Two Letters to Mogadon Man

If you ever want the pants bored off you, attend a Sandwell Council meeting when the new "acting" Leader [sic] Steve "Rotherham" Eling is soliloquising on the shitty state of "Sadwell" after 40 years of Labour failure.

With all the Cameron tax business going on, Labour politicians have been incessantly banding the "T" word about ie "transparency" and so I have sent two emails to Eling in the hope that he will "come clean" about two current "issues" - the bent ice rink deal and the Wragge Report into the dodgy land sales overseen by Sharma and Bubalo. They are set out below but I have yet to receive any response from Eling himself.

ICESTINK

Controversial ice rink magnate Mike Petrouis was quoted in The Express and Star last week stating that the bent ice rink deal is still on with the sleazy "socialists" of Sandwell Labour still anxious to gift him a very valuable site in West Brom (Star Group companies have enjoyed advertising revenue from Petrouis's companies for a number of years but that in no way affects their, er, impartiality.) A number of Council's up and down the land (including Labour ones) have allegedly shied away from projects involving this gentleman mysteriously fearing "reputational damage" but at least basket case Sadwell doesn't have to worry about this as it has already sunk lower than a snake's belly in the court of public opinion. And so if you see Eling out and about please ask him to reply to this email of Thursday 7th April, 2016:

To Steve Eling:

"THIS IS NOT A PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL COMMUNICATION

I appreciate that you have lied to the public in the past (eg the casino legal costs debacle) and were - apparently - the incompetent political architect of the disastrous ultra vires CTB scheme which has cost Sandwell folk so dear but I had hoped that your (temporary) elevation to "leader" might herald a new dawn for the benighted Borough of "Sadwell" and a departure from the idiocy - and worse - of "the Cooper era". Alas, this appears not to be the case as The Express and Star are reporting that the crazy ice rink "deal" is still on! (The Express and Star group have enjoyed advertising revenues in the past from Mr Petrouis's companies.)

Of course, your fingers are all over this "deal" as you were - with Cllrs Crompton and Hussain - on the Asset Management Committee in December, 2013 which suddenly and secretly decided to switch a lease of the site to an outright sale to your specially-favoured party, Mike Petrouis.

I hereby publicly call upon you to show that Sandwell is changing and to disclose all documentation relating to this "secret" deal - it is not commercially confidential as you have locked all other parties out (which may well be the subject of an application for Judicial Review from Planet Ice Property Leisure Limited). It is difficult to assess the deal as SMBC are failing to disclose the truth but clearly any sale at an undervalue to a favoured party (assuming no actual criminal fraud here) is unlawful pursuant to s123 Local Government Act 1972. Further, there is the question of unlawful state aid as this is a very valuable site next to Tesco and New Square and a sale at an undervalue (plus SMBC's alleged offer to also pay for demolition of the huge car park) may constitute unlawful state aid.

Your own Council employees "scored" this dubious project at only 54% which means it should not have been proceeded with. Please disclose the scoring documentation.

If this matter proceeds to judicial review the lies of ex-Councillor Cooper as to the instigation of this scheme will, of course, become material. Why have no other companies been offered this site? Who made the decision to lock everyone except Mr Petrouis out of any deal? What steps are being taken to prevent the taxpayer from being shafted by you and Sandwell Labour yet again?

Have YOU personally looked at the track record of your and your Council's new friend Mr Petrouis? Please note especially the fiasco that occurred on the Isle of Wight. Is he personally known to YOU or, to your knowledge, to any other Councillors or senior staff? Why not speak to your Labour colleagues in Cardiff?

As a long-standing Councillor you will know that it is not necessary for Petrouis to own the land to apply for planning permission but the suggestion in the Express and Star is that SMBC will sell him the land BEFORE any planning application - which suggests that this is going to go through the planning process on the "nod". I can tell you that there will inevitably be objections. But what steps are being taken to protect the taxpayer before disposal of a very valuable site when everyone else has been locked out of the deal?

Please read by blog post "How Sandwell Labour Piss on You" and answer all the issues raised therein:

http://thesandwellskidder.blogspot.co.uk/2015/05/how-sandwell-labour-pss-on-you.html

Come on Councillor - this is your chance to show that Sandwell is turning over a new leaf - lets have all the facts NOW!"

