Breaking News: Labour £8m+ Contract Overspend!

A quick post with some breaking news of, at best, yet more gross incompetence by bent Labour Sandwell Council. As with most Skidder stories I was alerted to the refurbishment of Alfred Gunn House by a concerned informant. In short the allegation was that Sandwell's current Labour Leader, the liar Kerrie "Dim Kez" Carmichael, when she was supposed to be Housing supremo - for whatever reason - accepted a wildly low estimate for this job from Seddon Construction (a firm which has declined to respond to the Skidder on this subject).

A further - and somewhat different allegation - was also received with regard to this and other Sandwell Labour contracts i.e. that even in the absence of corruption (!) the tendering process at the Cowboy/girl Council is wholly inadequate. Thus Labour signs up its preferred contractor following open tendering but then greatly expands the specification when the preferred contractor then has a free run without any further competition. Nothing is re-tendered even where there are major changes of spec. I am not saying that there has been fraud here, but in this situation the contractor has Labour with its pants down, and/or the opportunity for fraudulent kick-backs to the comrades or bent staff for extra work is self-evident.

Labour has not been totally forthcoming in a Freedom of Information (FOI) Request I submitted in respect of this particular matter (which, naturally, was totally ignored by the Council's Tory opposition before it imploded) and so the matter has been referred to the Information Commissioner. As with the overwhelmingly majority of my FOI requests this was made in the public domain via the What Do They Know website, although in recent times Shokat Lal, Chief Executive, has been trying to conceal responses from the public by having them emailed to me direct! WTF?

Bent Labour Sandwell has just admitted - thanks to the intervention of the Information Commissioner - that the agreed price for the refurbishment with Seddon was £13,996,049. However, as at 15th April, 2024, it has overspent by, wait for it, £8,282,431.09 ex Vat! The Council has refused to say whether the contract is complete or ongoing and so will yet more extra millions be heading Seddon's way?

As things stand the overspend is already almost 60% of the original contract price! Someone - other than me - needs to be asking some serious questions about this, at best, gross incompetence and/or deliberate manipulation of the tendering process.

Did the Government Commissioners raise this overspend with bent Labour and with what result? What do the partisan auditors, Grant Thornton, have to say about this - or are they going to cover-it up as with the Cox Review? Are the Tories ever going to start asking questions? Meanwhile, The Skidder will press on trying to get to the bottom of this on your behalf, dear readers.

No wonder Labour is screwing the people with full-rate Council Tax increases, rent hikes, car park rises, bin charges etc. etc. etc. Meanwhile the liar Carmichael has boasted of her supposed financial acumen (picture courtesy of the excellent @CorruptSandwell). You couldn't make it up (although she does ...)

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