Name and Shame UK
We expose the dirty deedsters
So when did council officers stop being public servants?
Yes, there was a time when officers of the council were paid a moderate salary to look after our interests; to provide us with basic amenities that made our lives less arduous, and to give us towns and cities we could be proud of. Now these same bureaucrats are paid exorbitant salaries to dream up half-witted schemes that will irritate us to death and cost us a lot of money. Money that comes from the bottomless purse called council tax. The perpetrators are little Hitlers who want to control our lives.
Lower down the scale, lesser council employees may not be paid such exorbitant salaries but they mostly get quite reasonable remuneration and they benefit from the inflation-proof pensions that we pay for; pensions that in many cases we cannot look forward to ourselves as ours have been whittled away to the extent that they are now almost worthless.
More galling is the fact that some council employees are complete numbskulls. They operate policies dreamed up by dickheads and they don't even have the brain power to question their feasibility. Indeed, many older and long-suffering residents will recall that the rocking horses they had in childhood were far more intelligent than some current-day council employees!
At one time, elected councillors did the job because they wanted to help their communities. There was no real financial incentive although some scandalously corrupt councillors did manage to do very well in a financial sense. Nowadays, councillors are paid salaries for their part time work that many of us would gratefully accept as just reward for a full-time job. This is, of course, in addition to whatever salaries they receive from their day jobs!
Our victims will often be local councils. The tricks they get up to would probably fill a book but we will concentrate on one or two specific matters that are likely to affect many people who live in boroughs controlled by corrupt local authorities. We would, of course, have preferred to promote boroughs that are not corrupt but we haven't managed to find one.
To see a sample of the unjust experiences faced by people all over the country, take a look also at http://www.rottenborough.org.uk. It makes fascinating reading!
Another good website is http://www.croydoncouncil.info which attempts to expose massive scandals in the London Borough of Croydon.
If you cannot understand how council officers and councillors do so little to truly represent the people they are supposed to represent, take a look at http://www.bullytown.co.uk - a fascinating website that proves representation is not the object of the exercise.
Visitors' Comments
This is true but don't forget the MPs are even better paid and just as bad. TK, Scunthorpe
I agree. Derek Edmead, Dartford
Hello. I'm a rare breed pig farmer who is trying to keep Britain farming with my smallholding. But I seem to be the target of what you might call townies - people who move to the countryside, buy a million pound house and move on to the parish council to look good. Most are probably in dept up to their eyeballs.
Suddenly we have a parish council who complain about putting animals in a field and planting trees! Recently I had a reply from Harrogate Borough Council regarding a complaint I sent in about an enforcement officer, MR JAMES CULLEN.
MR TIM RICHARDS (Head of planning services), who seems to run Harrogate council, and has family relatives on most parish councils in the little villages locally, replied by letter to an email of mine saying officially that whether or not JAMES CULLEN (PLANNING ENFORCEMENT OFFICER) HAS LIED, THE COUNCIL DOES NOT ALTER ITS POSITION??? Now that seems to indicate that this council condones liars. What do you think?
And I have the official letter from the council as evidence that when you complain to the local government ombudsman in York, you send the letters by fax and they send you a letter saying they have received them. But you never hear from them again! Do they all go to the pub and stay there?
I'm sorry but this country is knackered! There is no one who cares. So just do as you like in life because truly no one cares.
Debra Alexander, York
Editorial Comment:
With everything we have witnessed during the last 11 years under New Labour, we would love to think that you could "do as you like" (within reason) but, as we all know, you can't. The only people who seem to be able to "do as they like" are the government, the bureaucracy, the town hall dictators and their armies of paid enforcers - in fact anyone who would prefer that this country becomes a quasi-communist state run by Europe ... the very thing that our forefathers fought to avoid in two world wars.
The whole objective of the freedom wreckers is to stop us doing anything we might like, or everything they don't like, mostly by criminalising everything. And yes, Debra, councils do condone liars - it's a prime requirement for continued employment. If they employed honest and truthful people they wouldn't get away with half the things they did.
If we do not wake up to what's happening around us, it will be too late. Something has to be done now. We might hope that the next election will bring change but our hopes are probably unrealistic. And anyway we cannot afford to wait another two years. We must protest and we must make sure our protest is heard. But it will need more than minor demonstrations. It will require demonstrations by vast numbers of people who really care about this country - people who are determined to stop the rot now.
Any volunteers to lead us out of the New Labour mire and back to sanity?
I agree totally.
If people only understood this issue properly there would be outrage. My council is an 'Executive' NELC and they pay themselves outstandingly.
Most people think that the powerful people in their council are either MPs or civil servants; Think again! Both of the prior groups are well
regulated and easily monitored.
Your council (if it's anything like mine) is run by unaccountable and unregulated senior managers (Officers). Check your council's constitution,
see what power some councils have given themselves and realise that the main decision makers in your council are UNACCOUNTABLE.
GT, Lincs
I worked for the local council in Walsall for three years and was one of the few in the Department who lived locally. I was frightened by how much money was wasted on stupid items, and how many "contracts" were given to friends. Days out on expenses that were just glorified piss-ups, awards given to staff at top hotels for doing a job they were paid to do, and overtime allowed when there was no work - we sat all day for months, yet were paid time and half to come in on weekends. This was when Fujitsu were supposed to take over.
