Jordan Williams: running the shell game

Written By: - Date published: 6:28 pm, February 12th, 2014 - 40 comments
Categories: act, len brown, rodney hide - Tags: , , ,

This post previously ran on The Daily Blog

Jordan Williams got quoted extensively by the idiot media on friday as a result of a APNZ newswire. As a spokesfool for the self appointed “Taxpayer’s Union” he has placed himself into the idiot level with this statement on the Auckland city council ordered audit of the Mayoral office.

However, the Taxpayers’ Union questioned why the council was not taking steps to recover the full amount.

“The councillors who have let Mr Brown off the hook for at least $200,000 need to explain how it is fair that ratepayers pick up most of the tab,” union executive director Jordan Williams said.

Is this moron is actually a lawyer? He appears to have no understanding of the legal position of having one body (the council) doing a unbudgeted and unexpected audit on another body (the mayoral office) for what appears to have been purely political purposes.

As I understand the poorly written and thought through acts setting up the Auckland super city, I can’t see any authority for the council even being able to run this kind of unscheduled audit anyway. The ACT party through their representative Rodney Hide, the minister of local government at the time, produced some bad legislation that gave the mayoral office far too much power. It also wasted a colossal amount of ratepayers money in Auckland restructuring to a daft model and will continue to do so for a decade or more to come.

The apparent reason for Rodney Hide’s almost complete rewriting of the Royal Commission’s recommendations was to produce a city that was easy for people with money (like the mostly anonymous backers of ACT) to win control of a powerful mayoralty and have a small compliant council elected by money.  Unfortunately (for them) Aucklanders overwhelming voted twice against that model to the immense disgust of the ACT infiltrated C&R political grouping – originally called “Citizens and Ratepayers“.

But it is all part of an old scam that has been run by the right in NZ for years. Plug the word “taxpayers” or “ratepayers” into a lobby group for the extremely wealthy and you can drag in a pile of suckers resentful of their supposed victimisation by direct income taxes. Somehow when any group with those words in the name talks about taxes, they somehow manage to forget all of the indirect taxes that make up the other half of personal taxation.

Taxes like tariffs, consumption taxes like GST, taxes like vehicle registration, etc etc all of which as a percentage of income fall overwhelmingly on those with lower incomes. They have a lot fewer choices about having to pay them because of what they have to purchase. Somehow none of the “Taxpayer” groups ever manage to look at any taxes except those that impact the wealthy.

But then when you start looking at the people involved in these types of organisations, it often seems that it is like a con man shuffling a pea. The same people keep popping up with different labels.

Since Jordan Williams hasn’t laid out his other associations, I’ll just lay out the few that I’m aware of.

In addition to fronting for the front of the “Taxpayers Union”, he also works as a a lawyer for Franks & Ogilvie. The Franks part is Stephen Franks commonly known as one of the more nutty of the many nutty ex-MP’s for the ACT party – originally the Association of Consumers and Taxpayers when it started as a rapacious businessman’s lobby group in the 1990s.

He has fronted for several political lobby groups over the years – invariably those promoting the right of the right causes. Notably the recent Shirtcliffe/Lusk campaign against MMP and the coup in ACT when Don Brash shafted Rodney Hide. Both were ultimately miserable failures.

He was also the lawyer for Cameron Slater last year for a defamation case. The decision was released in late September. Last year also Cameron “exposed” the Len Brown affair after leaks from the John Palino campaign (managed by his father) in early October. It was apparently widely known about in National/Act circles weeks earlier during the mayoral campaign.

Now you have to remember that Cameron regularly pleads poverty. Indeed after Jordan lost a crucial ruling in that case said that he’d be representing himself because he couldn’t afford to pay a lawyer. There also does appear to have been a close relationship between Cameron Slater and Jordan Williams over the years (how else can you explain this post by Cameron). Or there was at least until Jordan lost Cameron’s legal point.

