Darren Cooper's Lying Circus!

Sandwell Labour (aka "The Goose-Killers") can always rely on The Express and Star for a blow job and those crusaders for truth and justice don't even bother to check small matters, like, er, the facts before happily "obliging".

This blog has produced evidence of repeated lies by Labour "Councillors" - the list is ever expanding but just by way of example there is The Liar Cashmore (lies about her employment and address); Poor Mohammad Rouf (lies about "unemployment"); Ian "it was all the staff's fault" Jones (lied to BBC's Adrian Goldberg on live radio about Bog-gate) and, of course, Sandwell's Senior Citizen and favourite amnesiac Mahboob "Keep it in the Family" Hussain (forgot to mention his and his wife's shareholding in Five Star Taxis when bidding for SMBC taxi-contracts etc etc).

I have also shown that Sandwell Councillors and employees are quite happy to lie in legal Council documents (eg. The Public, the Ice Rink Scandal) and in Freedom of Information replies (eg. Bog-gate).

Of course, the moronic "leader" - Disastrous Darren Cooper - a master of the dark political arts - is not averse to being "economical with the truth". He claimed, for instance, that there would be "an independent" investigation into matters concerning (still) "Deputy Leader" Hussain whereas, in fact, Sandwell's own auditors, KPMG, were appointed. He told us all that Sandwell's greedy comrades were taking a 10% reduction in their allowances whereas the figures - when belatedly released - actually showed a small increase (see my blog "Sandwell's Turdmeister Needs a Maths Lesson" - 03/11/14). Or what about his claim that ALL local welfare provision monies for 2013/2014 had been allocated to the poor whereas my Freedom of Information request showed that, in fact, only 57% had been distributed in "rich" Sandwell (see my blog " 'Socialist' Turdy Lies to the Poor" of 28/11/14).

(Mind you, Cooper can keep his trap shut when it suits him. He has repeatedly failed to repeat his comments to many people describing where he borrowed the money from for his house extension. He has refused to disclose details of the serious accident involving his car outside a Labour club. Spellar knows all about this too apparently. He has refused to disclose details about the crazed "celebration" statue "deal" including where the money actually is NOW and there is deathly silence concerning the departure of SMBC's chief financial officer, Stuart Kellas in the all-important period when the Council budgets are being set. Finally (for now), there is nothing being said about the multi-million pound Labour disaster that is 1 Providence Place in West Brom.)

But what is it about the sleazy socialists that makes them lie about legal costs being picked up by us taxpayers? Firstly, we had Cllr Steve "Mr Rotherham" Eling who told the Wolverhampton cock-suckers that the legal costs for the casino debacle were around £5,800 and that, in any event, these would be recoverable and, therefore, there would be no charge to the taxpayer. The Star duly gave this guff front-page billing without asking the obvious questions - which I duly did. It is not the norm in English law (excepting odd cases like misbehaviour by a party) for the LOSER to recover their costs and the comrades had cocked this particular episode up royal. As I later proved, the taxpayer had to shell out £21,500.38p excluding VAT for their incompetence whilst cutting jobs and front-line services!

Secondly, there was the CTB disaster - apparently all set in motion by the aforementioned Eling and unanimously approved by the "left-wing" comrades. For the uninitiated in this episode, the "socialists" hatched a plan which ended up losing Sandwell a government grant of £670,000 (yes, that is six hundred and seventy thousand pounds) and which was described by a High Court Judge following a judicial review (brought by the Child Poverty Action Group no less) as unlawful, discriminatory on the grounds of sex and race and a breach of the Equality Act! Three thousand six hundred of the poorest in our society were victimised by Sandwell Labour in this disgraceful episode.