I found that items were priced up wrongly on the system so it looked like unit was in profit, yet had actually been losing money for months. I witnessed stolen goods being sold, drugs, theft and even a child abuse book stored away by a temp. When I complained about this I was demoted. Then I managed to gather some evidence. Funnily enough my evidence was lost after being handed over and I was sacked for Gross Misconduct.
Weeks later, a co-worker who also spoke out was also sacked on health grounds. Worse still, six months later, the manager I complained about was released with £65,000 pay-off and the unit was downsized.
I have since been unable to clear my name, I have been abused by staff so much I can no longer go into Walsall alone. And I cannot get another job, even though I was good at my job and am willing to work hard.
Valerie Smith, Willenhall
None of this surprises us because we hear it all the time. Councils employ a large number of people who would be lucky to get a job anywhere else and the only qualification we think most need is the ability to turn a blind eye to the corruption, break the laws of the land with impunity and lie when required to do so. Read the section on parking administration in the London Borough of Bexley to see how they blatantly practise fraud, dishonesty and corruption - all with guaranteed continuous employment and a fully-protected inflation-proof pension scheme.
Despite the so-called legal protection granted to whistle blowers under the Public Interest Disclosure Act 1998, the usual result is that the honest person is sacked and victimised whilst useless executives walk away with handsome pay-offs, often strolling straight into another job with another local authority.
On another page of this website you can read all about Ian Clement - the former Conservative leader of Bexley Council - who was recently sacked from his job as Deputy Mayor of London by Boris Johnson after financial irregularities. It now transpires that the police are reviewing all Clement's expense claims to identify the scale of any potential fraud. They have already uncovered an instance where, as Deputy Mayor of London, he entertained the former Chief Executive of Bexley Council, Nick Johnson, at a posh London restaurant.
Johnson had retired from his £200,000-plus Bexley job on health grounds only days previously. He left Bexley with a full pension and a six-figure pay-off. Naturally, councils never worry about spending other people's money on such retirement luxuries for their senior staff. The only difference here was that Johnson's health couldn't have been that bad as he took another £125,000 a year job on a London housing trust four months later! He is now working for the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham.
In a world untainted with the corruption of local authorities, Bexley taxpayers would be demanding that Johnson's pay-off be paid back and that his full pension be stopped. Johnson himself, and anyone still employed by Bexley Council who sanctioned this gross misuse of public funds, would be dragged to the public square next to Bexley's civic headquarters and would be publicly humiliated by being placed in specially-erected stocks. Then they would be thrown in jail.
This will never happen, of course. All that will happen is that there will be more cover-ups, more wastage of public funds on more council trough gobblers, and continued corruption.
But none of this is any use to our correspondent. She made the mistakes of being good at her job and honest - the complete opposite of a perfect council employee. So what Valerie needs now is an employer who seeks the qualities she has. In the meantime, although it's not much consolation, she can at least hold her head high. Ed.
BARNET COUNCIL and ENFIELD COUNCIL are two of the most RACIST and corrupt councils I have ever encountered. Their Social Services for Older Adults are seriously corrupt. They PRETEND to be protecting older adults like my mother when really they are on the side of her violent abuser (my brother).
Barnet and Enfield Council helped my brother unlawfully and illegally evict my mother (who is a pensioner) from her own home. They ignored the fact that he has a police record of violence against my mother. Both councils have continued to collude with my brother to cover up the TRUTH. They don't want anyone to know how corrupt these two Councils are.
I was also evicted, along with my mother, and I was homeless for the whole of 2008. Barnet Council don't want to house me even though I have been on their housing register for 10 years plus ... all because they are colluding with my brother. There is one VERY big conspiracy by Barnet and Enfield Council to TOTALLY deny my mother her Human Rights and assist my Brother to drug my mother and make her appear confused. The ONLY reason these two Councils are colluding with my brother is to get my mother assessed as Mentally Incapacitated so my brother can take control of her property and affairs. I think these two councils have some kind of financial interest in my mother's house and want to be in control of her finances. Enfield and Barnet Councils are VERY corrupt!
Fran, London
How can someone get £200,000 per year while, at the same time, old age pensioners are going to get their bus passes took off them? That's to say nothing of the price rises! Councillors and MPs should get a working man's wage - the job they do is not too hard ... mainly a little paperwork. And masons should be banned from holding office!
Bill Kelly, London
I agree that local councils are corrupt. But what are we doing about it?
As they are our employees maybe we should start to question and demand information from them under the "freedom of Information" act.
I live in Harrow Council who I believe are corrupt to the core. Everyone knows this but we are unable to do anything. NO, that is not right ... we should go to the street and inform people. I have suffered at the hands of my local authority but I will enlighten people about Harrow Council - even if this means distributing leaflets in the street.
We all complain but do nothing. If enough people know their rights the Local Council idiots (employees) will not be able to bully their constituents. If this message gets one person to do something positive about their council then I have done my work. We need to start questioning what they are doing for us and where our money is being spent
Jamal Khan, Edgware
We should be able to rely on our councillors to put things right but unfortunately the vast majority are too weak or too dishonest to make any difference. We can use the Freedom of Information Act to force local authorities to reveal information but don't be surprised by the lengths they will go to suppress details or refuse FOI requests. Ed.
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"Many men stumble across the truth ... but most manage to pick themselves up and continue as if nothing had happened."
Winston S Churchill
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