Another Bog-gate Mystery!

In the useless "Wragge Report" much was made of the "fact" that the initial letter - out of the blue - offering to buy the bogs was sent to Cllr Ian Jones. It was on "Central Property Line" notepaper  - a company that would have been well known to Cllr Mahboob Hussain as it was run by a relative and was situated in the heart of his "patch" opposite Midland and Apollo taxis in which the Hussain family once held an interest (though not any longer as I understand it). The letter was signed "Abdul Naeem" ie Abdul Naeem Quyam, Hussain's relative - via marriage.

The conspiracy theorists amongst us have always believed that ANQ was (a) either tipped off to bid for the bogs which would be sold off by the bent Council cheaply or (b) that he was buying them for someone else. Indeed The Skidder has been given a cogent explanation of why certain people were very interested in the Albert Street bogs in Oldbury.

Far be it from me to attempt to defend Cllr Ian Jones but things have never quite stacked-up. Since the publication of "Wragge" Cllr Steve Eling and some other councillors have become obsessed with showing that Jonesy was some sort or mastermind pulling the strings on this deal. But the Wednesbury Councillor insists he had no idea the would-be purchaser was related to Hussain and that he had virtually no involvement in the whole sorry affair. He says, if I understand things correctly, that he effectively passed the matter over to an employee, Dave Willetts. Willetts seems to claim that he had some further involvement but does not seem to say why and, of course, he was subsequently forced to leave the Council in disgrace. (Despite this he is now Town Clerk of Stourport!)

As above, much has been made of the allegation that Jones initially received the letter from CPL - again, out of the blue - and this somehow fixes him with knowledge of what went after. But here's a thing - no-one seems to know where the original letter is but two photocopies of it became part of the evidence. Remember, this is two photocopies OF THE SAME LETTER. As the deal went on various people wrote on the two different copies which is fair enough. But take a look at the signature which should, of course, be identical:

They are clearly different. Why? Some might speculate that a deal was done and then an extra copy of the letter sent to Jones so as to put a veneer of independence on the deal. Who received version one of the letter? And, Jan Britton/West Midlands Police - where are the two originals?

To be fair to Jonesy he did raise this with the Wragge Solicitor who failed to grasp the significance and ignored the Councillor.

As we know, the Council had agreed to the sale of the bogs some years previously but there had been no real interest. The bogs were not auctioned off. By an amazing coincidence, at this time, Hussain's very wealthy son was sweating away doing a menial job in Nick Bubalo's department. (Very senior and highly paid Nick Bubalo was heavily involved in all the bent land deals but says he just failed to notice that anything was amiss!)

When Hussain's relative wrote in, he wanted four sets of bogs including the Bearwood site. Notwithstanding the corruption involved in the Labour Council this episode also shows how dysfunctional "Chief Executive" Jan Britton's bent paid service are (although, like Bubalo, he never seems to be aware of what is actually happening). Appropriately for Bog-gate (copyright CM!) the sh*t hit the fan on 12th April when Deputy Leader Steve Eling (now the embattled "leader") faced local residents' complaints about the sale of the Bearwood bogs. He emailed Jan Britton, and Cllrs Piper and Jaron together with employees, demanding to know why the Council was selling the Bearwood bogs. Britton also demanded an instant report with a copy to Eling. The next day Bubalo fessed up that he had used his "delegated" powers to sell the bogs and had overlooked that the Bearwood ones had not actually been decommissioned! So Bubalo was, yet again, at the very heart of a bent transaction. At "best" he had f*cked up!

Now Cllr Ian Jones is absolutely adamant that he did not order a valuation of the bogs yet just 12 days after the Council's "money man", Eling, came on the scene Willetts emailed a fellow employee not stating that Jones wanted the valuation but "the members [plural] did".

Even though there was no contract for the District Valuer (DV) to do this type of work Britton's out of control staff just went on regardless with one Mitchell Spencer saying to Willetts that he had "kept [the instructions] as simple as possible."

Of course, the DV reported and Jan Britton's bent paid service then sold the bogs for considerably less than the valuation.

Later, of course, Jones made the ill-fated  appearance on Radio WM. In Cllrs Eling and Marshall's "Operation Shaft" to destroy Cllr Hussain and Jones [see last blog] they have played on the fact that Jonesy claimed that the price was much less than the valuation because of restrictive covenants on the deals which the DV knew nothing about. Indeed readers of this blog will know that bankrupt Cabinet member Richard Marshall told me as recently as 12th January, 2017:

"The audit meeting minutes are available next week proving Jones a liar again, no restricted [sic] covenants on the toilets".

(Incidentally Cllrs Piper and Jaron were dealing with this on the audit committee when they had been copied in by Eling in his email referred to above and so were themselves aware of at least some problems with the "deal" since 2012.)

Although Jones lied in the BBC radio interview he has consistently complained that this was because he had been briefed badly by staff ( and, indeed, this was stated in my blog a couple of YEARS ago.)

So what did the author, Mr Ken Tudor of Sandwell MBC, actually say in the briefing note to Cllr Jones:

"An independent valuation was later sought but this was not intended for negotiation purposes and did not, in any event take account of the restrictions applied on the sale...."

And so Eling and Marshall have known what Tudor told him or have simply ignored it and carried on attacking their "comrade" on this point. There are dark forces at work still around all this!

Clearly if West Midlands Police had done their job properly we might have got to the truth of what really happened - but they didn't. Jan Britton has written to Councillors today saying a number of recent posts on the internet and associated messages have been referred to West Midlands Police for investigation which may lead to "prosecutions". Let us hope they do what we pay them to do this time!

And finally:

This blog has shown that the BBC and Express and Star's attempts to whitewash Cllr Richard Marshall's debt problems are "b*llocks". Marshall was mired in debt irrespective of his legal case and the fact that he had blown a large sum of money belonging to a vulnerable widow. A new creditor contacted me yesterday. Marshall claimed to this unfortunate man that there had been a mega problem with "an invoice" (although he claimed in the court case that he didn't routinely issue them) and he desperately needed £7k to "pay employees". The unfortunate person lent him the money and over £5k is still outstanding. You have to question why Eling is so desperate to keep a man with such a chequered history not only on the council but in his cabinet!?!

STOP PRESS

Whilst Britton's hapless authority have degenerated to an "inadequate" Ofsted rating for Children's Services, new figures show over 6,000 REPORTED incidents of child abuse in the sh*thole Borough in the last five years.

THERE WILL BE A DEMO AT 2.30pm NEXT WEDNESDAY - 30TH AUGUST - AGAINST THIS APPALLING SITUATION WHICH ELING CALLED "WORRYING" AND AGAINST THE CORRUPTION AND INCOMPETENCE OF THE COUNCIL.

COME AND JOIN US TO STAND AGAINST CHILD ABUSE AND FORTY YEARS OF LABOUR FAILURE IN THE BOROUGH OF SANDWELL!

THE CABINET MEETING IS AT 3.30 THAT DAY.

ELING, HACKETT, MARSHALL AND BRITTON MUST GO!!!!!

THE SANDWELL SKIDDER - COMMUNITY NEWS - READ THE SKIDDER, KIDDER!

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PROUD TO HAVE BEEN TROLLED BY DICKHEAD DARREN COOPER DECEASED!