Tag Archives: HM Government

Rededication services for 2 fallen World War 1 soldiers have been held today (Tuesday 17 October 2017) in Ypres, Belgium. The first for Rifleman William Dickson Evans of The King’s (Liverpool Regiment) at Blauwepoort Farm Commonwealth War Graves Commission Cemetery. The second for Private John Anderson of the 4th Battalion Gordon Highlanders at Birr Cross Roads Commonwealth War Graves Commission Cemetery.

Both services, organised by the MOD’s Joint Casualty and Compassionate Centre (JCCC), part of Defence Business Services, was conducted by The Reverend Paul van Sittert CF, Chaplain to the Highlanders (4 Scots).

2nd cousins to Rifleman Evans, Sue Muncher and Ann Trail (left to right). Also joining them are Tony Muncher and Les Trail (l to r). The maiden name of Sue and Ann was Dickson. Crown Copyright. All Rights Reserved. Crown Copyright. All Rights Reserved.

Rifleman Evans enlisted in Liverpool on 7 November 1914 as part of the Liverpool Brigade West Lancashire Division. He sailed from Southampton to Le Havre in February 1915 and joined the 15th Brigade 5th Division serving with the Expeditionary Force. His total service was 173 days before being killed during the second Battle of Ypres on 28 April 1915, aged 22 years old.

Newly placed gravestone bearing the name of Rifleman Evans. Crown Copyright. All Rights Reserved.

Rifleman Evans was originally buried in Blauwepoort Farm Cemetery with his fellow comrades of the same regiment who were also killed at the same time. Due to ongoing fighting his grave was subsequently lost or destroyed.

Standing by the graveside of Rifleman Evans his family; Regimental representatives and Deputy Mayor of Ypres; Sub lt Fred Warren Smith; and Max Harris, trumpeter. Crown Copyright. All Rights Reserved.

The JCCC understand that there is no evidence to suggest he is buried elsewhere. His relatives submitted a case to the JCCC in 2015 which has resulted in a headstone being placed in the cemetery near the entrance saying ‘Buried elsewhere in this Cemetery’. Members of his family attended the service alongside the antecedent Regiment The Duke of Lancaster’s Regiment.

Captain Gary Main laying a wreath at Rifleman Evans’s graveside on behalf of the 4 Scots Regiment.

In the afternoon the rededication service for Private John Anderson took place. Private Anderson joined the 4th Battalion Gordon Highlanders in late September 1914. He saw active service in France and Flanders landing in France in March 1915. In May he was in the trenches in the area of Vlamertinghe, West Ypres followed by marching through Ypres taking over the whole front from Hooge. Reports from a fellow soldier to his family stated he was killed in the second Battle by shellfire on 28 May 1915, aged 20 years old.

Standing by the graveside of Private Anderson Regimental representatives and a Royal British Legion standard bearer. Crown Copyright. All Rights Reserved.

Private Anderson was originally buried in Birr Cross Roads Cemetery as an unknown soldier of the 4th Battalion Gordon Highlanders. An identification case was submitted to the JCCC which was later accepted on completion of their research and investigations.

Reverend Paul van Sittert CF and Captain Gary Main both 4 Scots Regiment at the graveside of Private Anderson. Crown Copyright. All Rights Reserved.

Regrettably Private Anderson’s family could not attend the service. Regimental support was provided by the antecedent Regiment The Royal Regiment of Scotland. He is commemorated on the main village and district of Kemnay War Memorial and the Inverurie War Memorial. His brother Alexander was also killed in the Great War.

Sue Raftree, JCCC said: 

These brave First World War soldiers fought for their country to make our lives better. It is a privilege for the Joint Casualty and Compassionate Centre to have organised these two very fitting services to ensure that finally these two soldiers have their own named headstones.

Reverend Paul van Sittert CF said:

Lest we forget. Powerful words, and so much more for us that have been part of these rededication services where two previously unnamed soldiers have now been named. It is an incredible privilege and honour to have played a part. So many have paid the ultimate price, named and unnamed, yet their sacrifice will not be forgotten. We will remember them.

