Rouf House - SMBC Sale Price!

After MONTHS of battling on your behalf, The Skidder can finally disclose the amount Sandwell Labour sold the large plot of land (formerly occupied by 8 - eight - terraced houses) for to Labour Councillor Mohammad Rouf's son.

(This post has cost me well over £30 in Land Reg fees and so buy me a beer of a coffee when you see me.....).

Let me just set the scene (apologies to regular readers who will be familiar with some of this). On 10th July, 2008 Cllr Rouf made a legal declaration that he owned two properties in Smethwick - 88 Shireland Road and 23 Wellington Road. As far as Shireland Road is concerned this was transferred to one of his sons, Mohammad Shauib, seemingly in or around July, 2005.

Shauib has been the sole owner on Land Registry records for some time but then transferred it to one Saleeman Begum (a relative of Rouf) in February, 2015. But now here's a curious thing since on 12th March, 2015 - whilst Rouf was living in a SMBC Council House (below) - he signed a new legal declaration stating that, once again, he has an ownership interest in this property!!!! Here is his current legal statement:

Question: State:

4. Any beneficial interest in land which is within the area of the Borough of Sandwell.

Answer:

33 Trafalgar Road, Smethwick, B66 3SE 

88 Shireland Road, Smethwick, B66 4QJ

Dated: 12/3/2015

Rouf is continuing to lie about his Council house at Trafalgar Road which is registered at HM Land Registry as belonging to "The Borough Council of Sandwell" under title WM946677. Why is his declared ownership interest in 88 Shireland Road not declared to the Land Registry? (I have once again reported this to SMBC's so-called "Monitoring Officer", Neeraj Sharma, but have had no response)

Rouf sold his other (admitted) property, the Wellington Road address, for - officially - £125,000 and as far as once can tell from Land Registry records, this was in or around April, 2013.

Rouf had, of course, also completed a legal declaration for Sandwell Council claiming to be unemployed but this blog exposed that he was still the holder of a private hire taxi licence with Birmingham City Council (now surrendered).

A trick used by at least 2 Labour Councillors in Sandwell is to hide the fact that they have been awarded council housing by claiming to own the property. The multiple-named Steven Frear is one such and Rouf was another. Fortunately, my Smethwick informants alerted me to the fact that even though he had disposed of the Shireland Road (allegedly) and Wellington Road properties and was working, Rouf was lying when he said in his legal declaration that he owned the property he was then living in at 33 Trafalgar Road, Smethwick and a Land Registry search quickly showed that he had, in fact, been given a Council house by the comrades. I have been trying to get West Midlands Police to investigate this (and certain other matters) for some time but to no avail but then we know Labour Sandwell Council is apparently a "no-go area" for them.

Sandwell Leader [sic] fraternises with local council house resident at taxpayer-funded beano!

In the meantime, Sandwell Labour compulsorily purchased eight terraced houses in what used to be known as Poplar Grove, off Florence Road, Smethwick and then us taxpayers paid for them to be demolished - leaving a nice clear building plot apart from an old electrical sub-station on the site. Oh well, I hear you say, building plot prices have risen dramatically in the last years so this is going to be a "good news" story for the taxpayer isn't it?

On 27th October, 2011 Cllrs Hussain, Eling and Ian Jones secretly agreed to sell the plot and the official record was redacted - a curious thing to do, you might think, if the sleazy Sandwell "socialists" wanted to get the best price for it on the "open market".

The SMBC employee who (no doubt accidentally) provided false information about the bog-gate scandal in a Freedom of Information Act reply said the large plot was marketed (though he does not say how) for "4 to 5 weeks" and sealed bid were invited. Bidders had to pay £75 each to bid. Three bids were allegedly received. One bidder hadn't paid the fee and so was disqualified leaving two in the race. Happily, the successful bidder over the unidentified underbidder was the aforementioned Mohammad Shauib -  a son of Cllr Rouf. The scandal-ridden Council insist everything was above board! So that's alright then.

