"Nineteen and a big Doughnut….."
Back from my hols, and fully refreshed, so it is back to work.
A lot has happened over the past week, and I have been busy researching in England. Let me fill in that doughnut ‘hole’.
The High Court case has taken place – and the outcome was not exactly as portrayed in the media (a small detail that will come as no surprise to regular readers!).
The ‘Third Sector ‘, the charity world’s own news letter said it was the “Charity’s court bid to block compensation payments to Savile victims” – making it sound as though the Trust wanted to ban payments to genuine victims, if there were any – er, No, it wasn’t! The case was the Trust wanting to remove the Nat West as executors, because their solicitors, Osborne Clark, had been excluding the beneficiaries – Help for Heroes, etc – from any discussions on who and under what circumstances, any compensation payments were made. Solicitors for the claimants, Slater and Gordon, wanted to carve up the money in the estate between their present 139 claimants, on an agreed tariff, without any over sight – otherwise known as investigation – from those who may hold information that conflicts with their clients ‘memories’.
Although the judge didn’t agree to a change of Executor, he did agree that the Trustees have every right to be included in those discussions and to add their own input – otherwise known as research into the claims – to the discussions. He also agreed with the Trust that confining the available funds to just those claimants who had already signed up to one commercial firm, Slater and Gordon, was potentially unfair to other claimants and that advertisements should be placed in two national newspapers in case anybody else feels that they might be entitled to a share of the Savile Trust and has yet to come forward. Remember – you will be believed! – but also remember, that your claim will now be subjected to scrutiny by the Beneficiaries who have amassed a large amount of unpublished information over the past few months…
Slater and Gordon have run a very slick media campaign over the past few months, with regular stories appearing in the compliant press presenting their client’s case, whereas the Trust made the decision that it would not feed media speculation. Hence my silence on the matter – and galling it has been at times to see how things were twisted to fit that media narrative. Not least over the matter of the cost of that court action.
Liz Dux of Slater and Gordon was out on the airwaves claiming that the Trust’s decision to bring this case was ‘costing £10,000 an day’ – or was it an hour? It could well have been an hour – for when the Trust’s two lawyers, who were charging not a penny for their appearance, arrived for the hearing, a hearing merely between themselves and the Nat West Bank, they discovered that Slater and Gordon had invited themselves along for the day along with a phalanx of nineteen solicitors and barristers, including 3 QCs….to demand that the Judge agreed a tariff on the same day. That is where the £10,000 came into the picture. Potential claimants who find that the pot is empty when it comes to their compensation might care to remember that.
Alan Collins, principal lawyer at Slater & Gordon, said he was not entirely sure why the charity felt it was entitled to the money. “My interpretation, which they may not agree with, is that these cases ought to be defended, that they go back many years, that some cases are spurious and that they should be thrashed out in the court – but that is rather unrealistic,” he said. “For reasons that are not clear, the charity wanted the money.”
For reasons which are not entirely clear…Slater and Gordon want their clients to be paid on the basis of an undefended case, and don’t mention the spurious! That will not now be happening. All that has been agreed is that IF any claims are met, IF any money is left after the army of lawyers have been paid, it will be at an agreed ‘tariff’.
Those claims will be scrutinised against a vast volume of reliable evidence that we have amassed over the past few months – that I will not be sharing with you at present, much as I would love to. I have no intention of making life easy for those who think that the NSPCC holding itself up as the law in this land and stating the ‘crimes committed by Jimmy Savile’ is any substitute for our judicial system of ‘innocent until proven guilty’ means that all you have to do is dream up an occasion when your path might have crossed Jimmy Savile’s for a quick payout.
I will share one nugget with you, just because it made me laugh so much. Remember Karin Ward’s first excruciating ‘Poor Me’ tome? Remember how she said that after, aged ’14’, whoops, actually 16, she was allowed to go to Clunk-Click along with the some other girls and staff from Duncroft, at the BBC TV Centre, whoops, Shepherds Bush Theatre, Jimmy Savile took them out to an ‘exclusive’ and celebrated restaurant where they mixed with the rich and famous and she filled her ‘autograph book’. Oh dear, her age and the venue weren’t the only things she got wrong…
When you appear on TV, you get paid, and you sign a ‘consent form’. So, the BBC dutifully handed out 50p pieces to each of the girls and got them to sign a consent form. Then Jimmy Savile, ever the true Yorkshireman, took them out to, where? ‘The Ivy’, or maybe ‘Le Gavroche’, something to turn the head of a naive 14 16 year old, surely?
