Wi-fi — whose approach was it?

Throughout the entirety of Swindon’s wifi fiasco, Mr Bluh has been adamant that no tendering exercise was necessary nor appropriate, because it was not the council’s proposition, it was a proposal put to them by Mr Hunt. In the council chamber Mr Bluh has repeatedly been very clear, Mr Hunt approached the council, not the other way round. As long ago as December 2009 Mr Bluh said

[I]t is only recently we have been approached by Digital City UK who had a technical partnership with aQovia. They came to us because they wanted to set up services to sell in Swindon and we invested in them, so we have not disadvantaged any other businesses in Swindon.

Now Mr Hunt has given a version of events that differs somewhat. If Mr Hunt is to be believed, it was the council leadership that approached him.

What people do not appreciate is that I was talking for a long time about the concept, and the executive of the council approached me. We all looked at the risks and rewards and decided it was worth doing.

Given their track records — and that Mr Hunt believes his wifi proposal “was a good idea and it still is” — it’s impossible to guess whether Mr Hunt has had a lapse of memory, or Mr Bluh was lying. Of course, if the decision to fund this project had been done in a more open way, we wouldn’t be left to guess. But despite all the questions asked, Mr Bluh and colleagues continue to maintain excessive secrecy about the project, and honesty is in short supply.

Bluh’s wifi hindsight was others’ foresight

It seems that the current leadership of Swindon Borough Council are going through a rather ‘retro’ phase at the moment, claiming for themselves as original thoughts ideas put forward by others years ago. First there was Mr Perkins who claimed that creating a park on derelict town centre sites await redevelopment was his idea, whereas local residents suggested it in April 2008. Now it seems that Mr Bluh wants to get in on the act too.

Now, whilst it’s always refreshing — and all too rare — when a politician admits they got things wrong, Mr Bluh has a particularly unrefreshing way of admitting his errors. In fact he does so in a way that suggests he doesn’t accept he’s failed in any way at all. As long ago as December 2009 local residents — some that were members of his own political party — were pointing out how risky his decision to invest almost £½M of our money in a wi-fi start-up company was. A company lead by someone with no track record in the industry; a company where directors seemed not to know they were directors, and a company where the directors that did realise they were directors didn’t understand what their responsibilities are. So for Mr Bluh to now say,

We did all the due diligence but perhaps in hindsight we should have looked at the risk factors a bit harder.

is little better than an admission of total economic blindness. For Mr Bluh to only recognise with hindsight what others with just a little foresight have been telling him for almost two years is, though welcome, inadequate. And at the risk of stating the obvious, if they didn’t look at the risk factors hard enough, then they clearly didn’t do all the due diligence, only some of it.

We were prepared to take the risk and we felt it was a managed risk at the time and, with hindsight, perhaps it wasn’t the best risk.

Even if it were managed at the time — which is disputable — the council then chose to relax that management, disregarding concerns that were raised. Again, there’s no hindsight required here, all the evidence was available at the time, and pointed out repeatedly to Mr Bluh, but he wilfully chose to ignore it. Until he shows some signs of admitting that this isn’t just a matter of hindsight, but something he should have and easily could have avoided, there’s no reason to believe Mr Bluh won’t be squandering our money yet again.

Digital City (UK) Ltd, R.I.P.

Hard on the news that John Richard ‘Rikki’ Hunt has filed for bankruptcy, comes the news that Digital City (UK) Ltd is now in the process of being struck off the register of companies. So that’s £½M of Swindon taxpayers’ money gone, despite the assurances of the Messrs Bluh and Perkins that the equipment installed by the company and the use that could be made of that was worth more than the loan to them from Swindon Borough Council, that it was a no-lose proposition. How a patchy wireless internet service for Highworth, and nowhere other than Highworth, could be worth £½M is hard to see, but that is all we got for the money our councillors squandered on our behalf on this project.

Lest we forget, here are a few things said about this failed adventure with our money by Mr Bluh in December 2009.

