzy among social workers. There are council targets for recycling rubbish and now targets for recycling children.”
Recycling children? So do blonde kids go in one box, and dark ones in another?
Posted: 2nd, July 2007 | In: Money | Comments (2)
Take That: Robbie Williams Gives
WHAT a pity Robbie Williams didn’t join his former Take That mates on stage at Wembley last night. What a fitting gesture that would have been for the King of Self-Pity to honour the memory of the Queen of Hearts.
Still, despite not making it to the Diana concert, our national treasure has once again revealed his charitable side, this time in the welcomed form of a £1.5million donation to a Stoke-on-Trent charity.
The LA-based superstar donated the cash to the Give It Sum charity he set up with Comic Relief, with youngsters battling drink and drug problems expected to benefit from the cash injection.
The 33-year former addict says: “I’m glad the little help I give can raise the profile of things like this. I want to be more active in and around Stoke-on-Trent – the place I live and where I’ll eventually return to.”
According to the Mirror, Williams has now given a total of £3million to charity, with the hand-written lyrics to his smash-hit Angels, raising £27,000 alone.
The lyrics to Rudebox raised, a rumoured, 50p.
Posted: 2nd, July 2007 | In: Money | Comments (3)
Postal Strike Good For Private Competitors
PRIVATE delivery companies are preparing to make a killing during the Royal Mail’s 24-hour strike, with one firm, DX, expecting to rake in around £10million from the strike.
The strike, which is the first national stoppage in over a decade, threatens to hit postal services, Crown post offices and Royal Mail’s cash handling operation. Although 14,00 post offices will stay open.
Still, with more disruptions threatened over the coming weeks, private companies are licking their lips in anticipation.
Chief executive of DX, James Greenbury, claims the firm has attracted an “extraordinary” amount of demand from new customers in the past week. Says he: “We are taking on a significant number of new customers in a controlled fashion.
“We could take on more but we do not want to compromise the quality of our service and are concentrating on only signing up those people who we believe will want to stay with us long term.”
Along with DX, firms such as Global Mail and TNT are set to seriously threaten the Royal Mail’s dominance of the market and this new strike will only boost the private companies’ business.
Anorak plans to join the picket line sometime between 7am and 6pm, although we may not arrive until tomorrow…
Posted: 29th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comment (1)
One In Five Getting Advertised Broadband Speed
INSTANT web pages, music downloading in the blink of an eye and smooth-streaming videos of monkeys riding motorbikes – that’s what we have all come to expect from the technological wonder that is broadband. Yet for many web users, things never seem as fast they ought to be. Or as fast as they’ve been lead to believe.
According to a new survey by moneysupermarket.com, only one in five broadband users is gets to enjoy the high-speed internet access they signed up for. Indeed, the survey reveals that 30 per cent of broadband users feel that they have been misled by their provider over the speed of their connection.
Sky broadband is one service which is apparently failing to deliver the goods, with only six per cent of customers who signed up for the 16Mb package actually able to enjoy the top speed. Competitors such as TalkTalk, Orange and BT are also guilty of providing surprisingly slow services.
Moneysupermarket.com’s Jason Lloyd says: “Line interference, the quality of wiring into and around your home, its distance from the telephone exchange and the number of people sharing the same provider connection in your area at the same time affect broadband speed.”
Lloyd is also concerned by the fact that consumers are not made aware of these issues by the providers. Says he: “Providers don’t expressly give you these details when you sign up, instead putting it the contract small print. Most damning for providers is 30 per cent of broadband customers feel misled now they know what speed they actually get.”
I’m still waiting for that Paris Hilton Bible class video to download and she’s even been in and out of prison in the meantime.
Posted: 29th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comments (2)
The Great Prison Pay-Off: Prisoners Paid To Be Free
HOW does the Government deal with the prison overcrowding problem? How else but by simply letting some of the lags out?
