Sandwell Stunner - Taxpayer to pay for Jim Cadman Statue Scheme!

Sandwell you are being conned by Labour and once again they have LIED in a Freedom of Information reply!

This blog has pointed out all along the dubious nature of the joke leader Darren "The Turdmeister" Cooper's "deal" with statue entrepreneur Jim Cadman whose numerous companies have a less than glorious recent record of late. One of the companies operated by a member of his family recently went bust leaving dozens of cash-strapped councils owed hundreds of thousands of pounds. Here are the links if you want to see some more detail later:

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/08/the-darren-cooper-celebration-statue.html

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/08/jim-cadman-statue-entrepreneur.html

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/arts-council-money-diverted-for-private.html

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/celebration-statue-all-quiet-on-western_26.html

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/10/arts-council-private-statue-stunt-its.html

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/celebration-statue-sandwell-labour.html

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/statue-fiasco-latest-cadman-speaks-sort.html

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/bubalos-statue-you-couldnt-make-it-up.html

In the above blogs I have pointed out all the best aspects of this bent deal but, very briefly, Jim Cadman is a "businessman" with previous connections with Darren Cooper and SMBC. He has raised money for a number of statues but has never produced accounts for any of them. A string of his companies have been struck off and one went into liquidation. As above, another company which he claimed to represent and which was controlled my a relative with the Cadman name went bust recently owing three-quarters of a million pounds.

Cadman mostly uses a sculptor called Graham Ibbeson to make the statues. Ibbeson runs two companies which were, at the time of his last accounts, both also in poor financial shape.

(Cadman is currently also trying to raise money for a project in Morecambe and told the local paper that Ibbeson was "his business partner"?)

This deal was always "sold" by Cadman as a private initiative though there are grave doubts about this given the activities of Cooper and officers of Sandwell Council. Cadman brought in one of my great heroes - Cyrille Regis - to give the scheme credence. I simply refuse to believe that Cyrille is "in" on this dodgy business and can only assume that he is being somehow duped as to the true nature of this odd arrangement.

Enter self-appointed "Voice of the Baggies", The Turdmeister, and Sandwell employees. With no proper public consultation and at a time of unprecedented cuts to frontline services and mass redundancies, senior officers of the Council allegedly took it upon themselves to divert £30,000 of public money (mostly received from the new Tesco development in West Bromwich - what is known here as s. 106 money) to this PRIVATE project. I mean, it's not as if Sandwell needs any infrastructure improvements is it? The Council, including its amoeboid Chief Executive, has consistently refused to say WHO they paid the PUBLIC money too or to say whether they checked-out Cadman and the legal status of his unaccountable fund!

So much for this being a private project. Sandwell's planning chief, Nick Bubalo (a name familiar to readers of this blog in respect of a number of issues) then applied for planning permission for the hideous thing in the half-empty New Square IN HIS OWN NAME as an officer of the Council and then GRANTED THE PLANNING PERMISSION HIMSELF UNDER HIS OWN DELEGATED POWERS! When I pointed out the blatant illegality of this Sandwell came back with the comment that having looked at this again it had been decided that planning permission had not been required in the first place (something you might think the head of planning might have known)!

I suspect the £30,000 has been paid to Cadman and Ibbeson who have used it to make a small model of the ugly statue known as a maquette. Curiously, you have probably never seen this but it appears that one version has found its way into the private office of, er Cllr Darren Cooper. Take a look at the object behind his head here (apologies for quality):

A piece of sh*t?

I have put various Freedom of Information requests in about this scandalous state of affairs  and here is part of a specific reply of 31st July, 2014 which, after admitting the diversion of £30,000 of public money to Cadman, stated quite unambiguously:

"It is not currently envisaged that there will be
any further financial contributions to this project from s 106, or from
other SMBC funding sources. The balance of funding for this privately
sponsored public art initiative is to be raised through private
subscription and public donations."

Cadman was using his tried and tested routines to raise the secret sums for these projects and a gala dinner was planned for 10th November, 2014 - in Birmingham not West Bromwich. Unfortunately he had difficulty selling the £95 per head tickets (discounted deal £900 for a table of ten) and the event collapsed!

As above, Cadman has never produced accounts as to the money he has collected, what he paid out and how much he and Ibbeson took out of the pot. This cartoon-ish statue was to be far more expensive than other projects at £220,000 but then perhaps he knew that he had the idiotic "Baggies-mad" Cooper on the hook and that Cooper would use all his powers to ensure that the project was completed with public money.

Cooper was frantically pumping his pet scheme for all it was worth and then the Labour Council diverted a further £1,469 of public money intended for Sandwell Arts Festival (including Arts Council money) to promote the wretched thing. Once again this was seemingly permitted by senior officers of the Council without question. Even so it did not help Sunny Jim with the dinner ticket sales.

Cadman was interviewed by the Birmingham Mail following the collapse of the Birmingham shindig and this is what they reported on 20th November, 2014 - just three months ago:

"Entrepreneur Jim Cadman admitted there had been difficulties with the project but said the fund was well on its way to achieving its target even though the project was behind its original schedule.

Mr Cadman said: “In the time that has elapsed we have continued with our fundraising. Counting cash and pledges we now have £155,000 towards the target required of £220,000.” "

He also stated that the gala fund-raising dinner had been re-scheduled for "Spring, 2015".

Cooper takes the attitude that once Sandwell folk vote Labour in each year they can then fuck-off. He has a "democratic mandate" and the Labour party will do whatever they please. Here is yet another example. This is buried in the Regeneration and Economy [sic] budget for the next financial year commencing on 1st April:

Growth Points: Celebration Public Sculpture £160,000

Let us just recap for a moment:

1. There is no evidence of any proper consultation for this private project;
2. The legal status of Cadman's fund is unknown and he produces no accounts for his private projects;
3. There does not appear to have been any democratic decision of the Council to spend public money on this private project which has all allegedly been decided by officers of the Council.

The sharp-eyed will have also noted another serious discrepancy here. Super-salesman Sunny Jim says he has already "raised" £155,000 and Sandwell Council have already stumped up public money of £30,000. That leaves just £35,000 to raise to get to £220,000 so why on earth are Sandwell budgeting £160,000! IS SOMEONE TELLING PORKIES HERE?

Sandwell have destroyed  arts provision in the Borough, are killing the libraries, closing down Youth Services and hacking frontline services to pieces. They have budgeted another £8.5m for more mass redundancies in the next financial year but are, on the figures, putting £191,469 into a private project because Cooper demands it.The Council are being castigated for failing in their statutory duty to the most vulnerable kids in the Borough - those at very serious risk of harm - but continue to pump huge sums into The Albion Foundation - a charity allegedly operated by a rich Premier League club who, in fact, pay a pittance in whilst reaping the kudos from its activities. And all again because Dimwit Darren decrees it. The Club itself also benefits from taxpayers' money and just last month the cash-strapped Labour Council paid them £7,906.40 of OUR money for an unknown purpose!

When the Labour candidates come knocking before the May elections remember to ask them about all this won't you?

Don't forget you can speak to the police fraud team currently investigating Sandwell Council on 0121 251 2175 - DS Wayne Haynes and his team.

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