It seems to me to be unlikely that Cameron would have several lawyers during that time. Cameron isn’t exactly notable at being silent on anything for any length of time. It defies common sense that he wouldn’t have discussed Bevan Chuang’s revelations with Jordan Williams and either as a lawyer or a legally minded political ‘friend’. Somehow I don’t think that a political lobbyist with access could have been kept away from it. It’d be like stopping a blowfly from not wanting a close relationship with roadkill.

Given Jordan Williams previous track record as “a paid political mouthpiece” for the right I would be very surprised if he wasn’t involved with the attack on Len Brown by the perverts at Whaleoil. Of course this all simple speculation.  But having Jordan Williams popping under the mantle of a “Taxpayers union” getting his opinions about Len Brown’s actions just looks like conman lifting the lid in a shell game.

For a journalist to be bothered asking them for their opinion shows a distinct lack of knowledge.

But hell, this self-proclaimed “representative” for the Auckland ratepayer lives in Wellington… That should have been the first tip off even if they didn’t know all of this background sleaze

40 comments on “Jordan Williams: running the shell game ”

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  1. Tracey 1
    12 February 2014 at 7:22 pm

    The taxpayers union is a group of wealthy self interest. Of all those suffering in nz they have chosen today to speak up for the multi overseas traveller. Those millions of nzers ripped off by the price of passports. Never have so few screamed so loud for something most never use more than a couple of times.

  2. karol 2
    12 February 2014 at 7:28 pm

    I also dislike the use of the term “ratepayers”. It usually implies the 19th century idea that those owning property have more say in governance. It ignores the fact that us renters usually contribute towards the payment of the property owner’s rates.

    And Auckland Council has been set up to be all about the money. The cits & rats types are incensed that their guy never got elected mayor and will do anything to get the boot into the choice of the biggest bunch of Auckland voters.

    • Tracey 2.1
      12 February 2014 at 7:36 pm

      I think the word you are looking for is wankers.

    • fender 2.2
      12 February 2014 at 7:59 pm

      “….usually contribute……”

      I’d be very surprised if any renter doesn’t pay ALL the rates on a rental property, it’s included in the rental price.

    • Mary 2.3
      13 February 2014 at 4:03 pm

      Williams must surely be a contender for Entertainer of the Year. I try to never miss him on The Panel. The amount of drivel that he’s capable of is astounding, but delivered with such a strong sense of self-belief. His lines could be used verbatim for a political comedy. Simply wonderful, wonderful stuff.

  3. tricledrown 3
    12 February 2014 at 7:57 pm

    Karol you are wrong renters pay their rates imagine a landlord paying your properties rates that would never happen.
    If the property was unrented then the landlord would be paying the rates.

    • karol 3.1
      12 February 2014 at 7:59 pm

      renters pay their rates imagine a landlord paying your properties rates that would never happen.

      Isn’t that what I said?

  4. karol 4
    12 February 2014 at 8:06 pm

    By the way, just how “powerful” is the mayor. I understood he has more power than the councillors, but that the CCO CEOs had more power than the mayor. The mayor seems to be fairly unaccountable though. Lack of checks and balances.

    I imagined Rodney & co thought Banksie would be a good front/figurehead who would sell the CCOs’ (and the government’s) agenda to Aucklanders. And that they weren’t figuring on such a big focus on public transport & the rail link.

  5. fender 5
    12 February 2014 at 8:10 pm

    These so-called “taxpayers union” dorks are probably some of NZ’s most likely tax dodgers if truth be known.

    • srylands 5.1
      12 February 2014 at 8:48 pm

      I think you will find membership is dominated by those paying high amounts of tax.

      • lprent 5.1.1
        12 February 2014 at 8:57 pm

        Nah. High income people have accountants. They don’t pay many taxes

        Half of the tax collected from individuals by the government comes from sales taxes and fees. Somehow morons like yourself never seem to look at where they come from. I’ll give you a hint. Overwhelmingly from people at or lower than average income and they pay most of the income tax as well.

        Nett effect is that they usually pay a higher percentage of tax against their income than those on high incomes.

        • srylands 5.1.1.1
          12 February 2014 at 10:12 pm

          That is complete fiction in relation to professionals running a company.