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Bradley Trevor Silver, also known as Bradley Silva, has been disqualified from acting as a director for 14 years, beginning 2 November.

In the days prior to the disqualification hearing, the Insolvency Service’s lawyers were contacted by “Adam Solomans”, who claimed to be a friend of Silver’s, informing them that Silver had committed suicide. However, “Adam Solomans”’ name and signature both featured on a cheque paid into 24/7 London’s bank account which had bounced. In addition he appeared to have shared a mobile telephone number with Silver – who he insisted had died in a car crash – and he stopped responding to emails.

In her Judgement, Registrar Derrett said that she did not accept that Mr Silver had died, and that, in all probability Mr Silver and Mr Solomans were one and the same.

Silver was the sole director of 24/7 London, a sham company wound up in the Public Interest by the Insolvency Service in September 2016. His company contacted various editing and production with forged documents claiming it had worked on contracts on a number of TV shows including Big Brother, Britain’s Got Talent, X-Factor, and The Only Way is Essex.

He also approached a number of banks and credit institutions seeking credit on the back of fictional accounts, and also using forged documents and invoices.

Silver even filed fictitious accounts on behalf of 24/7 London, claiming turnover of £4.7 billion and assets of £2.4 billion, stated to have been audited by Deloitte LLP. Insolvency Service investigators found that Deloitte LLP had not in fact audited the accounts, which in any event contained basic errors. This included presenting numbers in billions, as Silver had headed columns “£’000” by accident, unwittingly inflating figures by a factor of 1,000.

Commenting on the disqualification, Cheryl Lambert, Chief Investigator at the Insolvency Service, said:

This is one of the more bizarre cases of dishonesty and misuse of Limited Liability I have ever come across.

That Mr Silver appears to have tried to fake his own death through suicide in order to avoid disqualification is disgraceful. Directors should be aware that the Insolvency Service will not shy away from confronting dishonesty and removing these people from the marketplace.

Bradley Trevor Silver, (also known as Bradley Silva), date of birth, March 1968, was registered with Companies House as the sole director of 24/7 London at all times. He was disqualified from acting as a director or being concerned in the promotion, formation or management of a company for a period of 14 years on 11 October 2017. The period of disqualification will commence on 2 November 2017.

24/7 London (GRP) Ltd (Company Registration No. 08225516) was incorporated on 24 September 2012.

24/7 London was wound up in the Public Interest pursuant to an order made on 6 September 2016 under section 124A of the Insolvency Act 1986, on the petition of the Secretary of State for Business Innovation and Skills (as was) and following an investigation by Company Investigations, part of the Insolvency Service.

At the time of its liquidation, 24/7 London’s Registered Office address was Suite 157 Berkeley Square House, Berkeley Square, London W1J 6BD, being a virtual office facility provider.

24/7 London’s only known debts in liquidation relate to a bank overdraft of £15,705.

Silver was also ordered to pay the Secretary of State’s costs of £6,721.74.

A disqualification order has the effect that without specific permission of a court, a person with a disqualification cannot:

• act as a director of a company
• take part, directly or indirectly, in the promotion, formation or management of a company or limited liability partnership
• be a receiver of a company’s property

Persons subject to a disqualification order are bound by a range of other restrictions

The Insolvency Service, an executive agency sponsored by the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), administers the insolvency regime, and aims to deliver and promote a range of investigation and enforcement activities both civil and criminal in nature, to support fair and open markets. We do this by effectively enforcing the statutory company and insolvency regimes, maintaining public confidence in those regimes and reducing the harm caused to victims of fraudulent activity and to the business community, including dealing with the disqualification of directors in corporate failures.

BEIS’ mission is to build a dynamic and competitive UK economy that works for all, in particular by creating the conditions for business success and promoting an open global economy. The Criminal Investigations and Prosecutions team contributes to this aim by taking action to deter fraud and to regulate the market. They investigate and prosecute a range of offences, primarily relating to personal or company insolvencies.