This means less people in prison, see. It’s genius. And what do the prematurely freed prisoners get for their trouble? A big wad of cash in their back pockets, that’s what.
With the first 2,000 prisoners set to enjoy an early release today, each will enjoy a cash payout of up to £173 to compensate the poor souls for losing their free bad and board as they can’t receive benefits.
They will also receive the normal discharge grant of £46. And maybe a bunch of flowers and a box of chocolates.
Paul Cavadino of penal reform group, Nacro, explains: “The scheme is the only immediately available way of relieving the prison population crisis. ‘Because it involves supervision, the scheme should reduce these prisoners’ chances of reoffending.”
Why put them in jail in the first place, then?
Posted: 29th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comment (1)
ITV Says To Tycoon Peter Jones: “You’re Fired”
THERE was always something incredibly annoying about the panel on the hit TV show Dragon’s Den; those self-satisfied, smug multi-millionaires passing judgement on contestants.
One such ‘dragon’, the charisma-free entrepreneur Peter Jones, loved being centre of attention so much that he decided to front a new ITV show all of his own. It’s called Tycoon.
And the show, which is nothing more than a carbon-copy of The Apprentice, has failed to attract the kind of viewing figures that Sir Alan Sugar and Co. achieved.
Indeed, after opening with a paltry 2 million viewers last week, Tycoon, which is produced by Jones’ own company – Peter Jones TV – managed to attract only 1.9 million on Tuesday.
ITV have decided to move the show from its prime 9pm slot to a 10pm backwater on Monday, as well as halving the running time to 30 minutes.
Bitter as it might sound, one can’t help but smirk at the failure of the show. Rule No. 1 of being a success in business – don’t make a fool of yourself on a flaccid, tinny copy of another product.
Posted: 28th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comments (29)
Nesta Roberts Is 341 Years Old: Fact
YOU wouldn’t think to look at her that Nesta Roberts was 341 years old. But that’s exactly what age her bank said she was and as we all know, banks are never wrong.
The 71-year-old spent half an hour trying to activate her new credit card by keying in her details over the phone. But still she couldn’t get the card up and running.
Eventually, Roberts asked bank staff to check her details and they eventually found that the year of her birth was down as 1666, the year of the Great Fire of London. She may be an OAP, but she’s not quite that old.
Roberts says: “I was put through to a supervisor and explained the recorded message kept telling me my details were incorrect. It was suggested I must have made an error. But I said that as far as I was aware, my date of birth had been the same for as long as I could remember.”
The poor woman was forced to pay her branch manager a visit, who jokes: “How is William Shakespeare?” which is a rubbish joke and explains why he or she is a bank branch manager and not a successful stand-up comic.
Oh, and Shakespeare died in 1616 anyway, even if ‘our records’ say otherwise…
Poles Send Back A Billion Pounds To Poland
AH, at last the Daily Mail has those blasted Poles were it wants them – caught red-handed taking money out of the great British economy.
The newspaper has gotten its hands on figures released by the National Bank of Poland which reveal that £1.1billion was sent back from the UK to family members living in the former Eastern Bloc country, money which, says the Mail, “would otherwise have been spent in shops, restaurants and other businesses.”
Ah, those shifty immigrants, damaging our nation’s wealth, and using our tolets. Except, they’re not really, as the Mail continues, “the sum is too small to dent the health of the British economy.”
Still, let’s not miss out on a chance to bash an immigrant, metaphorically speaking of course. Tory MP James Clappison is quick to pounce on the figures, claiming: “This is yet another consequence of Eastern European migration which the Government failed to predict. It has to raise question marks over whether there will be an employment effect here. The Government has not done proper research on that.”
The Mail then tells us that Poles living in the UK have been blamed for a shortage of £50 notes in the country, as they have been sending the money back to their homeland. Could they be any more devious?
We’re sure the Mail will let us know if and when they are.