…..The doughnut shop two doors away from the Theatre, for a cup of tea and a doughnut…and collected up all the 50p’s to pay for it! If ever there was a definition of ‘Yorkshire grooming’ it has to be ‘pay for your own bloody doughnut’! It was such a memorable piece of ‘Savilisation’ that there does exist a formal record of it…I have it.
There will be another post today, need to do some more research…
- Moor Larkin
March 5, 2014 at 10:21 am -
The British people seem to be the doughnuts just now, falling for this sugared legal/media confection that contains no nutritonal benefit whatsoever. Just as well Raccoon are known for feeding off pond life.
- Ho Hum
March 5, 2014 at 10:39 am -
I’ve been following the discussion on the other thread as to the way in which you see criminal law being subborned by tort etc.
I’m not sure what Anna thinks, and it would be interesting to hear, but a large part of the problem may well be the result of the corporatisation of the major law firms, the resultant change in their business ethic, and the change in practice which sees them as participants/players in the political and legal processes OUTSIDE of the framework of the law as it exists and the framework of the courts
I’m sure it was always thus, to some extent, but their massing into larger power blocks with interests and influence to peddle and lobby for makes them a much different animal, and one which can be significantly more dangerous to swathes of people whose ‘ideologies’ – for want of a better word – they may not share, in a country such as the UK which has no fixed constitution or other real reference points from which individual citizens ongoing freedoms, and non intervention by the state, are guaranteed
Sometimes I do wonder if we need some sort of decent revolution. They always start well, with the lawyers being first to be shot
- Ho Hum
March 5, 2014 at 11:00 am -
I should, of course, have said that this sea change is not all down to lawyers, and their organisation into massed suits.
The influence of other groups is as important. In 10 years time, Anna will have a whole new thread to write on, ie the prosecutions for historic denigration, such as having said 20 years ago to one’s spouse ‘Maybe you might want to try on another one, dear? That particular dress does make your bum look a bit fat”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26444731
- Ho Hum
- Lucozade
March 5, 2014 at 1:06 pm -
Moor Larkin,
To disagree with three fourths of the British public is one of the first requisites of sanity….
- Ho Hum
- Ho Hum
March 5, 2014 at 10:24 am -
Thanks for adding in the detail, Anna. It’s quite difficult for those of us not directly involved to get the look and feel of the whole thing when the facts are not portrayed entirely correctly in the reports that hit the streets. It’s good to know that it’s a wee bit further from the sort of pragmatic ‘solution’ – ‘stitch up’ can sometimes be a more appropriate phrase – that some of us, observing from afar, could all too readily envisage, especially the sort that lawyers will very readily compromise on, when the costs are in danger of wiping out all benefit to their clients
- Moor Larkin
March 5, 2014 at 11:35 am -
In the spirit of “filling out”, is it not the case Anna, that when all those 20+ lawyers turned up from Slater & Gorgon, they were all being paid out of the Trust because the Law makes the Estate pay all their fees whether the Estate likes it or not, and whether there is any real merit to the participation of these legal piece-workers? I doubt many UK doughnuts would realise how the law operates in this regard, it’s lawyers pockets to fill. I certainly never did before I discovered this nugget of lawyerly shakedown. Of course, I might be wrong……. ? If I am, I think I should be told.
- Moor Larkin
- Nicola
March 5, 2014 at 10:28 am -
Brilliant and concise as ever, Anna. Thank you.
- Angry Burd
March 5, 2014 at 11:18 am -
- Margaret Jervis
March 5, 2014 at 11:31 am -
The Dough-nuts – no wonder they bear a grudge…
- Lucozade
March 5, 2014 at 12:18 pm -
Re: “The doughnut shop two doors away from the Theatre, for a cup of tea and a doughnut…and collected up all the 50p’s to pay for it! If ever there was a definition of ‘Yorkshire grooming’ it has to be ‘pay for your own bloody doughnut’!”