This is a commercial decision, in the new world in which we all live more and more commercial decisions will be made. An opportunity was put to us, and we were asked if we wanted to invest…. This is a commercial venture that will bring commercial return. The only affects on capital budgets will be if this loan does not get repaid in full…. To get a reasonable level of council tax and to go forward we have been required to find savings and efficiencies. We are doing everything that is humanly possible to keep this ship afloat.

The ship was holed below the waterline before Mr Bluh squandered our money on it, and is now sinking rapidly to the bottom of the ocean. There were many that brought this to the attention of our arrogant council leadership at the time. They wilfully chose not to listen. Now it will be us, the council taxpayers, rather than those councillors personally, that will be paying for their financial stupidity.

What expenditure isn’t protected?

With the local blue councillors claiming first that expenditure on big arts events is not ‘not a priority’ and then that the programme of upgrades to play areas will be protected, I’m beginning to wonder whether there’s any scheme that — when challenged — they won’t claim is protected, despite their impending emergency budget.

But then, if that accounting genius, Mr Bluh, can claim that ‘the value is not related to money’ we really shouldn’t be surprised that Swindon Borough Council’s budget is in such a mess.

Swindon Tories back socialist town centre

The boys in Bluh ensconced in Swindon Borough Council are rapidly becoming the least conservative Conservatives in the country. What other Conservative controlled council would go for a government funded, local-government owned town centre regeneration? So far the only part of the regeneration of Swindon town centre to be privately funded is the rebuilding of the BHS store — which was never part of the New Swindon Company’s grand scheme. The big screen in Wharf Green belongs to the BBC. Repaving of Canal Walk and Regent Street is funded from government grants. Now the council is propping up the Union Square development by buying a car park for over £14M from developers Muse.

Last November, we were told that work on Union Square would be ‘starting on site in summer 2010’. As I said back then, never believe a project plan based on the seasons. Summer 2010 is here, but nothing’s happened, not even a planning application. As recently as December, Mr Bluh told us ‘We have the Union Square development going ahead’. As is so often the case, the easy way to tell whether Mr Bluh is spouting ignorant twaddle is to see if his lips are moving.

Last week, buried in a cabinet report ostensibly about lowering the charges at the council’s town centre car parks were options for splurging more of our money. The report makes it clear how ill-informed Mr Bluh’s earlier comments were.

It is clear that if the Council is unable to take up an option on the car park, the development would remain unviable in the current market. MUSE have indicated that they would mothball the project and unless there is a significant improvement in the economic situation, there would be unlikely to be any redevelopment for the foreseeable future.

And thus it is that the residents of Swindon once again find themselves at risk of picking up the financial tab for one of Mr Bluh’s grandiose schemes.

Hat-tip: Bogomil on TalkSwindon.

Unaudited

After last night’s disgraceful performance by Swindon Borough Council’s Scrutiny Committee — when the wifi deal was approved based on a report circulated to committee members before he weekend but kept secret from the public — it is no surprise that the Audit Committee meeting tonight was equally weak. Illustrating the worthlessness of the tawdry deal between Mr Bluh and Mr Montaut, the representative of the Audit Commission present at tonight’s meeting made clear that regardless of whether the council invited the Commission to investigate, the Commission itself would decide for itself whether it would do so.

With the arrogance that we have now come to expect from Mr Bluh, he dismissed concerns raised by Mr Martin and Mr Moffatt that the security obtain by the council for the loan was woefully inadequate. Mr Bluh may believe that the installed network — however little of that there might be — would be worth more than £450,000, but as noted later by the council’s own Director of Finance “It is early days and I wouldn’t want to put a value on it.”

Unfortunately for Swindon taxpayers, Mr Bluh seems to believe that he knows better than his professional council officer advisers. He behaves like an elected mayor in what is meant to be a cabinet run council, trusting that cabinet so little that he overruled the advice of the Borough Solicitor that there was a better way to make the decision on the wifi deal, simply to avoid telling most cabinet members about it.

