Britton and Bubalo Love Enterprise!

DUE TO AN ONGOING LEGAL DISPUTE, AN OBVIOUSLY COMEDIC REFERENCE TO JAN BRITTON HAS BEEN TEMPORARILY REMOVED.

DUE TO AN ONGOING LEGAL DISPUTE, AN OBVIOUSLY SATIRICAL, LAMPOONING, REFERENCE TO DARREN COOPER HAS BEEN TEMPORARILY REDACTED.

How strange that the political side of Labour Sandwell Council, with its large number of unemployed councillors, should hate business and enterprise so much (although becoming expert at screwing money out of central government for expensive projects) and yet officers of the Council bend over backwards to encourage entrepreneurship - particularly when it involves a member of their own staff (who, by happy coincidence, just happens to be the son of Cllr Mahboob Hussain).

I don't know when Hussain's son, Azeem Hafeez, started at Sandwell Council and they won't tell me - such information being not susceptible to Freedom of Information requests.

Back in the day, councils routinely had contracts that said employees should devote their whole time to doing the job the taxpayer was paying them to do. You would have thought with all the people "xxx xxxxxxxxxxx" [lampooning reference to Darren Cooper temporarily redacted] and his "socialist" chums have sacked recently, the remaining rump would be rather hard-pressed these days but those that are related to senior councillors are, apparently, allowed to have free rein by the Chief Executive, Jan "xxx xxxxx xxxxxxx" [comedic reference temporarily removed] Britton, when it comes to doing a few "little jobs" on the side. While still collecting their salary etc from us taxpayers, of course.

Naturally, the loony lefties pay lip-service to the dead hand of statist regulation and tell their employees that they should not work more than 48 hours per week because of the Working Time Directive but, once again, senior OFFICERS of the council seem rather more laissez-faire.

But there are a few rules and this is from the Officers' Code of Conduct about doing little jobs on the side:

6.0 Outside Commitments

 6.1 Some employees have conditions of service which require them to obtain written consent to take any outside employment. All employees should be clear about their contractual obligations and should not take outside employment which conflicts with the authority's interests.

7.0 Personal interests

7.1 Employees must declare to an appropriate manager any non-financial interests that they consider could bring about conflict with the authority's interests.

7.2 Employees must declare to an appropriate manager any financial interests which could conflict with the authority's interests.

Now I don't know what Azeem Hafeez's contract says but in the fullness of time it will be interesting to see which of his well-paid bosses authorised HIS other activities and recorded his declarations of outside interests. I am sure KPMG - the non-independent, er, "independent" auditor will let us see the complete dossier in due course (stifles hysterical laughter.....)

Once again, I must stress that I do not know when Hussain's lad started at SMBC. I am told he has been there some time but some of the following may NOT overlap with his time there. But he has been a busy boy, make no mistake! Happily, I am told a girlfriend also work there.

Firstly we have his Company interests (and this may NOT be the complete list):

Car Crash Direct Limited - sole Director, January, 2006 (company dissolved, July, 2010) - traded at Wellesley Road address - see below;

Wolves Impact Claims Limited - Director, May, 2006 (company dissolved May, 2008). Using a Dudley Road East address;

Dial A Rental Limited - Company Secretary - brother sole Director, June, 2007 (company dissolved August, 2012). Using a Fountain Lane, Oldbury address;

Shakes 2 Go Limited - sole Director, May 2009 (company dissolved January, 2011). Using a Waterloo Road, Smethwick address;

Central Car & Van Rental Limited - sole Director, April, 2012 (company dissolved November, 2013). Using a Birmingham address;

My and Your Care Limited - sole Director, November, 2012 (company dissolved, July, 2014), Using 31B Birmingham Street, Oldbury;

Broadwell Developments Limited - sole Director, April, 2014 to present (originally registered at 51 McKean Road but now registered in Birmingham).

(Query also possible connections with A1 Prestige Limos Limited?).

Then there were young Azeem's unspecified interests in The Rickshaw Restaurant, next door to Cllr Hussain's taxi business in Dudley. Here Dudley Council weren't such a soft touch as Sandwell and in 2007 and 2008 refused his applications to build extra storeys on the building for 14 flats.

The Rickshaw used to boast "A warm welcome awaits you at The Rickshaw Restaurant". It was certainly warm in the early hours of 7th November, 2013 when a mysterious fire broke out there and the fire brigade also found a small cannabis factory. And yet as far as I can tell there was never any police action taken in respect of this incident!

Curiously, there was another fire at the Wellesley Road factory in Oldbury which was not owned by Azeem but by our old friends Quyam and Quyyam and that too, purely coincidentally, followed an unsuccessful planning application. I should say here that the original planning application WAS granted by Labour SMBC but the applicants got greedy and put in a fresh application for a much bigger development which attracted opposition from various statutory bodies and ultimately failed.
Sandwell Police were definitely aware of this incident but I wonder what the outcome of their investigation was?

But returning to happier matters in Sandwell, you will see from the picture that our hard-working hero was actually based in Nick Bubalo's "Regeneration & Economy" Department.