He was to meant to be a ‘groomer’, lol. Her books hardly a autobiography is it? More just a fictitious story inspired by things or events around her – and not necessarily her own or those that happened to her….
- Eyes Wide Shut
March 5, 2014 at 12:49 pm -
Why did the doughnut maker retire? He was fed up with the hole business.
Sorry. Its your fault for telling that Savile story about making the girls pay for their own donuts. Reminds me of this one:
A Leeds man walks into a High Street bank & asks for a loan.
He tells the bank officer he is going to Australia on business for two weeks & needs to borrow £5,000.
The bank manager tells him that the bank will need some form of security for the loan, so the Yorkshire lad hands over the keys and documents of new Ferrari parked on the street in front of the bank. He produces the Log Book & everything checks out.
The loan officer agrees to accept the car as collateral for the loan.
The bank manager & its officers all enjoy a good laugh at the rough-looking Yorkshireman for using a £120,000 Ferrari as collateral against a £5000 loan.The bank manager then instructs an employee of the bank to drive the Ferrari into the bank’s underground garage where he parks it.
Two weeks later, the man returns, repays the £5,000 & the interest of £15.41.
The bank officer says to the Yorkshireman, “Sir, we are very happy to have had your business, & this transaction has worked out very nicely, but we are a little puzzled…
While you were away, we checked you out further & found that you are a multi-millionaire.What puzzles us is, why would you bother to borrow “£5,000”?
The Yorkshireman replies: “Where else in Leeds can I park my car for two weeks for only £15.41 & expect it to be there when I return”
- rabbitaway
March 5, 2014 at 1:12 pm - Johnny Monroe
March 5, 2014 at 2:25 pm -
Welcome back, Anna. I don’t know where the hell we’d be for genuine information without you. I know I’d certainly have trouble producing a video that hints at the truth bereft of your input. Anyway, I hope you returned from the cartoon theme park with a few mementoes and souvenirs, perhaps? ‘I went to the Paedoph Isles and all I got was this lousy T-shirt. I didn’t even get any compensation!’
- Ergathones the Philosopher
March 5, 2014 at 5:02 pm -
“Scrutiny” and “Evidence”… two words that bring a smile to my face. They’ve been sadly lacking from this whole sad story thus far, at least those parts of the story that the pitchfork-wielders have been fed.
Keep up the good work Anna… looking forward to reading how things progress (as far as you’re allowed to tell it at this stage, anyway!)
- Lucozade
March 5, 2014 at 6:38 pm -
With the Jimmy Savile fiasco, the NSPCC have shown themselves to be biased, unobjective, incompetent and downright stupid so, er, noo….
What children are they actually helping with this? They are a joke – not fit for purpose.
- Carol42
March 5, 2014 at 6:49 pm -
Does this mean the BBC and NHS may still pay ‘compensation’ on the basis of at best unproven allegations, with our money? You have cheered me up, the way it was reported I thought they were getting away with it.
- Lucozade
March 5, 2014 at 7:08 pm -
Carol42,
Re: “Does this mean the BBC and NHS may still pay ‘compensation’ on the basis of at best unproven allegations, with our money? You have cheered me up, the way it was reported I thought they were getting away with it”
You can’t believe a thing you read in the papers these days can you? It’s a waste of time bothering most of the time….
- Iain McCallum
March 5, 2014 at 10:53 pm -
I was at CTCRM in the early 80’s going through RM training. I am sure that Jimmy Saville was there and I am sure he might have looked at me. I am still traumatised and scared to go to the toilet by myself. Can I claim?
- Lucozade
March 5, 2014 at 11:10 pm -
Iain McCallum,
Re: “I was at CTCRM in the early 80′s going through RM training. I am sure that Jimmy Saville was there and I am sure he might have looked at me. I am still traumatised and scared to go to the toilet by myself. Can I claim?”
Of course you can, have you heard the quality of some of the other accusations?