The case was handled for SMBC by its own legal department. Despite the cunning comrades outsourcing shed-loads of work to locally-based firm (er, Exeter), Ashfords, the Law Society website still shows Sandwell as having no less than 25 solicitors - all paid for by the taxpayer. They (or their political masters) made the fateful decision to contest the judicial review - their star witness one Stuart Kellas - and were absolutely hammered on all 6 of the legal arguments. This was a case that had some significance nationally and it duly received wide media coverage. Except, of course, from the so-called political editor or any of the other staff of the LOCAL Express and Star (see my blog "Local Media Blackout on New Sandwell Council Scandal" of 05/08/14).

Three days after my blog The Star finally ran the story under the headline (and please hold this in your mind) "£40k bill for taxpayer after Sandwell Council lose legal battle over benefits" and sought quotes from none other than The Turdmeister himself!

May I digress very slightly here? The job of the Head of Legal, Neeraj Sharma, and her huge legal "team" (I use that word advisedly as I am told that morale within the department is at an all-time low) is to independently and impartially advise the Council as in an ordinary solicitor/client relationship. Of course that doesn't happen in Sandwell where Sharma and the Chief Executive, Jan Britton, have permitted Hussain and his sidekick, Cooper, "access all areas" and to interfere in the day-to-day running of all aspects of the Council's business. Clearly the legal defeat was so all-consuming in this particular case so that it is difficult to see how ANY qualified lawyer could have advised that an appeal should even be considered but, as we shall see, this was what Cooper said would happen. (EVEN The Star wrote that the High Court Judge "gave a stinging rebuke" to the authority for shafting 3,600 vulnerable and needy people!).

Yes, and so back to The Star article.... They stated - without mentioning at all the in-house legal costs incurred by SMBC's own legal department - that the case had cost the taxpayer £40,000 but that Cooper wanted to appeal at a cost of a further £50,000! Uber-thicko Cooper himself stated (or lied, whichever you prefer):

"This has cost us £40,000 to defend and an appeal could cost a further £50,000."

Needless to say, The Star did not question this bollocks (they could have phoned the CPAG but chose instead to just act as a propaganda sheet for Sandwell Labour) but noting that QC's and Junior Counsel were involved in this case I thought £40,000 seemed low and so I put in a Freedom of Information request on your behalf. Before dealing with the result, I should just say that there was no appeal since the lawyers finally managed to point out to Hussain and his sidekick that there wasn't a snowball's chance in hell of winning!

There are three categories of costs involved here:

1. Costs of SMBC's own legal department - we will never know this but a fair guestimate would be at least £20,000 excluding VAT of taxpayers' money;

2. The cost of SMBC's QC and Junior Counsel (paid in a hopeless case but authorised by whom at SMBC?) as per FOI response £25,675.00 excluding VAT;

3. The costs payable by SMBC as "loser" of the case to the "winner", the Child Poverty Action Group, er, £45,833.33 excluding VAT.

And so Cooper's "£40,000" was another porkie which the cock-suckers didn't bother to check. Labour cost the people of Sandwell the £670,000 grant and paid legal cost of - not £40k - but £71,508.33 excluding VAT PLUS their own in-house taxpayer-funded lawyers! In effect a figure in excess of £90k!

As we pass from one year to the next, Hussain remains the organ-grinder and The Turdmeister his (and Unite the Union's) gibbering monkey! I wish I could offer Sandwell folk and taxpayers everywhere a hearty "Happy New Year" but fear the runes are portending a very different outcome unless there are wholesale changes in local governance..... Of course, the inane Cooper is hoping to strut his stuff on the bigger stage of "Greater Birmingham" (sorry, I've got to go - I have just wet myself laughing......).

Thanks for staying with me this year folks. Please DO contact the police with any further evidence concerning SMBC and me with any "political" or other community stuff! I hope to continue The Skidder into the New Year and to shortly be able to offer a new series of "special features". Watch this space.... If you fancy doing a guest blog on matters Sandwell (which doesn't have to be political) my contact details are set out below. Happy New Year (with a small number of exclusions...).

Hotline for reporting suspected Sandwell Council fraud - 0121 251 2175 - Regional Fraud Team - DS Wayne Haynes.

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