The agency also authorises and regulates the insolvency profession, assesses and pays statutory entitlement to redundancy payments when an employer cannot or will not pay employees, provides banking and investment services for bankruptcy and liquidation estate funds and advises ministers and other government departments on insolvency law and practice.

Further information about the work of the Insolvency Service, and how to complain about financial misconduct, is available.

You can also follow the Insolvency Service on:

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Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Rt Hon James Brokenshire MP said:

Last night’s announcement that Airbus is taking a stake in Bombardier’s C-Series is positive and welcome news for Northern Ireland.

We have been working tirelessly across Government to secure the future of the C-Series in recent months, and we will continue to do all we can to ensure the unjustified case brought by Boeing reaches a swift and effective resolution.

Our number one priority throughout has been to safeguard jobs and livelihoods in Belfast. While there are still some steps before the deal is completed, this is clearly a significant move forward for the C-Series and for the workforce in Northern Ireland.

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I will now update the house on the fifth round of negotiations with the EU.

In view of the fact that the October European Council is this week, I will also review the progress of the five negotiation rounds since June.

Whilst at times the negotiations have been tough, both Michel Barnier and I have acknowledged the new dynamic that has been created by the Prime Minister’s speech in Florence.

This momentum was maintained during November. Both negotiating teams continued to work constructively together.

Since June we have steadily developed our shared political objectives. Now nevertheless there is still still some way to go to secure a new partnership.

But I am confident we are on the right path.

Mr Speaker, I will now take the House through each of the negotiating issues in turn.

Citizens’ Rights

On citizens’ rights, we have made further progress towards giving British citizens in the EU and EU27 citizens in the UK the greatest possible legal certainty about the future.

In future our legal orders will be distinct and different.

Last week, we explored the ways in which we will make sure that the rights we agree now will be enforced in a fair and equivalent way.

We also explored ways in which we can fully implement the Withdrawal Treaty into UK law.

That will give confidence to European citizens living in the UK that they will be able to directly enforce their rights – as set out in the Agreement – in UK courts.

The two sides also discussed ways of ensuring consistent interpretation of our Agreement.

Although we have not yet arrived at a single model that will achieve this, we have explored a number of solutions.

And we should also not lose sight of the fact that we have made significant progress in this area since June.

We have reached agreement on:

• The criteria for residence rights;

• The right to work and own a business;

• Social security rights;

• Rights for current family members;

• Reciprocal health care rights;

• The rights of frontier workers;

• And the fact that the process for securing settled status in the UK will be streamlined and low cost.

But, of course, there are still some issues outstanding for both sides, including the right:

• to continue to enjoy the recognition of professional qualifications;
• to vote in local elections;
• The right to onward movement move as a UK citizen already resident in the EU27;
• the right to return;
• the right to bring in future family members;
• the right to export a range of benefits;

And in many of these areas it is a straightforward statement of fact that our proposals go further and provide more certainty that those of the Commission. We are trying to find on both sides I think, pragmatic solutions. In the fourth round we offered the guaranteed right of return for settled citizens in the UK in exchange for onward movement rights for British citizens currently living in the EU. We look forward to hearing the Commission’s response on this offer, we haven’t had it yet.

Mr Speaker,

I recognise that there has been some concern regarding the new system which European citizens will have to use to gain settled status in the UK.

So last week, I confirmed that while there will be a registration process, the administration process will be completely new, streamlined, and – importantly – low-cost.

Furthermore, any EU citizen in the UK already in possession of a permanent residence card will be able to exchange it for settled status in a simple way.

They will not need to go through the full application process again.

The tests associated with this process will be agreed and set out within the Withdrawal Agreement.

As a result of our productive discussions, the Commission is also able to offer similar guarantees in return for those British citizens in the European Union.

These clarifications, on both sides, have helped build further confidence.

Northern Ireland

This round also saw further detailed discussions on Northern Ireland and Ireland.

In a significant step forward we we have developed joint principles on the continuation of the Common Travel Area and associated rights.

