There have been constant attacks on Julian Saunders saying that his major investigative work into the corruption at Labour Sandwell Metropolitan Boruough Council is somehow "not journalism". Well here is the start of Julian's history of his blog - make your own mind up!
The original posts can be found at thesandwellskidder.blogspot.com
Part One - 2013/2014
GENESIS
In 2013 a deeply corrupt Labour Council in the West Midlands, Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council (SMBC) decided to shut down a controversial arts centre called “The Public” where my wife was Managing Director. It became apparent to me that the leadership [sic] of both the political wing of the Council and the paid service were telling lie upon lie to the local media and even to junior Councillors about the nature of the transaction. I was outraged by this and set up a blog called “In The Public Domain”, more popularly known as “The Sandwell Skidder”, just for my own benefit to get things off my chest.
There is no need for me to retell the whole sorry saga of The Public closure since the tale is recounted at length in the blog, but I will provide two examples of what was really happening. Firstly, SMBC publicly announced on television that The Public was to be closed. They then tried to show that the decision had been taken properly and legally. As part of this Kafkaesque process staff members - who were already aware that the building was to be closed - held a meeting at Haden Hill House and discussed whether the building should be closed or not. Unsurprisingly they unanimously decided that it should. But at this meeting was a solicitor from Exeter who had no local knowledge. She participated directly in the discussions and, seemingly, even voted for the closure. Her firm was then given the contract for the legal work to lease the building out, for which it was paid over £40,000.
Secondly, SMBC gave a long lease to Sandwell College whilst, incredibly, retaining full responsibility for maintenance. They borrowed around £6m from the Public Loans Works Board to destroy the structure of the iconic building and gave the contract to Interserve without external tender (claiming that they had authority to do so via the, by then, defunct Building Schools For The Future PFI scheme). In turn, the College agreed to back the £6m to SMBC who issued them with a rent free long lease. To this day SMBC and friends in the media wrongfully state that the College is paying rent on the building when they most definitely are not - and I have shown this by putting the exact clauses of the lease on the blog.
If one reads my early efforts on the blog they are turgid in the extreme. I really didn’t care whether anyone read them of not. They were written as a cathartic exercise and for the benefit of the redundant Public staff and the tenants who were evicted. But then a strange thing happened in that people started to contact me making other allegations of misconduct by SMBC and an ex-Councillor set up a group, “The Scrutineers”, which held some meetings to discuss how to expose the corruption which I attended. My interest was piqued and I started to make my own investigations and to write about my findings.
It should be said that the corrupt Council did not make life easy. Labour had rock-solid political control of the Council - at one time during my involvement holding 71 of the 72 Council seats. The Leader was a monster called Darren Cooper - as thick as two short planks but bristling with low cunning and malice. He was widely perceived to be a puppet of John Spellar MP and Tom Watson MP and was known to regularly defer to their views. He had two deputies, Mahboob Hussain and Steve Eling who will both feature again below. A Chief Executive with a very thin CV was appointed, Jan Britton, who wrote to staff telling them it was their duty to defer to elected councillors. A new Head of Legal was brought in, Neeraj Sharma, despite her being heavily criticised in an Audit Commission Report into neighbouring Walsall Council that she had failed in her responsibilities and failed to challenge impropriety by councillors. The appointment of weak senior management was seen by many as a deliberate policy to ensure wrongdoing was not investigated properly or at all.
Sandwell is an incredibly insular place and Labour’s tentacles squirm into every organisation. Charities and associations were frequently told that if they challenged the Council they would lose their funding. Labour Councillors, members or cronies were placed on the boards of bodies. Staff within SMBC who rocked the boat were got rid off - always with a pay-off and confidentiality agreement - but Labour-supporting staff missed redundancy rounds. Many staff in the past have been related to each other and/or to Councillors and there has often been a strong code of omerta. The trade unions have generally been slavish followers of the Labour line. The small number of brave whistleblowers have invariably reported that they are scared of the management and distrust speaking with union reps.