During tonight’s Audit Committee meeting Mr Martin noted that if the council was intent on doing similar deals in future, it needed to ensure that it has officers as capable and “as sophisticated as those we do business with” to ensure the deals adequately protect the council’s interests. In his view, the deal done with the other partners in Digital City (UK) Ltd gives no assurance that the council will ever see its share of any profits there might be: the other partners could easily consume any profits in salaries and charges and the council — having only a minority stake in the company — would be unable to stop that.

But capable and sophisticated council officers are of no value if they are ignored. For as long as arrogant people like Mr Bluh are in charge, Swindon taxpayers’ money will continue to be put at what many perceive to be undue risk.

A shameful failure of scrutiny

A deal has been done between Mr Bluh and Mr Montaut, apparently in an attempt to suppress further scrutiny of Swindon Borough Council’s dealings with Digital City (UK) Ltd.

I have reached an agreement with the Labour Group Leader that as and when the wi-fi project, which is fully supported by both the Conservative and Labour Groups, has been finally cleared by the Scrutiny and Audit Committees then in the interests of allowing the wi-fi project to move forward without further damaging publicity, without incurring additional costs to the taxpayer and to stop the enormous amount of officer time being spent on this issue to date, I will ask the external auditor to confirm the findings of the internal audit report and also to confirm that due process has been followed throughout. It is time to allow this fantastic, innovative opportunity to get properly underway to deliver for Swindon.

There’s nothing fantastic about squandering local taxpayers’ money, Mr Bluh; nor in being so careless in the deal that much of what councillors and council officers have said on the matter has turned out to be untrue; nor in investing in a project so laxly run that even though it was eight months behind schedule and had to ask for its loan conditions to be relaxed, the company board had not met. And just how arrogant it is of Mr Bluh to think the District Auditor needs his permission to investigate. As I noted a couple of days ago, the District Auditor has already been asked to investigate the wifi deal.

What has this acheived for Mr Montaut? Nothing, just an external enquiry that would have happened anyway.

I have been calling for an external enquiry for months now, because this council needs to focus on the things that matter to all Swindoners, like getting value for money for our council tax payers and ensuring that our public services are working to suit the needs of our townspeople. With the external auditors now investigating the Conservative administration’s wi-fi deal, I believe the council can do this.

That sounds to me like Mr Montaut, the chair of the Swindon Borough Council’s Scrutiny Committee, wants to abandon scrutiny of this deal.

The role of the chair of a council’s scrutiny committee is to hold the council administration to account. To shirk that responsibility through worthless back-room deals like this is a shameful failure.

Deferred

At a tempestuous meeting this evening of Swindon Borough Council’s Scrutiny Committee — which at one point became a Tomlinson versus Tomlinson debate — it was agreed to defer a decision on the council’s loan to wi-fi company Digital City (UK) Ltd to the next meeting of the committee.

The committee agreed to a proposal by Mr Tomlinson (with amendments from Mr Moffatt) to defer a decision, pending clarification as to just who are the directors of Digital City (UK) Ltd — because Companies House records still show the only director as Rikki Hunt — and an investigation as to the providence of the investments in Digital City (UK) Ltd — because Companies House records show one of the shareholders to be Isle of Man registered aQovia Limited rather than UK registered aQovia UK Ltd. The main (90%) shareholder in aQovia Limited being Sara Kilduff whose main business is, apparently, a ‘virtual PA’.

The meeting also added to the catalogue of what in Mr Bluh’s view are ‘minor errors’; namely that entering an Isle of Man company — with full address — as a shareholder of Digital City (UK) Ltd rather than a UK one was just a matter of missing out the ‘UK’. Quite how this can be viewed as minor when the shareholder agreement underpinning the loan is with aQovia UK Ltd rather than the registered shareholder is something only Mr Bluh seems to ‘understand’. We were also asked to believe that not knowing who the registered directors are does not matter because the company has not made any ‘strategic decisions’. Seemingly, being eight months behind the original project plan and asking for variation of loan conditions are not strategic decisions.