Thus when Azeem applied for planning permission to build 3 houses on John Street, Oldbury the application went in on 23rd April, 2013 and "the Planning Department of the Year" were able to grant the application in less than 2 months with Azeem's boss himself signing the permission on 21st June, 2013. There may have been "grass" growing in the roof voids of The Rickshaw but there wasn't any under the feet of Azeem who has had the houses built and they are now occupied.

And then there was Azeem's application to build an apartment block for 12 (twelve) apartments at Clifford Road, West Bromwich. In went the application on 6th December, 2012 for this large development and even though the application had to go to the Planning Committee - who were all aware that it was an employee applying to build a block of flats (!) - and this was something all the Labour Councillors present were comfortable with - Azeem's boss, Nick Bubalo, was signing the permission - once again in less than two months - on 30th January, 2013! The councillors (see below) happily felt that a site visit was unnecessary and even felt able to remove a couple of conditions at the recommendation of Azeem's boss, er Nick Bubalo:

"Resolved that planning application DC/12/55397 (Proposed development of 12 No. apartments. Land adjacent to 2 Clifford Road, Clifford Road, West Bromwich) be approved, as recommended by the Area Director - Regeneration and Economy, subject to the removal of conditions (iv) to (vi)."

Of course, Labour went one better then and, as regular readers know, Cllrs Hussain, Eling, Hackett and Ian Jones agreed to sell land at Lodge Street, Oldbury and Nick Bubalo was tasked with marketing the large building plot. This was meant to be a "major" development (once the original plan to develop old folks' bungalows had been secretly shelved) and a glossy prospectus was produced which gave the nod that the cunning comrades would look favourably on a planning application for housing. But then the decision was made to sell to Azeem, an employee in Bubalo's own department. Azeem's planning agent (who was also the agent regarding the planning for the Wellesley Road site referred to above and who is also involved in the bog-gate scandal) signed a declaration that the property had been owned for 21 days two days BEFORE Labour conveyed the land to their employee! Not that Nick Bubalo or anyone else raised any query about this (application 30/12/13 - transfer 02/01/14). For a second time the mob who make up the "socialist" dictatorship's voting fodder were called upon to nod everything through and the Planning Committee was convened. Again the councillors present were fully cognisant of the identity of the purchaser.

Prospectus:

http://www.sandwell.gov.uk/downloads/file/4192/lodge_streetstone_street_development_prospectus

When the Planning Committee convened (and without a site visit) ROGER HORTON (father of the Liar Cashmore and husband of Cllr Linda Horton) moved that the final decision on what was defined as "a major development" need not trouble Councillors any further but the final decision would BE DELEGATED TO NICK BUBALO!!!! After resolving some highway issues Good Old Nick was able to grant planning permission for 14 houses and personally signed the permission for his employee on 29th July, 2014. Building is now under way!

The following Labour councillors were at one of the two Planning Committee meetings referred to above (for those who are absolutely determined to keep the blinkers on and vote for the perverted Labour dictatorship regardless of performance, those standing for election in May are starred):

PETER ALLEN*; LORRAINE ASHMAN*; Crompton; Davies (S); Downing; Price (B); Ward (not Labour).

The following Councillors were at BOTH of the planning committee meetings. You might have thought they might recognise the name of the applicant!

Frear (Chair!); ELAINE COSTIGAN*; BAWA DHALLU*; ROGER HORTON*; Hughes (P); Preece; Rouf; Tagger; Trow; Webb.

The disastrous ELING who was responsible for the original decision to flog Lodge Street is also up for election. He, of course, also lied to the press about recovering legal costs from the casino debacle and appears to have been the "mastermind" behind the Council Tax Benefit court disaster which cost Sandwell so dear. An excellent candidate I am sure!

Regulars will also be aware that Cllrs Hussain & Hackett then managed to get through a land disposal committee meeting in seven minutes and agreed to sell the old Coroner's Court building in Crockett's Lane, Smethwick. One of the co-authors of the report recommending sale was NICK BUBALO and he happily also supplied an estimated valuation which the crafty comrades are still trying to keep secret. After all this hard-work, Bubalo was duly authorised to sell the site on "terms and conditions to be agreed". Happily Mr Bubalo was able "to agree terms and conditions" with Azeem Hafeez who duly bought the property!

I suppose we should applaud the highly-paid Britton and Bubalo for employing someone who could do all this and still hold down the day-job. Labour Sandwell is indeed in safe hands.

(Just as a small aside, "xxx xxxxx xxxxxxx" [comedic reference temporarily removed] was behind the outsourcing of the dustbins service to Serco on behalf of the crafty comrades and the Unite members were "sold off" to the private company following negotiations on their behalf by the fearlessly independent union officer and troll, Brian Rickers, who also just happens to be bezzy mates with "xxx xxxxxxxxxxx" [lampooning reference to Darren Cooper temporarily redacted] himself. Nice to see Rickers has pledged a tenner to the xxxxxxx's [comedic reference to Jan Britton temporarily removed] charity trip to South Africa! All very "fraternal"!)

If you have evidence of possible fraud at Sandwell Council please ring the Regional Fraud Team in confidence on 0121 251 2175 - DS Wayne Haynes & Team.

THE SANDWELL SKIDDER - A COMMUNITY BLOG - READ THE SKIDDER, KIDDER!

E-mail:   thesandwellskidder@gmail.com               Twitter:  @bcrover (Vernon Grant)

Confidential phone no:  07599 983737