These joint principles will fully preserve the rights of UK and Irish nationals to live, work and study across these islands. They will also protect the associated rights to public services and social security. To provide legal certainty, these principles recognise that the Withdrawal Agreement should formally acknowledge that the UK and Ireland will continue to be able to uphold and develop these bilateral arrangements. Our teams have also mapped out areas of cooperation that function on a North-South basis. And we have begun the detailed work to ensure this continues once the UK has left the EU.

We also agreed a set of critical guiding principles to protect the Belfast (Good Friday) Agreement in all its dimensions. And we are working on the necessary steps to make this a reality. And throughout this process we have reaffirmed our commitment to protecting the rights of people of North Ireland to choose to be British, Irish or both, as they choose. I have set out before our shared determination to tackle the unique circumstances of Northern Ireland by focusing on creative solutions and we have begun to do so.

But we cannot fully resolve these issues without also addressing our future relationship.

As the Prime Minister said in her statement to this House last week, “We owe it to the people of Northern Ireland—and indeed to everyone on the island of Ireland—to get this right.”

Financial Settlement

On the financial settlement, discussions continued in the spirit fostered by the Prime Minister’s significant statements in her Florence speech.

The Prime Minister reassured our European Partners that they will not need to pay more or receive less over the remainder of the current budget plan as a result of our decision to leave.

And she reiterated that the UK will honour commitments we have made during the period of our membership.

Off the back of this, in the September round we agreed to undertake a rigorous examination of the technical detail where we needed to reach a shared view.

This work has continued.

This has not been a process of agreeing specific commitments — we have been clear that this can only come later.

But it is an important step, so that when the time comes we will be able to reach a political agreement.

Separation Issues

Finally, on separation issues, we have continued to work through the detail on a range of issues, particularly those areas relating purely to our withdrawal, such as nuclear safeguards, civil judicial co-operation and privileges and immunities.

Whilst we’ve made good progress the remaining issues in this sector are dependent on the future discussions on the future relationship, so we are ready and prepared to start those discussions.

Conclusion

In conclusion Mr Speaker,

Our aim remains to provide as much certainty as possible to businesses and citizens on both sides.

I have made no secret of the fact that to fully provide that certainty we must be able to talk about the future.

We all have to recognise that we are reaching the limits of what we can achieve without consideration of the future relationship.

The Prime Minister’s speech in Florence set out the scale of our ambition for the new partnership with the European Union and she also laid out the case for a simple clear and time-limited period of implementation on current terms.

At the European Council later this week, I hope the leaders of the 27 will recognise the progress made and provide Michel Barnier with the mandate to build on the momentum and spirit of cooperation we now have.

Doing so, will allow us to best achieve our joint objectives and move towards a deal that works for both the UK and the EU.

Mr Speaker,

There has been much discussion of what will constitute sufficient progress.

Let me be clear that sufficient progress, and the sequencing of negotiations, has always been an EU construct, not the UK one.

Negotiations require both parties to not just engage constructively but also to develop their positions in advance.

For the UK’s part, I have I have always been clear that we will be conducting these negotiations in a constructive and responsible way, we have been entirely reasonable in that.

The work of our teams and the substantial progress that we have made over recent months proves that we are doing just that.

And we are ready to move these negotiations on.

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Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, Rt Hon James Brokenshire MP said:

I want to pay tribute to the efforts of everyone from the civil contingency groups and the emergency services who have been working diligently to help keep people safe during the last 48 hours as Storm Ophelia hit Northern Ireland.

The close co-operation between these groups mean that effective action was taken to ensure public services and people’s lives were protected.

While there is still more to do, significant efforts have already been put in to see that electricity supplies are restored and debris on our road networks is removed. The recovery operation, which has involved hundreds of people through the night and taken place in very challenging circumstances, will continue over the coming hours.

What we have seen over the last 48 hours is the resilience of Northern Ireland, the resourcefulness and community spirit of its people, and the commitment and professionalism of Northern Ireland’s front line responders.

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