Nick Tiratsoo's Posts

LBWF tells a disabled tenant on a redeveloped estate: we are offering you a new flat, but you’ve got to complete the formalities, and move your stuff over…within four days

March 3, 2022 Redevelopment

Sometimes, LBWF’s behaviour really is beyond the pale. An example is the letter below. It was sent to a longstanding tenant, who is disabled, lives on an estate that is being re-developed, and has been waiting to be rehoused since 2018. On the plus side, the letter is the offer of a new flat. But on the minus side – and it is a very big minus – the offer comes with some stringent conditions. ... »

LBWF hands out £8m. of government support grants for pandemic hit businesses, but won’t say which got the cash

February 28, 2022 COVID-19, Post-COVID

During the pandemic, LBWF has been awarded large amounts of central government money both for its own use, and to support the borough’s economy. One of the biggest of the latter disbursements occurred between November 2020 and July 2021, when LBWF received £8m. from the England-wide Additional Restrictions Grant (ARG) scheme, and paid it out to 1,051 local businesses. The objective was to focus on... »

Google has some fun with Cllr. Anna Mbachu

February 21, 2022 Cllr. Anna Mbachu

Google ‘Cllr. Anna Mbachu’, and scrolling down finds the one time Mayor of Waltham Forest featuring in this juxtaposition: Who says algorithms don’t have a sense of humour? PS Just to be clear, Cllr.Mbachu’s indiscretion happened during her Mayoral Year in May 2010, and afterwards she apologised profusely, see »

The Housing Ombudsman Service berates LBWF for its error-strewn response to a resident’s routine request for information

February 17, 2022 Freedom of Information Act, LBWF spin, Town hall staff and policies

Hardly a week goes by without someone from the Town Hall popping up to insist that, in everything LBWF does, it is ‘resident focused’. However, as previous posts have suggested, whether such a boast can be sustained remains debateable. In this context, a recent complaint that a LBWF tenant lodged with the Housing Ombudsman Service (HOS) is significant. The tenant had wanted to confirm that her ten... »

Senior Cabinet portfolio holder Cllr. Simon Miller steps down, as local election tensions split Waltham Forest’s Labour and Conservative parties

February 10, 2022 anti-semitism, John Cryer MP, The Conservatives in Waltham Forest, the Labour Party in Waltham Forest

In recent days, Cllr. Simon Miller has announced he will not be standing at the forthcoming local elections, and this is provoking some comment, because as Cabinet portfolio holder for Economic Prosperity he has guided many of the development schemes that are transforming parts of Waltham Forest. In a parting message, as reported by Victoria Munro in the February 2022 Waltham Forest Echo, Cll... »

Ex-Leader Cllr. Clare Coghill’s breach of the LBWF Code of Conduct: Director of Governance and Law Mark Hynes adds further fuel to the fire

February 2, 2022 Cllr. Clare Coghill, Mark Hynes, register of interests

Leading on from previous posts about Cllr. Coghill and her breach of the LBWF Code of Conduct by not declaring in 2017 that she was on the staff of Barry Sheerman MP, Director of Governance and Law Mark Hynes has just provided some new details, small in themselves but nevertheless significant. First, he underlines that Cllr. Coghill’s error ‘was down to her and no one else’ (in other words, ruling... »

LBWF Leaders rattle the begging bowl, but splash £100,000 on ‘a conversation’ between seven floodlit buildings

January 25, 2022 Cllr. Clare Coghill, Cllr. Grace Williams, LBWF finance

Since the start of the pandemic, the respective Labour Leaders, first Cllr. Clare Coghill and later her successor, Cllr. Grace Williams, have returned to versions of the long-standing Labour complaint that LBWF is not getting a fair funding deal from the Tory government. Cllr. Coghill early on set the tone, stating in a press release of April 2020 that “‘If lockdown measures continue f... »

Cllr. Clare Coghill confirmed to have broken LBWF’s Code of Conduct by not declaring her work for Barry Sheerman MP, but Director of Governance and Law Mark Hynes declines disciplinary action

January 11, 2022 Cllr. Clare Coghill, Mark Hynes, register of interests

A recent post (see first link below) looked at ex-Leader Cllr. Clare Coghill’s LBWF register of interests in the period 2014 to 2018, and noted some discrepancies.  In 2014, Cllr. Coghill declared that she was office manager for the Labour MP Barry Sheerman, but in her next register three years later, she included no such entry: The clear implication was that her job with Mr. Sheerman ha... »

LBWF fraud team’s investigation of the FEDs fire safety scandal dodges key questions, as officers focus on their ding dong battle with Osborne at the High Court

December 23, 2021 fire hazards, fire safety, Goddarts House, Northwood Tower

In response to a Freedom of Information request, LBWF has just released a redacted version of the June 2021 investigation report, authored by the internal Corporate Anti-Fraud Team (CAFT), concerning the flat entrance door (FED) scandal, much discussed previously on this blog. The ‘executive summary’ of the findings reads as follows: ‘Osborne Property Services Ltd (OPSL) were contracted by LBWF to... »

LBWF Director of Governance and Law Mark Hynes lands a plum job on the side, but then ‘unforeseen circumstances’ spoil his Christmas, leaving the Town Hall hierarchy with questions to answer

December 17, 2021 Mark Hynes

Reports reach this blog of a new and arresting episode in the life and times of our old friend, LBWF Director of Governance and Law Mark Hynes. The gist is as follows. In the past few years, Thanet District Council (TDC), which provides services to 140,000 people living in the Margate, Ramsgate, and Broadstairs area, has descended into chaos, said to stem from a near complete failure of gover... »

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