Croydon’s second Report in the Public Interest
In late January Croydon Council’s external auditors, Grant Thornton, published a Report in the Public Interest into the refurbishment of the Fairfield Halls.
As a result of this Croydon Council was forced to hold an Extraordinary Council Meeting, at which Grant Thornton presented their Report and answered councillors question.
These Reports are issued extremely rarely, because the threshold to commission them is so high – but that hasn’t stopped Labour being issued with two of them in just 15 months. Croydon is the only Council to have been issued two reports in such a short space of time, a terrible indictment of their failings over the last eight years.
During the Meeting which was held on 3rd February, the independent auditors confirmed that:
· The Labour-run Council handed the Fairfield Halls refurbishment contract to their friends at Brick By Brick, without letting any other company bid;
· At no point did Labour give Brick By Brick a list of things they wanted done, nor did they attempt to properly work out the cost of the works;
· The total cost of the works rocketed to £67.5m, more than double the £30m budgeted. What’s more, this huge increase was never agreed by Cabinet or Council;
· No evidence of a Sales Agreement – alongside other fundamentally important documents – between the Labour-led Council and Brick By Brick could be found.
I had the opportunity to speak at the Meeting and my speech is reproduced below:
“Thank you Madam Deputy Mayor.
The shame which this Labour Council continues to pile on our Town deepened once again last week with the publication of this second Report In The Public Interest.
For a Council to have one RIPI is VERY rare but to have two within 15 months is unprecedented and the language used in the Report is stark.
The Report written by Grant Thornton on the refurbishment of the Fairfield Halls raises very serious questions about the whole project.
- The legality of giving the contract to their own company of house builders – Brick by Brick
- The failure of the Labour Cabinet members to ensure full accountability
- The performance of former senior, highly paid Council officers
- The fact that the whole project was delivered late and has cost millions more than budgeted for and agreed by the Labour Cabinet in June 2016 - and it still needs more of our money to complete
This Labour Council failed in some of its most basic of duties in failing to ensure that the arrangements were legal and vast gaps in governance and oversight were allowed.
Questions raised by my Conservative colleagues and I were either shut down or given incorrect and misleading answers and we were given incomplete reports with details which the Labour administration didn’t want us to see, redacted.
This whole cover up approach meant that scrutiny and challenge, which could have allowed corrective action to be taken, were completely blocked.
The auditors have described the weaknesses in the council’s financial, legal and governance processes and management of this project as “fundamental failings by the council” and It highlights that significant amounts of public money was spent without proper authorisation.
One can scarcely imagine a more damning indictment of this Labour-led Council.
There is no doubt that public trust has been lost and residents are understandably keen for some proper accountability.
It’s just not good enough to say, ‘oh it happened years ago’, ‘nothing to do with us’ and ‘we have apologised’. When millions of pounds of taxpayers money is involved, you simply cannot just shrug your shoulders and walk away from this debacle which happened on your watch.
Cllr Ali, you are the Leader of the Council, and you were in the Cabinet when all this unlawful behaviour was allowed. What questions were you and your Cabinet colleagues asking about the project, the risks and the approach being taken to circumvent procurement law and competitive tendering?
And why when my colleagues and I raised concerns about the apparent spiralling costs of the Fairfield Halls project did none of you support our questions?
Indeed just two years ago a Senior Labour member called a £70m figure a ‘ruse’ despite, as it turns out, being pretty accurate.
Residents are baffled as to why many of those who sat in the old Labour Cabinet are still there in your Cabinet but surely, every Member who sat at that table whilst vast sums were given away to Brick by Brick in such an unaccountable way, must now resign.
The Report in the Public Interest covers some of the failures and incompetence but not all of it and residents across Croydon have been seriously let down by this Labour administration. Residents are looking for accountability; for the people who failed to do their jobs responsibly, honestly and legally, to be held to account.
Its time this happened.
Having notified the Monitoring Officer earlier today of our intention, I will later this evening be moving a Motion to add a recommendation that this Report in the Public Interest concerning the refurbishment of Fairfield Halls, be sent to the Police.
The public have completely lost trust in Labour and if two RIPI’s in 15 months aren’t signalling loud and clear that something is seriously wrong and that it’s time for change in Croydon – I don’t know what is.
Croydon deserves so much better than this broken Labour administration. “
Despite the Labour Councillors claiming that they ‘fully accepted’ the report which labelled their actions as unlawful, every Labour Councillor attending voted against sending the report to the police.
Croydon’s Conservative Opposition were, however, determined not to leave the matter there and shortly after the Meeting we contacted the Police.
If you would like to watch the whole meeting, which took place on Thursday 3rd February, then you can do so via the meeting link on the Council’s website at: https://webcasting.croydon.gov.uk/croydon
