Second Sandwell Land Sale Scandal - It's Worse than First Thought!

The scandal surrounding the sale by Sandwell Labour of the old Coroner's office in Smethwick to the Deputy Leader's son is worse than stated in my first blog on this subject ( "Another Labour Land Sale to Mahboob Hussain's Son!" 07/10/14).

Whole Plot as Sold by the "Socialists" for just £80,000

You will recall that Labour Deputy Leader Mahboob Hussain and fellow Cabinet member, Simon "Two Houses" Hackett, resolved to sell this property at a Committee Meeting with the sale to be sorted out by £128,138 Head of Legal, Neeraj Sharma, and £108,614, Area Director Nick Bubalo. No doubt highly competent employees to command such salaries in these austere times.

Up pops Azeem Hafeez - son of Labour's Mahboob Hussain - and makes an offer. Presumably this must have been made VERY shortly before the actual transfer of the land to him since Cllr Hussain never declared an interest in this subject when it came before the full "cabinet" and the full Council.

And so the sleazy socialists flogged the building AND A LARGE PLOT OF LAND TO THE REAR to Cllr Hussain's son for just £80,000. Incidentally, they sold the separate adjoining plot to someone else (also named Hussain but seemingly unrelated) for, er, £160,000.

Clearly Cllr Hussain's son had thoughts of "doing a deal" since he immediately divided the titles to the plot when he registered his purchase with HM Land Registry and in a rather curious way as you will see here from the registered plans under two separate titles and where you will note that one small "square" of land is isolated from the main plot:

For first Land Registration Hussain's son omits middle area

Central area registered under a separate legal title

In my earlier blog I mentioned that, almost immediately, Cllr Hussain's son tried to auction the property with a guide price of £120,000 but it now seems that this was only for the corner plot with the building on it and did not include the significant patch of land to the rear. He then withdrew the lot from auction and marketed the whole site via estate agents, Bairstow Eves of Oldbury for a much more substantial, er, "Offers in excess of £200,000"!

I am informed by a local journalist that the property is now sold "subject to contract" but I am not sure whether that includes the whole plot area.

Yesterday, the assembled comrades in Labour's cabinet publicly shed crocodile tears over the swingeing cuts they resolved to make to Sandwell's much-needed Children's Centres blaming it all on the Tories/Coalition for "the cuts". But yet again, this apparent massive failure to comply with their legal duty to obtain the best possible price on the sale of our public assets (or something far worse) has sold the people of Sandwell and the taxpayer at large short. Once again I call upon the police and SMBC's Chief Executive, Jan Britton, to begin immediate investigations. And the auditors, KPMG, for that matter.

Happily for the people of Sandwell and the taxpayer generally the beneficiaries of Labour's largesse are at least local folk ie, once again, members of the Hussain family who will no doubt soon be able to add to the fleet of Mercs, Audis, BMW's and other vehicles that are so much in evidence at 51 McKean Road and other Oldbury properties in which they have interests.

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