Quite why Mr Bluh still has confidence in this ‘partnership’ is a mystery, especially as every time the company that constitutes the partnership makes a mistake, Mr Bluh refutes all responsibility. Why he expects any member of the public to have confidence in it is an even greater mystery.

Language is important

That was Mr Bluh’s oft repeated refrain to Mr Montaut during the debate at last night’s special meeting of Swindon Borough Council’s cabinet. But rather than using the phrase ‘language is important’ to attack Mr Montaut, Mr Bluh should reflect on how the meaning of language has been distorted in the record of the council’s actions relating to the wifi deal. There were many new meanings that we learnt for simple phrases at the council meeting last night.

• When in a report presented to the meeting it said “The delay in having a fully operational ‘back-office’ customer care and billing operation has hindered opportunities to sell.” it actually meant the back-office software was ready, but the company never intended to start selling before it did.
• Where Mr Patel wrote on his LinkedIn profile “Board Director Digital City (UK) Ltd” he actually meant “SBC observer on Board of Digital City”.
• When Mr Jones, the council’s chief executive, wrote in a letter to Ms Snelgrove on 26 January “we have a director on the board” what he actually meant was “we have a director position on the board but have not filled it yet”.
• By analogy, where in the appendix to the minutes of the 14 December 2009 meeting of the Scrutiny Committee it states “The Council has one Director representing its interests on the Digital City Board.” it also meant “we don’t yet have a director on the board”.
• When Mr Bluh said to the Special Committee at its 25 March meeting “This is a loan repayable with interest at above commercial rate” what he should have said was “This is a loan repayable at a commercial rate”.

With a record like that of saying one thing but meaning another, it’s little wonder that the scrutiny of this deal continues.

More scrutiny to come

Recently, Mr Buckland offered some sound advice to his colleagues on Swindon Borough Council.

The failure by a Council official to declare that he was in fact a Director of the operating company is an example either of incompetence or of something worse.
I blogged recently that I was sure that the lack of openness was not the result of deliberate subterfuge. I still hope that I am right. My advice to those involved is to come clean about everything now. As well as a demonstration of transparency, it may well be the best thing to do in order to secure the future of the project, which I hope will be a success.

It’s advice that Mr Bluh seems very reluctant to accept. In his view, there’s nothing more he needs to tell us about how the council is spending almost £½M of our money on a venture described in parliament as having ‘a detrimental effect on small and medium-sized IT companies in Swindon’.

This deal has been subjected to the most enormous scrutiny in the past months and has passed all those tests.

Err… has Mr Bluh forgotten that his latest attempt to throw our money at the wi-fi project didn’t pass through the last meeting of the council’s Scrutiny Committee? Just what aspect of ‘failed’ is it that Mr Bluh interprets as meaning ‘passed’?

It also seems not to have occurred to Mr Bluh that it has ‘passed’ some of those scrutiny tests only because very limited information was made available. It is for that reason that it has been referred back to the council’s cabinet, where additional information will be presented next Wednesday. It is unfortunately that the claims of Mr Patel that he did not know he was a director of Digital City (UK) Ltd seem inconsistent with the letter sent by the council’s chief executive, Mr Jones, to Ms Snelgrove on 28 January stating

we have a Director on the Board.

It’s difficult to know who, if anyone, involved in this at the council can be believed.

However, from later this week there will be a new Swindon Borough Council representative on the board of Digital City (UK) Ltd. It is proposed that Mr Perkins become a director of the company. Quite what the relevance of his cabinet responsibility for “children’s services” has towards the alleged social inclusion objectives of the wifi project is less clear. Perhaps the more relevant Mr Mattock is out of favour… or has less favours owed to him.

In a recent pep-talk to his party members the blue nest’s Mr Pickles said

We have seen what can be done as a council, and now it is time for our extremely good candidates to get into place and bring some honesty, decency and straightforwardness into government.

We have indeed seen what can be done as a council, and recently it’s not been pretty. If they’re to stand any chance of getting into national government they’ll first need to bring some honesty, decency and straightforwardness to local government.

