West Bromwich is a ghastly sh*thole after 43 years of Labour dictatorship but there are still a small number of fine buildings dotted about. One such is the old Grade II listed Ryland Memorial School of Art in Lodge Road, a 1902 structure by Wood and Kendrick in the Renaissance Revival style which was formally owned by the rapacious scumbag organisation known as Sandwell College.
For reasons that are not clear to me (and require investigation) the larger site, of which the Ryland was but a part, came into the ownership of the Government's Homes and Communities Agency and the word was that the site would be used for housing. The HCA's agents were our old friends, international property consultants Jones Lang LaSalle, who Cllrs Cooper, Hussain and Eling paid a fortune to for them to produce a report shafting The Public. (These three paid them even more to report on the Borough's town halls but that can wait until another day).
In 2013 Cllr Haque (the current mayor of Sadders) popped up with a planning application - citing the HCA as owner - for change of use of the Ryland from an educational facility to a Muslim boarding school for boys only. The application was made on the 10th of June (with an application for listed building consent) and passed through the process with considerable speed being granted on 26th July despite a massive 48 letters of objection and two petitions against the project containing, er, 409 signatures! The Committee report itself remarked on the fact that there was no mention anywhere in the application of the number of boys who would be boarding there which one might imagine to be rather germane to the whole issue even to the thick as sh*t "comrades". The application specifically stated that no parking issues would arise as there was plenty of town centre parking nearby.
In 2015 a further planning application was made but I can't tell you anything about it as Jan Britton's bent paid service have mysteriously removed it from the Council website for reasons unknown! Has this gone to internal audit for some reason? (If you want to look by the way, the applications are not for an address in Lodge Road but under "Sandwell College, High Street"!
This lovely old building has high ceilings and windows but in 2016 a Mr Mishbaur Rehman of Dudley turned up on behalf of the Latifiah Fultali Complex (LFC) and obtained listed building consent to whack in a suspended ceiling. There is now no reference to ownership nor of any continuing involvement of Cllr Haque. Rehman is recorded as a Director of LFC.
In 2017 there was a further application for planning permission to replace walls destroyed in an earlier fire. The application specifically states that
no Councillor is involved in the application. But who should pop us as the agent but our old friend Anthony Hope - planning adviser to the Mahboob Hussain family and whose name coincidentally appears in connection with a number of the bent land deals described in this blog! (It is believed that corrupt West Midlands Police failed to interview Mr Hope under caution.) Needless to say the application was granted.
It is not clear whether the HCA sought offers from anyone else or how they came to favour this particular scheme. They appear to have entered into some sort of agreement with LFC on 6th March, 2015 with restrictive covenants but then appear to have flogged the site to them - subject to a covenant on the 2015 agreement - for just £110,000 on 27th April, 2016.
Meanwhile, in 2015 locals had become concerned that the "boarding school" apparently required 60 (yes, sixty) parking spaces in central West Bromwich not least because the "on-site prayer hall" was to cater for up to 2,500 people! A concerned resident put in a Freedom of Information Request in 2015 but SMBC basically said "nothing to do with us gov" - Haque had properly declared an interest in the 2013 application and there was no mention of any use of a prayer hall on site nor any mention (as above) of the requirement for ANY parking spaces in the planning applications.
Where on earth would silly downtrodden locals have got such an idea? Perhaps from, er, LFC itself who went onto the GoFundMe website asking for money. Not only was the school and prayer hall going to be used, they said, but the site was to be
a conference centre for between 1,000 and 2,000 people too (although n
ot mentioned on the planning application!) But at least they now had their own car park????
(Query why the HCA sold it so cheap if it is so big and LFC also intended to use it as a conference centre?)
Here is part of the GoFundMe begging plea:
On Go Fund Me LFC boasted of being over 70% towards "target" but on closer inspection most of the cash was allegedly from anonymous "donors" not using the site:
In other words, of £154,666 of alleged donations only
£4,666 was documented online. (A donor of £2,000 was dear old Cllr Haque). Anyone wonder if a big con was going on here?
However much this lot actually raised they, er, neglected to pay the builders! Two companies who worked on the building had to pursue them for debt (and still are) and after an adjudication LFC acknowledged a debt of just £225,247.63p!!! That will knock a hole in the "donations" and they will have to run a few illegal conferences to pay that back "lol"!
One thing that WAS mentioned in the planning application was that the change of use at West Brom was needed because existing premises at Tipton were too small. Or maybe it was really because the Jalaliah Educational Institute for 11 boarding boys was operating illegally under the stewardship of someone I am told is Cllr Haque's son, Muhammed Khurshid-Ul Haque (it was a different one that had the more "infamous" run in with the law.) There were serious problems at this "school" and Haque's alleged son was found to have put the children there at risk of "serious harm". He was suspended as a social worker for 12 months. The whole sorry saga is here:
http://www.communitycare.co.uk/2013/03/28/social-worker-suspended-for-running-unapproved-boarding-school-for-boy
Unbelievably Haque was working for SANDWELL COUNCIL whilst all this was going on!
Jalaiah Educational Institute is not listed as a charity and LFC give it's Tipton address as its own at HM Land Registry. It also gave this address at Companies House when LFC was set up as a company limited by guarantee in 2015 but has changed it now to the Ryland address. (LFC is NOT a registered charity.)
It is very important that bent Sandwell Council release the 2015 planning applications since if they say Cllr Haque was no longer involved in this project serious further enquiries must be made as, on 23rd September, 2015, the person referred to above as allegedly being Haque's son was a founder Director of LFC. In other words, depending on the dates, a close relative of Haque appears to have been directly involved in the applications and this was may not have been declared.
Furthermore, Muhammed Kurshid-Ul Haque (who, remember, put children at risk of senior harm in 2013) remains a director and this has been specifically NOT mentioned in the 2017 planning application - indeed it is specifically stated that the applicant is NOT related to a Councillor. This is false if he is, indeed, related.
But then what's this? Mayor Haque MBE (FFS)
HIMSELF became a director of LFC on 24th September, 2015 and did not resign until 25th September, 2017 so that the 2017 planning application (at the very least) contain a blatantly false declaration:
The false application to which this sleazebag was a party was dated 28th June, 2017 and he didn't resign his directorship until 12 days AFTER the planning permission was granted. I am making an immediate standards complaint.
The comrades have form in destroying important architecture in the Borough and locals need to make sure that the applications for further listed building consent here are thoroughly scrutinised.
Am I the only one Haqued off by the way these so-called "socialists" are operating with impunity in this crap area? This arse needs to resign the mayoralty now before he brings that office into even further disrepute (if that is possible after Linda Horton and Derek Rowley.)
The Dictatorship - approximately 70 Labour councillors have presided over thousands of cases of child abuse in the last five years and looked the other way. The Government has had to intervene in the disastrous Children's Services department. Safeguarding has been non-existent and many unfortunate children have paid the heavy and unacceptable price. I personally feel queasy about a man who has been suspended from working as a social worker in recent history being a director of a company involved in this project whether he is related to Haque or not. Does he have day to day control of the premises?
We know the comrades are mostly a bunch of dozy f*ckers but we need to collectively keep an eye on the situation in this case and hold them PERSONALLY to account if anything goes awry here.
THE SANDWELL SKIDDER - COMMUNITY NEWS - READ THE SKIDDER, KIDDER!
No phone at present - please use email. Facebook: Julian Saunders
Email: thesandwellskidder@gmail.com
PROUD TO HAVE BEEN TROLLED BY DICKHEAD DARREN COOPER DECEASED!