SMBC have gone to great lengths to prevent me from investigating matters as will be seen later but right from the start there was an unwillingness to deal with Freedom of Information requests. The Press Office was told not to deal with me. Enquiries were ignored or responses were meaningless. My work was not refuted but I was constantly smeared - everything (yes everything) I wrote was “lies” even when I produced documentary and other irrefutable evidence.
It is also the case that SMBC have redacted information from published documents - particularly regarding The Public and Lion Farm (see further below) with the intention of thwarting potential applications for Judicial Review within the relevant timeframes.
2014
Whilst the Public controversy and my investigations into it rumbled on I exposed what became known as the “Icestink” scandal - a corrupt deal to demolish a large car park in West Bromwich and replace it with an ice rink, the ice rink “entrepreneur” having been introduced to the corrupt Council by a Labour peer. My disclosures about this transaction were instrumental in the “deal” eventually being scrapped.
I disclosed plenty of relatively minor but embarrassing stuff - a ridiculous payment by the Cemeteries Department to a Z-list TV personality for an inspirational talk; that the money for a project to “save money” had, in fact, been borrowed; the hilarious hoaxing of Cllr Hussain and the highways team by a prankster; that local MP Tom Watson was claiming twice the expenses of Sandwell MP, John Spellar; fake FOI’s were being submitted by associates of Cooper (or himself); SMBC lied to the media about the level of payments to their top management; that SMBC told the press they had taken a “minimum of £120,000” in ticket sales for a music festival they held whereas I exclusively discovered that the true figure was, in fact, only £43,945; that Darren Cooper lied to the press claiming that Labour had helped the poor by releasing the entire Local Welfare Provision budget whereas, in fact, over half a million pounds had not been spent (£568,791.41); and that Cooper claimed to have made “around a 10% reduction” in members’ allowances whereas I showed that they had, in fact, increased by £8,361.40p;
As early as February, 2014 I became the victim of a massive Twitter trolling campaign orchestrated by the (then) Leader, Darren Cooper. This expanded to trolling on an industrial scale but stopped at the same time as Cooper’s heart when he died in a drink and drugs-fuelled binge at Easter, 2016. He had various associates in this campaign including Reps from the Unite and at least one other trade union.
I exclusively disclosed that despite The Public deal (and I say as part of the corrupt arrangement) Sandwell College rented even further space in West Bromwich but this time direct from Labour Party Properties Limited. (Curiously this situation has recently come back to life.)
I submitted a story to Private Eye Magazine about the incredibly short Council meetings held by SMBC (because everything was agreed in secret beforehand and there was no opposition) which they duly published.
As early as 30th February, 2014 I started writing about a charitable foundation associated with West Bromwich Albion football club and a pet project of Sandwell Labour who ploughed taxpayers’ money into it and placed a Councillor on the trustee board. (This is also an ongoing story!)
At this time Darren Cooper wrote twice to my wife’s new employer , an arts charity, using SMBC staff to prepare and send the letters, suggesting they sack her because of her association with me. When my wife made a formal complaint this was dismissed by the aforementioned Neeraj Sharma effectively saying that Cooper had acted “in a personal capacity” and, anyway, my wife deserved it. Three Councillors then dismissed my wife’s appeal again stating, inter alia, that Cooper was acting in a personal capacity and that the matter was "not serious enough” to merit further investigation.
In a major exclusive I disclosed that Cooper, without going through normal procurement channels, had arranged to have expensive monthly “executive coaching sessions” at £450 each from a recently de-seated Birmingham Labour Councillor, Steve Bedser. My intervention brought an immediate halt to this scam although Bedser had already pocketed £11, 800 via a limited company.
I broke another major story almost immediately. A company connected with Cllr [A1] had bid for and won part of a major taxi contract via a limited company where he had divested himself of his shares but where control remained with his wife and daughter (and after the contract was awarded the daughter re-transferred "her" shares to him). He did not make any declaration of interest. A “thorough investigation” was undertaken by the Chief Executive, Jan Britton, who decided that the contract should continue as “everyone knew Cllr [A1] had taxi interests”. A later FOI showed that Britton’s “thorough investigation” did not generate a single document or record of any type.