          If you run a professional services business, your deductable expenses are relatively limited. Car expenses, phone, website. These might be 5% of revenue. Accountants fees 2% of revenue tops. Relative to revenue these are modest expenses. Following the Penny and Hooper ruling, you need to allocate 80% of the company’s pre tax profit as personal income.

          You have no evidence for your claims. Typical left envy based on a fantasy.

          • mickysavage 5.1.1.1.1
            12 February 2014 at 10:27 pm

            Nice limitation there srylands. So everyone running a business that is not a professional services business has much bigger latitude?

            Besides I run a professional services business without aggressive tax limitation measures and I can assure you my figures look nothing like what you say. You are obviously referring to professional services working out of home with no employees but there is no allowance for accommodation costs. In fact the more I look at your figures the more I wonder what they are based on.

            • McFlock 5.1.1.1.1.1
              13 February 2014 at 12:16 am

              don’t bother referring SSpylands to reality – he doesn’t believe in it.

            • lprent 5.1.1.1.1.2
              13 February 2014 at 7:56 am

              So did I (I’ve run one as well). Some of the advice about how to move costs into the company were *interesting*.

              I ignored that to concentrate on the curious bits that he just missed out. I didn’t even get into the interesting things that can be done with trusts and capital.

          • ropata 5.1.1.1.2
            12 February 2014 at 11:40 pm

            Seems to me that most tax breaks for businesses are a rort. Why should a company director effectively have a free car, free petrol, and subsidised office space courtesy of the IRD? Why should the govt fund his new Merc when a minimum wage family of 5 could hardly afford to run their rusty old Corolla?

          • lprent 5.1.1.1.3
            13 February 2014 at 7:54 am

            Typical right wing fool running a spin. Just taking your inane example.

            You push expenses into the cost structure. Computers, home office space, capital expenditure of all types like desks chairs, superannuation funds, medical insurance, insurance, etc etc.

            The visible 5% may not sound a lot. But it is on revenue, not profit. If you expressed that as being a percentage of pre-tax profit (assuming you allow yourself to make a profit), it is more likely to be something like 20% or higher.

            Not to mention that you probably minimize GST on much of your capital goods adding it to the companies GST via various means.

            Of course you try to confuse the issue by using revenue and segueing into profit. You don’t need a MBA (which I have BTW) to understand that you can only be taxed on profit.

            And as usual like all of the right wing fuckwits I seem to run across who try to play the *victim*, your single-minded lack of compassion for others beams through to anyone reading your comment. All of your statement was about how hard done you feel yourself to be.

            You cheerfully ignored the main point of my comment. That if you look at the total nominal taxation (before your accountants get hold of it), you’ll find that people living below the median or average incomes pay a far higher proportion of total tax relative to their income than you do.

            That is because sales taxes are much more unavoidable (they don’t buy as much property ofr financial services for instance) and taxes like car registration are a much higher proportion of their income.

            Based on your past performance around here, I suspect that you’d be too gutless to look at that particular issue. It doesn’t fit your personal image of being hard-done-by in society. The reality is that you are simply a specific type of sociopath – a RWNJ

          • KJT 5.1.1.1.4
            13 February 2014 at 11:30 am

            The only “professionals” I am aware of that have Srylands cost structure are self employed sex workers.

            And, we already know that Srylands hasn’t enough consideration and feeling for his fellow men/women, to do that job.

      • fender 5.1.2
        12 February 2014 at 9:42 pm

        Ok shrunk-glands, I should have just suggested they re-name their union to: “We Don’t Wanna Be Taxpayers Union”.

    • Tracey 5.2
      13 February 2014 at 7:02 am

      It’s the only union they dont lobby to have broken.

  6. tricledrown 6
    12 February 2014 at 8:55 pm

    In the cayman islands.

  7. JK 7
    12 February 2014 at 8:58 pm

    What the heck is Brian Edwards doing advertising on the Cameron Slater blog? Okay – I know its off thread …….
    So …… this stuff from Jordan Williams is all about making sure Len Brown doesn’t get a third term,
    and that the left are so p-ss-d off with him, that they give up fighting for Auckland City …. AND inevitably in a couple more years – or so – the rightwing will be in control in Auckland City, and able to do what they really want : sell all its infrastructure and assets off to their moneyed mates. Goodbye local govt in Auckland . …… and its the same scenario being repeated elsewhere throughout the country …. goodbye local govt for the locals !!