Posted: 28th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comments (2)
The New BT Credit Card
WHILE most of us are desperately trying to cut down on the bulk in our wallets, BT are set to introduce their own credit card to add to the mountain of plastic already out there.
The new BT Credit Card will be linked to customers’ internet and phone bills, with each transaction helping to knock money off those BT bills. Which is rather good, isn’t it?
Karen Darby of simplyswitch.com (yet another comparison site) is as excited as one can get about credit cards. Says she: “It is quite rare to find any reward scheme operating on a card with 0% balance transfers. This is a strong indication that BT is pushing the boat out to retain its existing customers.”
However, BT customers who pay their telephone bills with the new BT card will still have to pay the company’s non-direct debit fee.
With all these price comparison websites, isn’t it time there were some price comparison website comparison sites?
Wimbledon: Anyone For Thieving?
CALL in Columbo! Even better, get wine-soaked DCI Tom Barnaby from Midsomer Murders. Something is afoot at the All-England club.
According to the Mail, there is a thief stalking the Wimbledon locker rooms and he or she may even be a player or a coach! TV scriptwriters get typing….
So far, a number of players have had cash and valuables go missing from changing areas in the run-up to the famous competition, with Jamie Murray, brother of crocked Scots star Andy, having money and his mobile phone stolen at the Artois Championships at the Queen’s Club.
Last year’s semi-finalist, Jonas Bjorkman, has had his wallet stolen twice on the tour this year and he’s rather unhappy. Says he: “The ATP are deciding whether it is necessary to put cameras in dressing rooms. This year the problem has been extremely bad. In some tournaments there are up to 128 players and if the guard sees someone going around picking up things in racquet bags, it is hard for them to understand whose the racquet bag is. “
Cameras in dressing rooms, eh? I can see the headlines already…
Posted: 27th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comment (1)
Intelligent Life Found On Railways
WEB ticket agency Trainline have paid out £18million for smartcard giant AST in a deal which will pave the way for the introduction of train swipe cards and sound the death knell for the humble train ticket.
In the coming year, the company plans to launch the new system at rail and tube stations and boss Alan Tomlin is rather excited. Says he: “It will revolutionise travel. All customers need to do is swipe at entry points with no queuing or worries about remembering different sets of tickets.”
However, while the idea of not having to queue up for tickets does sound rather good, the unions are understandably concerned about the inevitable resulting job losses.
Bob Crow, leader of the Rail, Maritime and Transport Union, warns that rail bosses will “have a fight on their hands”. Says he: “It is typical of rail privateers to see technology as a means to cut costs and maximise profits. Booking staff provide a vital service way beyond simply selling tickets. We will defend them.”
Indeed, the booking staff are needed to take money, make you wait in line, nip to the toilet and refuse to serve you if you look at them ‘funny’…
Posted: 27th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comment (1)
Spice Girls Learn That Power Is Money
YOU would think it was the bloody Beatles who were re-uniting what with all the hype and tales of amazing comebacks. Yet, it’s only the Spice Girls, those espousers of Girl Power-fuelled catchphrase feminism.
Still, one shouldn’t underestimate the all-consuming power of a hype machine, and now, the fab five – Victoria, Geri, Emma and Mels B and C – are set to pocket a massive £25million from a two-hour TV special set to air in late September.
The documentary will coincide with their much-awaited (it says here) reunion world tour and will feature the girls reminiscing about their career as well as, wait for it, showing footage of their first-ever rehearsals. Wow.
According to a “source close to the girls”: “There have been ongoing discussions about doing a documentary looking back at the beginning, the height of Spicemania and what happened towards the end. It will be full-on nostalgia and a look back at living through those amazing years.”
Spice guru and professional turd polisher, Simon Fuller, will net around £40million for the project.
Money Power!
Posted: 27th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comments (12)
Fast Food Prisons: Lags Do Fish ‘N’ Chips
SURELY this is not what our beloved Bobby was trained for – to collect takeaway dinners for prisoners, is it? Obviously it isn’t, but according to new figures, police stations are spending a lot of time and money on feeding inmates in their cells, as overcrowded prisons can no longer hold accommodate the nation’s lags.