- Lucozade
- Fat Steve
March 6, 2014 at 11:16 am -
Come on Anna ‘nineteen solicitors and three silks’? I am sure you are right though!!!! —sounds like one of those NHS clinics my wife conducts when the whole family turns up with the patient for a day out at THEIR NHS. Yes I do so love the possessive adjective used about the NHS and just before leaving legal practice I remember some prat of a District judge opining about County Courts being the People’s Court’ as if somehow that was justification for the farce that had just taken place in respect of a costs application . Strange but I always thought the Courts and the NHS was about the provision of a rather important professional service that requires individual attention —the interface between the individual and Society or the State or whatever one terms the civic system devised for delivery of health care or justice (or should those terms be more properly be referred to as Medicine and Law respectively in this day and age)—-and individual responsibility from the professional to the individual receiving it and not some generic service delivered as the individual or for that matter the professional decides he wants it delivered or wants to deliver it. I chuckle a bit if you are correct on numbers (I haven’t known you wrong on fact yet) shouldn’t any High Court Judge have questioned his court (the possessive adjective being appropriate in this instance for he holds responsibility for conduct within it and regulates it as he in his sole discretion thinks fit) being turned into what might have appeared given the numbers something of a circus with Liz Dux the star turn and her retinue the supporting caste??? It appears from Liz Dux’s words she seemed to think she should have been Master (or should that Mistress or even Mperson?) of ceremonies Hey Ho just another minor detail of legal procedure glossed over in the general melee. This little production will run and run unless someone has the guts to call a halt to it —if for no other reason than I can’t see it greatly assisting those who are victims of Savile (if there are genuine ones) or genuine victims untouched by the (alleged) hand of celebrity of which Anna you appear to have some experience
- Keith M
March 6, 2014 at 11:25 am -
As much as I value Ms Raccoons insights into historical abuse claims Re: Savile et all I cannot help but feel her blatant pimping of yet another fake abuse victim and compulsive liar/bully/abuser Darren Laverty and his ‘me me me’ scribblings on his blog, leave a rather unpleassnt taste in my mouth. As an investigator held in such high regard by many, why did she not spot the clearest evidence of this man’s duplicity, gold-digging and attacks on anyone who challenged his version of the Bryn Estyn Fable. I cannot even cling to the hope that she was somehow misguided or naive. So there must be another reason she goes totally against the views of some very knowledgeable people. Richard Webster’s opinion on ‘Ryan Tanner’ in his book for example, who everyone should already know is of course Laverty himself. As ‘Leon’ is/was Steven Messham. Not even his latest alliance with Jon Sawyer, AKA Gojam, who runs the Needle blog seems to have put her off. Sorry, but until that particular set of anomalies is cleared up my suspicions will remain.
Disappointed.com
- Keith M
March 6, 2014 at 4:27 pm -
Lol. Maybe ‘pimped’ was too strong a description. I have noticed that you have retweeted his various blog posts and commented positively about his role as a ‘voice’ of children that were abused in the north Wales care system. I do not have the quotes to hand, but allow me some time and I shall of course locate them.. unless the internet cleaning team has been busy of course *insert smiley face here*
- Keith M
March 6, 2014 at 10:15 pm -
Please accept my apologies. I had not realised that this site was just another cliqué which does not tolerate critisism or dissent within it’s ranks, I shall look for a more balanced view elsewhere.
- Ho Hum
March 6, 2014 at 10:25 pm -
As a regular dissenter, yet one still tolerated by the landlady, I can assure you that you are quite wrong
- Ho Hum
- Royal
March 7, 2014 at 6:50 am -
Are the trustees given a list of claims beforehand and do they know who the claimants are?
Will the tariffs paid to claimants & their lawyers be made public, also the amount each claimant receives?
- Will Power
March 18, 2014 at 9:29 pm -
“Darren Laverty injects some much needed sanity into the millions of words written about ‘Victims’ – One non-victim we should be listening to” – Words by and ‘Floosted’ by Anna Raccoon.
Laverty a ‘Non-Victim?’ Not very astute are we Ms Raccoon? Laverty has made a living out of being an abuse victim, the only thing he has not talked to the media about is what he did to Peter Wynne and others in Bryn Estyn.
Your Floost entry obviously deleted but available in Google Cache.
People who delete their words and then deny they write them are A: Not to be trusted. B: Not to be trusted
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