Darren Cooper was obsessed with West Bromwich Albion FC. Despite questions about the Foundation I disclosed that a dirt poor Council had recently paid over £50,000 to the club itself ie not the Charity. They had also given £30,000 to a private individual who made a living out of persuading councils to erect statues of “celebrities” and who had sold Cooper the idea of having a statue in West Bromwich of three famous black WBA players. (It is noteworthy that the Club itself refused to deal with the statue “entrepreneur” and the matter dragged on for several years. It featured in my blog many times and the story is still not concluded as the financing of the final scheme remains a secret.)
I broke yet another significant story regarding Cllr Lucy Cashmore, the daughter of Cllrs Linda and Roger Horton, and close friends with Cooper. Although not resident or working in the Borough, Cooper and the Hortons let her register as being registered at the Horton’s address when she was, in fact, living just down the road from me in South Birmingham (as SMBC well knew as her husband was on the payroll). This lead to me revealing a couple of other Councillors who had lied about their residence and the matter was reported to West Midlands Police (WMP) who took no action until it was too late to do so. They stated in writing that they had missed the limitation period as they were “unaware of the law”. This story is interesting in that Cashmore decided to step down at the next election (having received four years’ worth of allowances) and the local newspaper, The Express and Star, ran a piece blaming me for exposing her and forcing her out without disclosing that she had just taken a job with the Express and Star Group!
The summer of 2014 was something of a “golden age” for The Skidder. A Twitter troll attacking me (and associated with Cooper and Cllr Frear ) was exposed as an employee of SMBC. Further Frear lied about his address but he had been given a council house with no apparent entitlement to one which he was sharing with the troll.
Labour had an anti-gambling policy and said they would not allow any more casinos in Sandwell before backing a new casino in Oldbury. The project was stopped following court action and the local press trumpeted Cllr Eling saying that the Council would only have to pay minimal costs despite losing whereas I discovered that the costs were actually in excess of £18,000 excluding vat.
At around this time “socialist” SMBC lost an important case in the High Court brought by the Child Poverty Action Group (CPAG). This involved Council Tax Benefit. None of their friends in the local mainstream media even mentioned it even though the Council had to pay substantial costs and lost a large £675,000 grant. It was left to me to enlighten local residents of this disaster where SMBC had been absolutely torn to shreds by Hickinbottom J.
In August, 2014 the Boggate scandal erupted. Despite the relatively small amount involved this became a major issue as it was one of the few cases where I was actually able to get hold of some documentation. In short, this involved the sale of three decommissioned public toilet blocks which were to be put to auction. But they were sold at a significant undervalue to a member of Cllr [A1's] family. SMBC deliberately lied to me about the identity of the purchaser at first but I was able to disentangle the web. The story ran and ran and became a feature in the Regional Fraud investigation, the infamous Wragge Report (see further below) and later standards hearings.
Boggate was a turning point for the blog. Whereas it had grown from being an opportunity to “sound off” about the bent Public deal to a serious “hobby”, I now realised that I was only scratching the surface of the corruption and began to devote serious investigation time to issues. From then onwards I was a serious campaigning investigative journalist. Also, I started getting death threats and threats of extreme violence via burner phones. One call was, “Do you still live at xx xxxxxxxxxx Road because we are going to come and burn your house down”. (And one of the protagonists in this saga was known to have been associated with at least three building fires.) WMP offered me no help saying that they could not trace burner phones and that I should dial 999 if in danger.
I worked with the Daily Mail on a story proving that Tom Watson MP had not actually received a degree from Hull University.
And there was a rare case that arose where, for once, I was ahead of the game. It was not unknown for SMBC to lease valuable land to parties with use covenants and then quietly remove the covenants and sell it to them at a later date for a pittance. Thus SMBC planned to lease at a peppercorn rent a valuable plot some distance from Dartmouth Street Mosque as parking for Mosque-users. I actually spoke to a number of local residents who unanimously stated that they were unaware of the planned scheme and opposed it (not least because the access was to be via a narrow residential road). This was a large plot and I raised questions via the blog about any valuations of the property etc. The scheme was quickly dropped.