One police station is apparently spending £700 a week on fish suppers, curries and Chinese takeaways for its prisoners while in the region covering Essex, Suffolk, Cambridgeshire, Norfolk, Northants and Bedfordshire, the police cell bill has topped £2million.
Apparently it costs £13 per day to feed a prisoner in a police cell, compared to £2 for those in jail and now the Government is expected to come under fire over the spending.
Alan Page, 63, who works in a chippy near Halesworth police station, confides: “They come in and get fish and chips once a day, sometimes six or seven portions of cod and chips. These people should be living on bread and cheese and water like they did years ago – they are having a cushy life.”
Presumably he was referring to the prisoners and not the police. And shouldn’t he be happy with the extra business anyway?
Posted: 26th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comment (1)
Card Sharp: OFT To Simplify Credit Card Deals
NEVER mind the small print, many of us Britons struggle to understand the big print when it comes to credit card, mortgage and insurance deals. But now the OFT has decided to make the cost of credit card deals easier for us simpletons to understand.
The decision by the OFT to simplify the system has come after Which? magazine highlighted the fact that consumers were choosing credit card deals without being aware of all the issues which affect the cost of the card.
The magazine also found that the 20 biggest credit card providers used an incredible 12 different methods to apply interest charges, which are worth around £400million a year.
The OFT chief executive, John Fingelton, says: “Credit card pricing has become increasingly complex, with many new dimensions such as interest free periods. While these give additional choice and value to consumers, they can make it harder to make informed decisions.”
The investigation is expected to take up to six months to complete, and will be run in conjunction with the credit card industry.
In the meantime, let’s here it for debt…
A Nation Of Fine Winos
I ALWAYS wondered what exactly ‘fine wine’ was. The same goes for ‘fine dining’. Where do you draw the line between ‘fine’ and ‘quite good’? And who draws it?
Anyway, it seems that we, the great British nation, are starting to get a little more sophisticated when it comes to wine. According to a spokesman for Majestic Wine shops, sales of wine costing £20 or more have jumped by a quarter in just the last year.
Although considering you can buy a decent bottle for a fiver, maybe ‘gullible’ is a more apt description than ‘sophisticated’.
Posted: 26th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comments (2)
Paying The Price For Nudity In Scotland
STEVEN Gough likes to feel the wind on his, erm, body, and while we are indeed all naked underneath our clothes, the law is still rather prissy when it comes to nudists, naturists and their ilk.
So far, Gough, 48, of Eastleigh, Hampshire, has been sentenced to a total of 30 months in prison for letting it all hang out, running up a bill of around £40,000.
The nude dude was again put back in prison yesterday after being arrested last month for leaving Edinburgh’s Saughton jail in the altogether, for the seventh time, and has now racked up court costs of over £60,000, which the taxpayer has had to shoulder.
Tory justice spokesman for Scotland, Bill Aitken, says: “All this nonsense means is that he is back in court and back in prison and is costing the taxpayer a damn fortune.”
Nudism is fine. But in Scotland? What about the midges…
Posted: 26th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comment (1)
Cleaners Not Taken To The Cleaners By Roy L. Pearson Jr.
AS well as being the home of the brave, the United States is also the land of the litigious, and while this nationwide penchant for taking everything that moves to court can sometimes have a positive effect such as keeping dodgy businesses in line, things can often get rather silly.
Take the case of Roy Pearson, for example. One day, the administrative judge took a pair of trousers into his local dry cleaners in his Washington DC neighbourhood. However, he never saw them again. The owners of Custom Cleaners then offered him $150 in compensation, which he duly accepted.
Then three years later, Pearson took another pair of trousers into the shop, this time for tailoring. And while he claimed that those trousers also went missing, the Chungs, who owned the dry cleaners, claimed that they had indeed found the pants in question and even had a receipt to prove it.