If Mr Bluh wishes the scrutiny to stop, he first needs to ensure that the very serious concerns about the way he spends our money are answered, and answered honestly.

Key lines of enquiry

Before he was interrupted by the borough solicitor at the meeting of Swindon Borough Council cabinet just over a week ago, Mr Bluh tried to say — though it’s not made it into the minutes of the meeting — that the only thing that external auditors were looking at in relation to the council’s wi-fi deal was ‘value for money’ and that they were not investigating any issues of process. What it does record of in the minutes of the meeting is Mr Bluh’s view of what is important in this issue.

He did not believe it was necessary to await the outcome of the Audit Committee review that was to look at the best value aspect of the loan agreement for the project.

Let’s look at the Audit Commission’s ‘key lines of enquiry’ when considering value for money.

The use of resources assessment considers how well organisations are managing and using their resources to deliver value for money and better and sustainable outcomes for local people. The assessment comprises three themes that focus on:

• sound and strategic financial management;
• strategic commissioning and good governance; and
• the management of natural resources, assets and people.

Sound financial management and good governance: I’d certainly welcome a thorough examination of those for this wifi deal. Perhaps we could start with an in-depth examination of the governance process and how a director of Swindon Borough Council came to be a director of a company before giving advice to Mr Bluh that the council should invest in that company.

Another noticeable omission from the meeting minutes is Mr Patel’s denial that he was a director of Digital City (UK) Ltd. What it does say is that an appointment to the company’s board will be made, but says nothing about the situation at that time.

The Cabinet were advised that under the loan arrangements, the Group Director, Business Transformation would represent the Council at meetings of the Board of Digital City (UK) Limited and that he received no remuneration from the company. It was confirmed that the Special Committee was likely to be asked to make an appointment to serve on the Board in the near future.

Meeting minutes have rarely been so misleading.

Back to cabinet

Well, well. Swindon Borough Council’s Scrutiny Committee have finally done the honourable thing and stood up to Mr Bluh, referring back to cabinet their recent decision to greatly relax the loan conditions on Digital City (UK) Ltd. Tho’ given recent revelations, it would have been very remiss of them to have done anything less.

komadori is disappointed not to have been able to attend this evening’s meeting of the Scrutiny Committee. Reports suggest it was an interesting event.

Update, 08:39, Tuesday, 16 March 2010: Mr Wakefield has an interesting and informative perspective of last night’s ‘scrutiny’ meeting over on his blog.

Rod Bluh’s wifi seafood platter

Mr Bluh has repeatedly maintained that the process by which Swindon Borough Council made a decision to invest in Digital City (UK) Ltd — for the purpose of providing boroughwide wireless internet for Swindon — was totally above board. Even as late as the meeting of the council’s cabinet last Wednesday, Mr Bluh said that ‘Process is a red herring’. It seems that Mr Bluh has difficulty distinguishing red herrings from great white sharks.

The meeting of Swindon Borough Council’s Scrutiny Committee last December was provided with evidence that the decision to invest in Digital City (UK) Ltd was made in October of that year, 20 October 2009 to be precise. At last week’s cabinet meeting, it was stated that Mr Patel was not a director of the company, that no appointment had been made, he was just ‘an observer’. Not so.

Evidence from Companies House shows that not only was Swindon Borough Council allotted shares in Digital City (UK) Ltd (at that time still known as DM 56 Ltd) on 15 September 2009, but Mr Patel also became a director of the company on that date. His directorship has only just been terminated.

Mr Bluh would like us to believe that there are no problems with the process by which the decision was made to invest in Digital City (UK) Ltd. He thinks — as he said last week — that it’s time to move on. If he weren’t so confused about not just what the process was but also when it happened, perhaps his pleading would be a little more convincing.

Hat-tip: TalkSwindon

Update, 01:43, Monday, 15 March 2010: Seems Mr Patel is trying to rewrite his recent past so his LinkedIn profile now describes him as having been an ‘SBC observer on Board of Digital City’ where twelve hours earlier it said he was a ‘Board Director’. Either Mr Patel didn’t understand what he was doing last September when he signed the Companies House form declaring himself to be a director of the company, or he regards the public as rather naïve. Either way, perhaps it’s time he found himself a less onerous job to do.