The summer heat was on for SMBC as I exclusively disclosed a pair of major scandals - Lodge Street and the Smethwick Coroner’s Office. It is worth noting how this came about. I am not very computer-literate but these deals were brought to my attention. When I looked at the Council’s planning website both sites produced no information and so I went into the Council’s offices. It may just have been some sort of glitch but the staff member let me use one of their computers and there it all was. I immediately realised that both these properties had been sold to [A2] , the son of Cllr [A1].
In all the dodgy land transactions there was a common theme. The relevant committee approved land sales (often hard for the public to notice because of heavy redactions in the records) and then delegated powers to Nick Bubalo, the Director of Regeneration and the aforesaid Neeraj Sharma, the Head of Legal. [A2] actually worked in Bubalo’s department where he was well-known to be Cllr [A1's] son. Yet, incredibly, Bubalo would later tell the Wragge investigation he had never met him!
The Smethwick Coroner’s office sale was dubious as a local solicitor wanted to buy the building which was suddenly withdrawn from sale and sold to [A2] together with some additional land at the side. The price for the office alone, without the additional plot, was “light”.
Lodge Street was a particularly egregious “deal” whereby a large building plot was sold to [A2] for just £145,000. I personally interviewed Cllr [A1] outside the Oldbury Council House who informed me that the land was cheap because it was “shit”. Nevertheless, Bubalo soon granted planning permission for 15 houses with no s.106 or community infrastructure charges. [A2] built houses on the land which quickly sold and he is estimated to have made a seven-figure profit.
When I exclusively disclosed these scandals the local mainstream media finally began to take notice as did the police.
Before my time in Sandwell, as it were, SMBC had entered into an absolutely disastrous contract with BT called “Transform Sandwell”. There have been persistent allegations of fraud relating to the original deal from a former SMBC solicitor who worked on the transaction. And the police have investigated similar contracts with other councils. Whatever the position this was a shockingly bad deal which SMBC eventually had to get themselves out of. BT had been leasing a large new building with the unfortunate name “Providence Place” in West Bromwich from SMBC who announced they were borrowing £20m just to acquire the unencumbered freehold. They boasted how they would then hold a very valuable asset (this is an ongoing story as SMBC recently told the press they were selling the £20m asset for just £8m.)
The statue saga rumbled on with SMBC diverting Arts Council money for an Arts Festival to use for a publicity stunt promoting it instead.
As September drew to a close, I dug out another massive scandal following contacts from residents in and around Florence Road Smethwick. SMBC purchased a row of old houses and demolished them leaving a much sought after building plot in Florence Road - an old fashioned terraced street. A very large seven-bedroom house was being built on the plot to the chagrin of neighbours. SMBC deliberately tried to obfuscate the true position but I eventually established that the plot had been withdrawn from public auction on the orders of Cooper and sold privately to the son of Labour Councillor Mohammad Rouf (Rouf now lives in the house with family members). This became another long-running saga and each time I appeared in Smethwick I received dire threats - once, and I do not exaggerate, within 30 seconds of me getting off a bus.
In October, I had a detailed session with the Regional Fraud Team and gave the police as much information as I could (some of it going way beyond what has been shown in the blog). On 17th October, 2014 I sent an open letter to SMBC staff urging them to search their consciences and speak out now that the Police were involved.
I also discovered that the former premises of the Sandwell Muslim Organisation (of which Cllr [A1] was a leading light) had been the subject of onerous covenants. In 2012 they had been released for no reward by Nick Bubalo and the premises developed as six residential units. SMBC denied wrongdoing on this transaction but never provided a convincing explanation for what had happened. The beneficiary of this fortunate transaction was Mr [A3] but I was unable to link him to Cllr [A1].
SMBC had “zoned” an area of land for commercial use only but relaxed this requirement in 2012. [A2] was in the right place working in Bubalo’s department. Happily he was able to buy the land from a private vendor and develop it.
