Gowling WLG Racism Scandal Rolls On!

If you are slightly confused about the title of this post, Gowling WLG are a firm of solicitors formerly known as Wragge & Co. If the penny still hasn't dropped, Wragges were responsible for the hopeless "Wragge Report" into fraud and cronyism at bent Labour Sandwell Council (posts passim and see legal notice below).

(Please note that the font sizing seems to have gone haywire today and so apologies if the posts looks "odd" in places".)

Briefly, bent Labour managed to stop their pals at corrupt West Midlands Police (WMP) from investigating crimes at the Council by appointing Jan Britton's (the disgraced former Chief Executive) mate, Mark Greenburgh, then of Wragges, to do a partial investigation of SOME of the issues instead. Wragges had none of the powers of the police and produced a pathetic Report (just try and read it!) Britton used taxpayers' hard-earned to pay Wragges around £181,000 for this heap of ordure.

Even given the bent arrangement things did not go well - so the story goes - since Britton claimed he could not ignore a vile racist remark by Greenburgh when he mocked disability within the Muslim community. Britton alleges that he sought a hugely expensive "Opinion" from a QC about his concerns whether this supposedly solitary remark had fatally tainted the Report - which was specifically aimed at destroying (then) Cllr Mahboob Hussain. Of course, we now know that Britton and Eling (Steve "Squealing" Eling, besmirched former Labour Leader) were desperate to release the Wragge Report to shaft Eling's former best man, and it seems the stated racism may have been used as justification to win legal support to release a Report which The Squealer had stated in writing would never see the light of day!

This Blog has repeatedly pointed out that the Wragge Report was not worth the paper it was written on - a jumbled, incoherent, work. Not only did Greenburgh have inadequate powers but it seems to most readers he did not even employ those he did have to good effect. When bent Labour Sandwell itself disclosed the racist slur, I personally made a complaint to the Solicitors Regulatory Authority (SRA) which they did not even bother to acknowledge despite its very serious nature.

I did not follow-up my SRA complaint as Sandwell sources told me that Mahboob Hussain has made a complaint himself and that, eventually, Greenburgh had been reprimanded. Greenburgh also left Wragge and Co in opaque circumstances and set up his own law firm.

Outraged that Gowling WLG (as they now are) could profit from racism I made attempts to contact David Fennell (Chief Exec) but he blanked me. I also did a one-man demo outside their Birmingham offices and distributed over 150 leaflets demanding that they repay the fees to bent Sandwell or to a Muslim Aid Charity. (A copy of the leaflet is exhibited benealth the Legal Notice below). Neither a public apology nor repayment were forthcoming from the mega-wealthy firm.

But it now transpires that bent Labour Sandwell Council commissioned a Review into the original crap Report which is known as either the "Cox Review" (after Neil Cox who is said to have written the Review) or the "Steven's Review" (after the sacked former SMBC Chief Exec who commissioned it). But the previous and current Labour Leaders [sic] of bent Sandwell, Cllrs Maria Crompton and Rajbir Singh won't make it public. This is the case even after yet more money was thrown at lawyers in that it is said that another QC - believed to be Jenni Richards of Essex Chambers in London -  had advised that it SHOULD be released!

The Stevens/Cox Review is absolutely explosive - disclosing (a) more racist and unpleasant comments allegedly made by Greenburgh; (b) serious questions about how disgraced Britton commissioned the Report and the huge overspend; and (c) numerous important questions about the poor quality of Greenburgh's so-called "investigation" and his ultimate report. (Curiously, SMBC's current external auditor, Mark Stocks of Grant Thornton, is also reported to have entered the political arena and made statements encouraging the suppression of the Review! WTF? Incidentally Stocks - supposed protector of the public purse -is also trying to condone bent Labour's unlawful attempt to pay Lisa McNally's £100k + legal costs - more anon.)

THE STEVENS/COX REVIEW MUST BE MADE PUBLIC IMMEDIATELY! END OF!

There are wider ramifications to all this. I was once again outraged that, whereas the disgraced Britton claimed his mate Greenburgh had made a single racist remark, the Stevens/Cox Review states he made other such comments and openly displayed bias against his target (which Greenburgh will have the chance to deny once Rajbir Singh grows a pair). Of course, Gowling WLG were legally liable for comments he made during the time he was unemployed by them. If my understanding of the contents of the Review are correct, and they stack up, they must now cough-up their massive fee as to retain it will be unconscionable.

I realised that I had never read the actual SRA "decision" when Greenburgh got away with a smack on the wrist. Here it is - see if you can spot the missing element!

Yes folks, the racism issue - the central plank of my complaint and - so I am told - that of ex-Cllr Hussain, has been airbrushed away completely! 

My complaint was via the SRA website which led to a very interesting exchange with them. I asked why I had not received any communciation from the SRA, why the racism element of the complaint (the main feature of it) had been ignored and what the ethnicity was of the Panel which administered the mild "rebuke" to Greenburgh.