However, Pearson, decided to sue the Chungs, for an incredible $67million.
As Washington’s consumer protection law provides for damages of $1,500 per day, Pearson got out his calculator and multiplied 12 violations over 1,200 days, times the three Chung family members. Added to this was $15,000 to rent a car to drive to another cleaner in the area as well as $500,000 in emotional damages and $542,000 in legal fees, even though he was representing himself.
He lost.
Posted: 26th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comments (3)
Tooth Fairy Feeling The Pinch
FORGET about the first-time buyer struggling to get a foot on the property ladder, the household crippled by debt or indeed the local shopkeeper put out of a business by a local supermarket, the real victim of these harsh financial times is none other than the humble tooth fairy.
According to a new survey by the Children’s Mutual, which apparently has a lot of free time on its hands, children wake up to an average of £1.05 left by the tooth fairy for each tooth, a massive increase on the 27p average their parents pocketed for losing a tooth.
Overall, that works out at a massive £20million a year, a 500 per cent rise over the last 25 years compared to the 125 per cent rise of inflation. Indeed, tooth fairy inflation has almost kept up with house prices, which have jumped by over 600 per cent in the last 25 years.
David White, head honcho of the Children’s Mutual, says: “The generosity of the tooth fairy has accelerated rapidly and shows no signs of abating.”
But what of the tooth fairy? Reports suggest he (or is it a she?) has had to lay off 75 per cent of his staff and is facing a hostile takeover by Tesco.
Posted: 26th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comments (3)
The £2.50 Alzheimer’s Work, But You Can’t Have Them
THE Government’s health watchdog, the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice), was condemned by the High Court for depriving 100,000 Alzeimer’s sufferers a £2.50-a-day drug.
The decision by Nice to block the drug was branded “abhorrent and disgusting” by one of the judges after a case was brought by drug company Eisai and backed by the Alzheimer’s Society. If the case is successful, it could trigger a whole torrent of legal actions from patients who have been refused the treatment.
Nice had originally decided that the drug was apparently too expensive, at £2.50 a day, when weighed up against the benefits to patients with mild Alzheimer’s.
During the hearing, Alzeimer’s sufferer, Keith Turner, who had been prescribed the drug Aricept, one of the three acetyl cholinesterase inhibitors shunned by Nice, said: “Life was slipping away so fast. But that has all now changed because of this drug.”
David Pannick QC, representing Eisai, opines: “The inevitable consequence of removing funding for those with mild AD – and the evidence shows that is about 96,000 people in this country – is that the opportunity is lost for delaying the onward march of this appalling disease and maintaining a relatively good way of life for a patient as long as possible.”
The hearing is set to last for four days.
Posted: 26th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comments (2)
Lotto Sister Tight With Brother Powell
PICTURE the scene. Your lucky sibling has just won a whopping £9.3million on the Lottery. Then, you hear it, the tantalizing sound of a letter dropping through the letter-box. How much will your brother or sister have given you? Half-a-million at least, surely?
Well, for poor old Len Powell, that cheque, from sister Irene, was for just £1,000, a measly 0.010638 of his Lottery millionaire sibling’s enormous winnings. To add insult to injury, the offending cheque came with a hand written note which read, “Hope it will help you out with the struggle with money.”
Len’s son, 37-year-old Mark, who actually opened the letter, framed it with a copy of the cheque and placed it on his parents’ mantelpiece.
At the time of their massive win, Irene, 69, and her husband Ron promised to look after their close relatives. Says Irene: “We are wondering how to spend the money but one thing’s for sure – we’re going to take our time and ensure that all are loved ones are taken care of”.
When questioned yesterday about the grand slap in the face to her brother, Irene said, “I’m not going to say anything about money because it only stirs things up.”
Indeed it does.
Posted: 25th, June 2007 | In: Money | Comments (6)