Two individuals, at least one of whom was a close associate of Cllr [A1], were granted planning permission to develop a factory site for 12 flats. They got greedy and re-applied for 35 flats but this led outside bodies to intervene. The planning consultant was one used regularly by Cllr [A1]. At one time the building “caught fire” and a former policeman told me his colleague was told to go and fetch the keyholder who just happened to be Cllr [A1]. And a company registered at the address had [A2] as a Director and another of Cllr [A1's] sons as the company secretary.
Local people, including members of the Muslim community, informed me that there was a dodgy deal involving a property at Clifford Road, Oldbury. I am afraid that I could not get to the bottom of this as Cllr [A1] had seemingly bought the property legitimately. It later transpired that was indeed the case but that he had then tried to sell the property TO SMBC for a substantial profit.
In the late 1990’s SMBC compulsorily purchased a large part of West Bromwich Street in Oldbury where both Cllrs [A1] and Cllr Bawa had houses. Favourable arrangements were made for these two but not for any of the other residents. I was able to ascertain that Cllr Bawa acquired a building plot in Bridge Street, Oldbury but the whole transaction was surrounded in mystery and a long time ago. I am afraid this defeated my journalistic skills although recently SMBC said they themselves were re-investigated the whole CPO affair.
I was the only journalist to flag up questions about these last three properties. Soon Cllr [A1] was back on my radar. Two sisters complained to me that their late Mother had occupied a four bedroom council house in Judge Close, Oldbury but that Cllr [A1] had visited a couple of times suggesting she moved to somewhere smaller. Following her death, Cllr [A1's] daughter, [A4] took the council tenancy. What was even more odd here, which I discovered and disclosed, was that [A4] and her husband already owned their own house at Century Road, Oldbury and SMBC actually had a charge on that property. I disclosed that the 4 bedroom council house was occupied whilst they rented out their own house to tenants. SMBC later said that they could find "nothing wrong" with this.
As the year drew to a close Cooper’s Twitter trolling of me and my wife increased dramatically and he also had me covertly photographed and put the image on Twitter. In the meantime I showed that Cllr Rouf was claiming to be unemployed on his declaration of interest form when he still had a Birmingham City Council taxi licence (and worked extensively in his son’s pharmacy although he alleged this was on a "voluntary" basis).
By December, Cooper and a Unite the Union rep started using Twitter to harass my wife’s employers and a large Birmingham arts charity where she was a voluntary trustee. Unite promised me and my wife a Christmas we would never forget and sent me their online Christmas card. On 20th December I was subjected to a bully incident by another union rep and close associate of Cooper and Tom Watson MP. She then boasted on Twitter what she had done implying to the world at large that I was a pervert.
At this time the Deputy Chief Executive and the Finance Director suddenly left the Council. It is said that only one was to be fired but the whole thing was mishandled and the other walked out too. Whilst the two individuals had their critics they were generally perceived to be the two of the more able members of Jan Britton’s team (the Finance Director particularly) further weakening it.
A troll Twitter account of Cooper’s put up a tweet: “its going to be one hell of a Christmas for someone this year. Be prepared my boy. L & J ready?" Cooper regularly used the words “my boy”. L and J is me and my wife. And this was no idle threat as what is not known as a Twitter sh*tstorm started against us via multiple accounts.
Cooper finished the year saying that the costs of the disastrous Council Tax Benefit case had been just £40,000 (excluding all the work done in-house which SMBC said they were unable to quantify!) In fact, I revealed that the external costs alone were £71,508.33 excluding VAT.
Through the latter part of the year and into the beginning of the next year it was very unsafe for me to visit Sandwell even in the daytime. On one occasion three men in a Range Rover (belonging to a well-known family) were circulating around Oldbury Centre looking for me and I had to hide in a bus queue. There was a problem with “Scrutineers” meetings which were held at night and far too dangerous for me to attend alone. Accordingly, kind members of the group provided transport for me to and from busy tram or rail stations.
To be continued ...
iancrowmultimedia@gmail.com