This was the initial response which contained incorrect information that mine was the only complaint and that the decision was actually made by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT):

"Dear Mr Saunders,

 

Thank you for your recent email regarding our investigation into Mr Greenburgh.

 

I am sorry that we did not keep you informed of the progress and outcome of your report. At the time when you made your report, our business process did not require us to update complainants. In recent years, we have updated our procedures and we now provide regular updates to those people who report matters to us. I am sorry we did not update you. I do understand that as the maker of the report, you would have expected to be told about our investigation process and the action being taken.

 

Regarding the sanction given to Mr Greenburgh, this was done by the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT). Our role as a regulator is to identify potential misconduct and to prepare a case against the individual solicitor or firm. The SDT are independent of the SRA and we present our case to them so they can decide if, and what sanction is required.

 

On that basis, I am unable to answer your query about who was on the panel at the hearing.

 

While I understand you are unhappy with the level of sanction imposed by the SDT, it would not be appropriate for me to provide comment or attempt further explanation of their decision.

 

I have checked our records and I have not found any other reports about Mr Greenburgh relating to matters of discrimination. The case before the SDT was based solely on your report. While you say Mr Greenburgh’s comment was not an isolated incident, we have received no other reports about this and our investigation did not find evidence to support wider concerns.

 

Our investigation resulted in a sanction being imposed on Mr Greenbaugh. We are unable to reopen or reinvestigate this matter. If you have evidence of further concerns about the conduct of Mr Greenbaugh then I would kindly ask you to complete our report form so we can consider them. The report form can be found here. Alternatively, if Mr Stevens at Sandwell Council has information that calls into question the conduct of Mr Greenbough then he can report this to us.

 

Thank you for taking the time to contact us. If I can be of further assistance, please do let me know."

I duly referred the matter to the SDT who responded with lightning speed:

"Dear Sirs,

THIS IS NOT A PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL COMMUNICATION

I made a complaint to the SRA concerning Mark Greenburgh, Solicitor. They did not even acknowledge my complaint.

It was my understanding that Greenburgh's victim had made a complaint too but this turns out not to be correct.

My complaint was specifically that Greenburgh made racist comments about the Muslim Community whilst undertaking an investigation at Sandwell Council. He commented that the disability of a Councillor's daughter was due to "inbreeding" within the local Muslim Community.

I was told that he received a "smack on the wrist" but only recently became aware of your decision from June, 2018. I was horrified that although my specific complaint was about his racist comment this was totally excluded from the Tribunal decision. 

As it happens, Sandwell Council have unearthed what they say is further racist abuse by Greenburgh although they are currently trying to suppress the Report.

I made a complaint to the SRA - unfortunately this was via their website form which does not provide an email "copy". I am outraged that this racism has been covered up by the legal establishment. I also asked what the ethnic make-up of the Tribunal was?

[Copy here of the above email]

Incidentally, the Mr Stevens referred to was the Chief Executive of Sandwell Council who had caused or permitted (with others) he suppression of the further evidence of racist comments. (He has just been sacked). When the Report is finally forced into the open with the further evidence, rest-assured that I will be making a fresh complaint to the SRA but, in the meantime, I would appreciate your comments on why the SDT appears to have completely ignored the appalling racism - which was the central feature of my complaint?"

Reply from the SDT:

"Dear Sir

 

Thank you for the email below.

 

The information that the SRA have provided is incorrect. The SRA imposed an internal sanction of a written rebuke on Mr Greenburgh.  Mr Greenburgh lodged an appeal  with the Tribunal against that decision but withdraw his application before the appeal was heard. His application to the Tribunal is known as a S44E appeal.

 

The SRA has not made any application to the Tribunal in respect of Mr Greenburgh. The sanction imposed on him was not made by the Tribunal. The only decision made by the Tribunal was to permit Mr Greenburgh to withdraw his appeal." 

(You see folks - when you think I am not doing anything all this sort of work is going on!)

Obviously I wrote back to the SRA and they responded:

"Dear Mr Saunders,

 

Thank you for your email of 29 July 2021. I am sorry it has taken me some time to reply.

 

I have reviewed our file again and wish to correct a mistake I made in writing to you previously. I informed you that the Solicitors Disciplinary Tribunal (SDT) had sanctioned Mr Greenburgh. This is incorrect. The sanction given to Mr Greenburgh was a decision made by our organisation.

 

We are able to impose some sanctions on solicitors (such as rebukes and fines). The information given in my previous email was incorrect and I am sorry for any confusion or distress this may have caused.

 

I would also like to clarify that we did receive another report about Mr Greenburgh. The report concerned the same issue you raised with us. Both reports were dealt with together under the same investigation.

 

As we did not notify you of the outcome of our investigation, I have attached a copy of the published decision in this matter.

 

If you have any further queries about this matter, please do let me know."