Incidentally - you can read the full court transcript of Eling's and Sandwell Labour's disastrous, unlawful and discriminatory behaviour (racial and sexual) via this link:

http://www.cpag.org.uk/sites/default/files/Winder%20%20ors%20v%20Sandwell%202014%20EWHC%202617%20(Admin)%20(30%20July%202014).pdf

The left hand drops down as someone becomes strangely animated next to a green plastic bin

WRAGGE REPORT

This request has been slightly superseded by events since, as you will see that Sandwell's under-pressure Sycophant-in-Chief responded to me yesterday. Please also note that Wragge Lawrence Graham (WLG) solicitors - who charge out their lawyers at huge cost - have now changed their name again to Gowling WLG. I shall continue to refer to them as Wragges.

Regular readers will know that Neeraj Sharma (who scored £129,146 from the taxpayer in the last financial year) gifted a contract - without putting it out to tender or other competitive process -  to her friends on the canape circuit, Wragges, for them to pour a bucket load of whitewash over the land sales by Sandwell Labour to sons, relatives and friends of Cllrs Hussain and Rouf (plus another curious land deal involving Cllr Bawa).

Don't forget that there had been a long-standing police investigation [sic] into at least some of the bent deals which the man who purports to be Sadwell's "Chief Executive", Jan Britton, claims the Council co-operated with "fully" (rumours of the mass shredding of documents by a Councillor and a very senior SMBC employee are clearly false). Thus all the documentation must be easily and readily available to the expensive lawyers.

Sharma instructed the vultures over one year on April Fool's Day, 2015 but the report is STILL claimed not to be available. Here is some of the email traffic on this subject:

Sharma to me 21st, October, 2015:

"Wragge Lawrence Graham and Co LLP (WLG) were engaged to progress and complete the audit investigation work.  The terms of reference were originally formally agreed on 1 April 2015. Disclosure of the terms of reference would be likely to prejudice the investigation.  In my view the public interest in withholding the information currently outweighs the public interest in its disclosure.

This work was not tendered and an exemption was applied to the Procurement and Contract Procedure Rules.

WLG have not yet reported and it is expected that the authority will receive the report in the next 3 months.  No draft reports have been received.

Consequently I cannot currently address the other questions that you have asked."

Me to Sharma on the expiry of a further three months (21st January, 2016):

"The three months is up today. Please deal with my FOI request in full."

Sharma denies receipt of the report but then confirms that it will be disclosed before the election (which is now less than a month away):

26/01/16: "The authority is not yet in receipt of the report. Wragge are trying to get the investigation completed as soon as possible so that they can then submit their report to the authority.

I understand that we should have the report in the next few weeks."

Me to Sharma 26/01/16: "Does "a few weeks" mean "after the election"? Darren Cooper says publicly that nothing to investigate and so why the delay?"

Sharma to me 26/01/16: "I anticipate receipt of the report before the election."

Time dragged on and at the end of March I wrote to SMBC and Jan the Man himself replied:

31/03/16: "In reference to your email, below, I am unable to comment on an on-going investigation."

On Sunday a Council insider phoned me and alleged that SMBC had received the Report in January. You will see from what follows that Britton himself categorically denies this:

Me to Britton, Sharma and Eling 10/04/16:

"I am informed that the Wragge Report was received by SMBC in January, 2016. Sharma specifically wrote to me on 26th January saying the Report had not been received and so we must assume that it was received in the few days following the 26th of that month.

In that case why has not yet been disclosed? What date - precisely - was the report received?"

Britton's reply 10/04/16:

"You have been informed incorrectly.

I cannot comment further on an ongoing investigation."

And so the question to Eling changes to "what the f*ck is going on?" A supposedly high-powered firm of solicitors who got the contract without competition from someone who socialises with them is seemingly incapable of producing a report for over a year. Get on the f*cking phone to Wragge's Eling and kick ass! And tell us NOW how much Sharma agreed to pay this lot for such apparently dismal handling of the matter? Over to you, matey as clearly Britton and Sharma can't sort it out (even though Sharma was a material witness in most of these matters).

PLEASE NOTE THAT THERE IS A BRISTNALL HUSTINGS PLANNED WHERE YOU CAN MEET THE CANDIDATES FOR THAT UNFORTUNATE WARD ON WEDNESDAY 20TH APRIL AT 6.30PM - LONDONDERRY BAPTIST CHURCH, BRISTNALL HALL ROAD.

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