(c) IT Security Guru
From Insider, two days ago:
‘High-value fraud losses halved across Scotland. KPMG found money lost to alleged fraud in cases worth £100k or more has fallen from £3.8m in the first half of 2017 to £1.8m in the first six months of this year.’
More dramatically, though, we see that the nine Scottish cases of high-value fraud accounted for less than 0.5% of the £895 million total across the UK!
https://www.insider.co.uk/news/fraud-money-kpmg-scotland-embezzlement-13091281
Does this suggest, at least in part, that white-collar crime, like other forms of crime, is falling in Scotland but not elsewhere in the UK and, so, points once more to differences of the kind we might expect to see in a country thinking it should run its own show?
Here’s the evidence that crime generally is falling in Scotland but not elsewhere:
Serious violent crime soars in broken Tory England but falls in SNP Scotland
Retired Professor fails BBC Reporting Scotland Editor on Organised Crime research
And, here’s evidence of other differences:
Another wee difference as Scottish consumers seem more willing to pay more for ethical goods?
8% of the population but 11.8% of the charitable donations – ‘punching above our weight?’
Have ten years of progressive SNP policies made Scots more optimistic?
Talking-up Scotland 
Ah, but a Glasgow born man who has lived most of his adult life in the US has been placed on the FBI’s ‘most wanted’ list for fraudulently selling gold to people and not delivering. This is the lead on the Scotland page of the BBC website. So, this proves that we really are criminals despite what the data says.
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Yes, one of their most pathetic evenings of news.
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It could be seen as proof of how poor Scots are at anything – we cannot even defraud to the same extent as people elsewhere!
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Its worse than that, Alasdair. Much, much worse.
We no longer have football players who can command row-boats in the Clyde without the use of oars—it follows they cant really be expected to kick a ball in a straight line without that apres-binging skill. Rugby? Our best player could play keepy-uppy with the Calcutta Cup after a good session, in golden days of yore.
Now all the headlines are made by our southern sporting cousins.
Affray, boozing, assaulting a polis wumin—all part of an England internationals training it would seem, while we modern, house-trained Scots can only stand back and soberly watch.
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Snippet from Scottish Legal News site regarding the Russian authorities launching an investigation into the distinctly dodgy financial vehicles called ‘Scottish Limited Partnerships'(SLPs) whose use is regulated (regulated?) by the Westminster midden. Truly we are living in strange times when there is greater action by Russian authorities regarding fraudulent financial abuses by these SLPs than the Westminster spivs are managing to rouse themselves to: see snippet below:
Authorities in Russia have launched a probe into export tax fraud involving Scottish Limited Partnerships (SLPs), The Herald reports.
Prosecutors in a port near the Estonian border say they are looking into an attempt to avoid more than $200,000 in duty on a tanker carrying fuel oil.
Port officials in Ust-Luga this month inspected a ship, the Freya, which said it had a cargo of 1,500 tonnes of mineral tar bound for Estonia.
But authorities found that only 10 per cent of the cargo was tar and the remainder was fuel oil, which is subject to significant export taxes.
According to local news, the cargo was destined for an SLP registered in Glasgow, called Sungaty, whose person of significant control is a Russian national named Ivan Krylov.
The UK government department for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) reported this year that, according to the National Crime Agency, SLPs played a part in a disproportionately high number of suspected criminal activities.
They also said that five individuals were responsible for registering over 50 per cent of all SLPs registered between January 2016 and May 2017. BEIS therefore launched a further call for evidence on proposed reform to limited partnerships which closed on 23 July 2018.
Westminster have demonstrated time and time again that they cannot protect Scotland’s international reputation by acting to prevent the abuse of these SLPs. Time to take these powers into Scotland’s hands – TIME FOR INDY.
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