The game of shuttlecock continued:

My response:

"Thank you for your response which does help in part.

You reply does not deal with the fact that it was the racist comment of Mr Greenburgh which was the focus of both complaints (as I understand it, as I have not seen the other complaint but believe that it was made by Mr Greenburgh's Muslim victim).

How did the central and very serious allegation come to be airbrushed from the original complaints? Were those at the SRA who made the decision all white?

Finally, there is an allegation that in this process, Mr Greenburgh was provided with a "reference" by Jan Britton, the now-disgraced former Chief Executive of Sandwell MBC. Is that true? This enquiry is not made from idle curiosity since it was Britton who made the racist comment of Mr Greenburgh public in the first place. It seems that there was a personal connection or friendship between the two and it would be extraordinary if the poacher had turned gamekeeper.

Further, Cllrs Maria Crompton and Rajbir Singh, political "leaders" of SMBC in recent times are deliberately suppressing a further Report clearly stating that Mr Greenburgh's comment was not an isolated outburst but just one of a series of such vile comments. It is inconceivable that Jan Britton was not aware of this and so if (if) he provided a reference this will have been grossly misleading.

As before, once the current Council leader, Cllr Singh, finally desists from the attempted cover-up and makes the latest Report public, it is inevitable that the comments will be the basis of further complaints to the SRA and so it is important for public confidence in your organisation that you are seen to be dealing with these issues objectively and without an institutional racial bias."

I should add that Britton refuses to communicate with me (lol) and so I am unable to put the extra allegations to him.

The SRA response:

"Dear Mr Saunders,

 

Thank you for your further email.

 

Our published decisions are only a very brief summary of a case. I can confirm that our investigation did focus on the allegation that Mr Greenburgh’s comment was racially motivated.

 

The decision-makers in a case are selected from a panel. We take care to ensure that our panel is representative of gender and ethnicity.

 

I note your comments about other members of Sandwell MBC. These people are not within our jurisdiction so it would not be appropriate for us to comment on their actions. If you do obtain further information relating to Mr Greenburgh, or other solicitors within our jurisdiction, please do let us know."

So there we have it folks - the SRA claims it DID consider the racism issue with a "representative" panel - before slapping Greenburgh with a limp lettuce leaf. They can't have found it very important even though they also had a complaint directly from a victim! It is entirely coincidental that Greenburgh is a Liveryman of the City of London Solicitors' Livery Company - and would have been called "one of the boys" in less enlightened times.

But no-one knew the SRA considered the racism element of the complaints from its decision notice which has allowed Greenburgh to - and I sh*t ye not - claims now to be a champion of diversity! Indeed - he is even the Chair and a Director of The Diversity Trust Cic. I wonder if he - a man who very publicly describes himself as "a Zionist" - has cracked his "joke" about Muslim disability and inbreeding at their Board meetings? Incredibly - yes truly, incredibly - here's how he now describes himself:

When I asked the Diversity Trust about his involvement with them via Twitter they, er, blocked me so I am assuming they don't want the history of their Chair made public. Oops ...

Interestingly, Greenburgh also crops up as a "Corporate Partner" of the organisation "Lawyers in Local Government" (along with Bevan Brittan - recipients of bent Labour Sandwell's cash from Britton's £300k legal fund to close this blog down - and Wilkin Chapman - used, inter alia, by Surjit Tour in an effort to subvert the Standards Investigation into Squealing Eling and who even attended a Gold meeting with an Assistant Chief Constable of WMP to attempt to shaft me).

                       

Of course, WMP are said to enjoy corrupt relationships with some individuals referred to in the Wragge Report and their rapid exit from the fraud investigation in favour of Greenburgh leads us directly to the current scandal with the £22m SEND contract where the lucky recipient was WMP's "prime suspect". When Jacob Rees-Mogg said recently in the House of Commons that the police should take a look at the SEND contract he was right - but it needs to be an independent force and NOT WMP!

(There are plenty of rumours swirling about the involvement of SMBC staff in the SEND deal and all information welcome - contact details below!)

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Leaflet given out at Gowling Wragge's Offices by Julian Saunders:

RACIST WRAGGE’S?

THE DAUGHTER OF A PAKISTANI MUSLIM COUNCILLOR WAS DISABLED DUE TO “INBREEDING” SAID GOWLING WLG (FORMERLY WRAGGE’S) PARTNER*, MARK GREENBURGH!

JAN BRITTON OF BENT SANDWELL COUNCIL EMPLOYED GREENBURGH - A SELF-PROCLAIMED ZIONIST - TO REPORT ON A MUSLIM COUNCILLOR AND PAID WRAGGE’S £185K FOR A USELESS REPORT AND THIS RACISM!

WRAGGE’S - GIVE THE MONEY BACK OR TO A MUSLIM AID CHARITY NOW!

* Mark Greenburgh and now left the firm.

READ THE FULL SHOCKING STORY AT thesandwellskidder.blogspot.com