All very odd given the versions given to me by other interested parties. A number of callers told me they were interested but were never told about having to pay £75 to "bid". Some were told that the property could not be sold until the electrical sub-station was moved. One local family who were extremely interested were also told this and specifically also told that the property had been withdrawn from sale as it was to be auctioned....... All very odd but West Mids Police can't be bothered to take a look even though there is an ongoing Regional Fraud Team investigation into er, Labour Sandwell Council still ongoing! It would be helpful, eh readers, if they took a peek just to make sure no terrible "mistake" has been made......

(Incidentally, it proved very easy to move the electrical sub-station as, er, Labour Sandwell Council kindly provided land for it in the car park on the corner of Shireland Road and Florence Road. Who paid for it to be moved remains a mystery at present).

Sandwell Labour has fought for months to avoid stating how much they sold this publicly-owned land for (!) and the Rouf family have been able to keep this secret by the simple expedient of failing to register the title at HM Land Registry.

BUT DRUM ROLL PLEASE.....

Rouf's son paid £65,000 for this very large plot according to Sandwell Council. (This, in itself, is slightly odd as a number of my contacts have said Rouf personally told them his family had paid "50 grand" for it).

Well you might say, that's not too bad is it? The Rouf family have had to pay to build their seven-bedroom mansion where 8 affordable homes had once been:

Rouf Towers now occupied but has Mo moved in?

Let's go back to the original purchase of the eight terraced houses - 13 to 20 Poplar Grove. Two of the houses, numbers 13 and 19, were on the same legal title and no purchase price is available. This is certainly not going to be less than £40,000 for the two and may have been quite a bit more. Here is what the you, dear taxpayers, paid for the others:

No 14 - £27,000
No 15 - £23,000
No 16 - £27,500
No 17 - £27,000
No 18 - £28,000
No 20 - £25,000

So that is £157,500 plus a minimum of £40,000 for the other two houses plus legal costs plus demolition costs. Accordingly the Labour w*nkers who run the local dictatorship paid over £200,000 for this site but then flogged it to a Councillor's son for £65,000. That is "open market value" in sleazy Sandwell WMP. Good eh?

You probably feel like vomiting at the moment but just to add insult to injury.....

Many readers will know of the similar large residential property occupied by a Councillor in McKean Road, Oldbury and that the fairly substantial parking in front of the house is clogged with a fleet of flash and expensive cars with "overflow" being parked on the street. Happily, there will be no such problems in Florence Road since SMBC are offering residents the opportunity for an annual parking permit at the car park on the corner with Shireland Road for just £20 (that is not a misprint - just 5p a day) for the first vehicle and £25 thereafter. How very convenient for the Rouf family and their pharmacy business next to the car park! And the Order made just in time for the move too!

Regular readers will know that Rouf told me to my face on 16th January, 2015 that he personally would NOT be moving into Rouf Towers (see the link below to my post of 17th February, 2015 below - "Cllr Mohammed Rouf - An Oasis at The Midnight"). Anecdotal evidence suggest he may have had a change of heart in which case, what has happened to the Council house in Trafalgar Road?

The joke Leader [sic] of the Labour politburo, Darren Cooper, has spent two years constantly making the "alarming and distressing" allegation that my whole blog is "lies" without putting forward a single piece of evidence by way of rebuttal. Now he has his social media spokesperson, Andrew Hipkiss (behind at least one troll account already suspended by Twitter), making the same allegation:

Mr Hipkiss publicly says he is mentally-ill......

Come on then, Cooper - I'll give you 48 hours to tell us all what is untrue about any of the above. That's fair isn't it?

Don't forget the police Regional Fraud Team are still investigating possible misdeeds at Sandwell Council - phone DS Wayne Haynes on 0121 251 2175

The full Rouf House story:

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/forget-bedroom-tax-its-seven-bedroom.html

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/now-whats-labours-councillor-rouf-up-to.html

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/sandwell-labours-rouf-on-skid-row.html

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2014/11/cllr-rouf-unemployed-my-arse-another.html

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2015/02/cllr-mohammad-rouf-oasis-at-midnight.html


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