Like a tory council: local elections 2010 round 2

If I were Mr Tomlinson or Mr Buckland I’d be worried. Not because of how their party’s lead has diminished in recent national opinion polls. Nor because of particular campaigning successes of their opponents, Mr Agarwal and the government’s representative in South Swindon, Ms Snelgrove, respectively. No, what would worry me would be the antics of the leadership of Swindon Borough Council. Mr Bluh through his arrogance and extravagant splurging of local taxpayers’ money on vanity projects, is giving the opponents of his party’s candidates in the national elections an easy target.

The leaflet dropped through my letterbox today by Mr Wright in the company of Mr Montaut is devious in its attempt to confuse national politics with local politics. Thus it compares recent expenditure by the blue nest controlled council with alleged ‘investment’ by national government — bragging about money spent by Mr Brown’s government without mentioning the record-breaking debt they’ve run-up is like praising a bullion robber for their money laundering skills. But all that is a side issue in comparison with the simple messages of Mr Bluh’s vanity projects — wifi, tabernacle stones, the Radio 1 Big Weekend — and a simple claim.

David Cameron has already said he would run the country like a Tory council – don’t give him the chance.

I can’t find the source of that claim. And if Mr Cameron were to run the country like most Conservative councils, I wouldn’t mind. But Swindon Borough Council isn’t like other Conservative councils — it’s one with a legacy of Mr Bluh’s failed vanity projects.

Contemptuous — pouring our money after bad

It seem that the wi-fi company to which Swindon Borough Council has loaned almost £½M of our money may be running a little short of cash. At a meeting of the council’s cabinet this coming Wednesday, there is a request to significantly relax some of the conditions of the loan.

Whilst fifteen out of the original nineteen Highworth progress measures have been considered to have been met, four have not been fully met to date…. These four measures, however, do not represent a significant enough risk to justify placing constraints on generating revenue by slowing down the roll-out of the Wi-Fi network across the rest of Swindon. All four measures are still expected to be achieved, however, variations are requested on the timing and scale of these.

Four out of 19 measures failed is not good, especially as they are some of the more measurable measures. And the failure to fulfil them indicates that the business case was significantly less robust than the likes of Mr Bluh would have us believe.

Measure 1: Originally stated: “Highworth network installed, working and accessible.”
Proposed variation: Highworth network installed, working and accessible to 90% of households and a commitment made that the two remaining router installations that enable consistent coverage for the outstanding 10% of Highworth will be completed within a week of planning consent being granted.

That’s not too significant of itself: 100% coverage is never a sensible measure. That it’s a consequence of the company not noticing that there are hills in Highworth, is rather more worrying. One would hope that they have learnt from this.

Measure 2: Originally stated: “Private sector sponsorship or commitment to future funding, to the value of at least £20,000, secured by end of Quarter 1.”
Proposed Variation: Expressions of interest received from the private and or public sector for investment once a Borough wide network is available.

So that’s replacing private sector money with a vague promise of more tax-payers’ money.

Measure 3: Originally stated: “Sold – at least 100 private use packages by the end of Quarter 1.”
Measure 4: Originally stated: “Sold – at least 25 business packages by the end of Quarter 1.”
Proposed Variation: The measures 3 and 4 be combined and changed into a single measure : “Sold – some business and private packages by end March”.

That’s a clear, easily measurable sales target being replaced by something vague and far less stringent. Just how many less than 125 packages is ‘some’? The council paper states the number of ‘packages’ sold:

as of Monday the 2nd March 5 packages were sold.

5 out of a planned 100. That’s not just poor, that’s pathetic. Just how badly does the company need to fail to meet its sales targets for Mr Bluh to recognise a commercial disaster?

Mr Montaut has expressed some concerns about these changes.