    • lprent 7.1
      12 February 2014 at 10:00 pm

      Brian Edwards (actually I think Judy does) advertises on google. Google advertises it in Whaleoil (along with a lot of other places) because it fits the right profile for the business.

  8. tricledrown 8
    12 February 2014 at 9:01 pm

    Karol usually should be always ,just because the landlord collects the rates on behalf of the council this should not deminish your or any ones democratic rights.

    • karol 8.1
      13 February 2014 at 7:51 am

      OK. gottit, tric. Yes, I know it doesn’t diminish my democratic rights. But those that proudly support the “ratepayer” label as a political weapon, imply that we renters have lesser rights.

  9. JK 9
    12 February 2014 at 9:53 pm

    Going back to the beginning of what you said, LPrent – that’s really useful stuff to know – especially the bit about J Williams – being mouthpiece for Auckland – and LIVING in Wellington. Ta for that.

  10. Sanctuary 10
    13 February 2014 at 7:18 am

    “…The Franks part is Stephen Franks…”

    Anyone who is foolish enough to listen to Franks on Mora’s afternoon show are in for a treat. They get to spend an hour with Oswald Mosley, without having to go to the trouble of inventing a time machine.

    • Tracey 10.1
      13 February 2014 at 7:32 am

      LOL

      • lprent 10.1.1
        13 February 2014 at 8:04 am

        It usually does sound like you need a screen against the deluge of spittle when he gets started.

        Fortunately I only get the Mora show if I’m chasing food in a late lunch. I have to use the car to find somewhere open.

  11. Cemetery Jones 11
    13 February 2014 at 9:47 am

    The lack of basic gun safety on display in that Lusk/Williams hunting photo never fails to amuse me.

    • MrSmith 11.1
      13 February 2014 at 11:06 am

      More to the point what does a picture of two men having there picture taken over a dead spiker have to do with the post?

      • Hayden 11.1.1
        13 February 2014 at 11:30 am

        Well, one of them is Jordan Williams, who is the subject of the post, and the other is Simon Lusk, National-affiliated political strategist, friend of Cameron Slater, and suspected WhaleOil collaborator. The links between the three are not irrelevant in the context of the post.

        I’d never noticed before, but does look like Williams, instead of metaphorically shooting himself in the foot, is about to literally (if accidentally) shoot himself in the face.

        • MrSmith 11.1.1.1
          13 February 2014 at 12:34 pm

          The picture clearly stereotypes these two with hunting and guns, and the post has nothing to do with hunting or guns! That’s my point!

          Lets let the other side play this game because most people will see it for what it is, the continued attacks on the Greens being a prime example (and I see they are up in the latest poll). If it was a picture of Peter Dunne it might have had some relevance as he has been championing hunting issues (and watch him start beating this drum before the next election).

          • Hayden 11.1.1.1.1
            13 February 2014 at 12:53 pm

            The picture clearly stereotypes these two with hunting and guns, and the post has nothing to do with hunting or guns! That’s my point!

            That might be your inference, but it’s far from clear.

            • MrSmith 11.1.1.1.1.1
              13 February 2014 at 9:09 pm

              Far from clear!

              It’s like standing up at a trial and saying these two in the picture weren’t involved in the killing of the deer your Honor, they just happened to be walking around with a rifle and came across a dead deer so they asked a passer by to take a picture of them! Now your Honor the picture also insinuates these two are somehow connected with guns when in-fact they found the gun laying beside the dead deer! Your Honor the guy that took the picture is the one you should be looking for, he said his name was Hayden.

  12. Tracey 12
    13 February 2014 at 3:29 pm

    Fwhy does craig foss think the bullying of suppliers by a big supermarket is a serious issue? The little supplier is free to independently ask for more money or not to be rogered out the back…

    Does anyone else see some similarity betw the suppliers and the average worker in nz?

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