I understand that the Conservative administration are eager to get wi-fi rolled out throughout the borough. However, there is an investigation into the wi-fi deal being undertaken by the council’s Internal Audit and there have been enquiries made by the district auditor into the deal…. The council and Digital City stand to be in a much worse financial position if the auditors find the wi-fi deal to be contemptuous.

As has become all too familiar, the response from Mr Bluh to those expressing concern, rather than addressing those concerns, is just dismissive.

I am deeply disappointed that the opposition party should be so desperate to score political points that they are willing to sabotage and undermine private sector investment in Swindon.

Just how stupid does Mr Bluh think we are? Since when has £½M of taxpayers’ money been regarded as private sector investment?

The Labour opposition is being contemptuous of the residents of the borough by failing to support this investment. The Labour opposition is jeopardising the borough’s economic future by trying to bring down Digital City.

The only contempt I can see is from Mr Bluh, who seems to behave as those this is his own private investment, rather than taxpayers’ money. Has Mr Bluh ever asked the residents of the borough if they wanted this investment?

Mr Hunt also appears either naïve or to take his funders — Swindon council tax payers — as fools.

First of all the investment is a contract — the council pull out of this, they break the contract and face penalties.

Err… remind me, who is it that has failed to meet 4 of 19 contractual obligations under the loan agreement?

This political scrap is 100 per cent damaging our business plan.

The plan seems rather damaged even without any political problems. And if you don’t like politics, you shouldn’t go begging for public sector money. And if Mr Hunt doesn’t like politics, he shouldn’t be making political comments himself.

It has been very, very frustrating and what stuns me is that the Labour group are preventing us getting on with rolling out free wi-fi, which is something that will increase social inclusion – something I thought was at the heart of their group.

Let’s also be clear that concern on this isn’t just political. If the decision to spend almost £½M of our money had been made openly, there would be far less concern. It was not. The basis on which the decision was made remains a secret. Whilst that secrecy remains, the scrutiny will continue. Investigation by the Audit Commission would be more than welcome.

Forward Swindon — repackaging failure?

On the same day that the University of the West of England announced it had ditched plans to build a university in Swindon, thereby knocking yet another hole in the masterplan for Swindon town centre regeneration, the council’s fantasist leader Mr Bluh was busy burying his head in the sand.

2010 will see us kicking off out of the recession because of the resilience we have here in Swindon.

The only resilience I see is in Mr Bluh’s habit of throwing our money at vanity projects.

[I]n 2009 we had one of the best years in getting the name of the Swindon known better around the country — getting rid of the speed cameras, the Radio One weekend; the wi-fi launch which attracted interest from around the world and, of course, our twinning with Disneyworld.

Let’s not forget that the council has admitted that the claimed £2M benefits from almost £½M splurged on the Radio 1 Big Weekend are partly speculation rather than fact. Let’s not forget that the almost £½M spent on wifi is on companies with minimal track record and whose project is already behind schedule. Let’s also not forget that Mr Bluh and Swindon Borough Council had no part in the Disney twinning — the once source of sustained good publicity.

So why — apart from naïvety and arrogance — is Mr Bluh so optimistic? Apparently because he’s throwing yet another £1M of our money at a replacement for the New Swindon Company. As was announced back in January, the old company and parts of the council are to be replaced by a new company, now to be named Forward Swindon*.

If Forward Swindon is to bring about the long promised regeneration, it’ll need to be considerably more successful than its predecessor — and significantly more careful with our money than its council masters. With little money available in current economic conditions, small steps rather than grand plans would be in order. Swindon needs a town centre that serves the needs of its population, rather than one that serves the ego of legacy-seeking political masters.

* Just a holding site for the moment, but registered in the name of the New Swindon Company’s Ms Ashdown.

Monday night at the playpen

On Monday night, for the first time, I went to observe a meeting of Swindon Borough Council. This was the budget setting full council meeting. Even allowing for the poor reputation of politicians, one might expect that for an important issue like this the debate would be serious and behaviour respectable. Instead, there was a display of infantile posturing and bad temper.

The meeting started with a minute’s silence to mark the death of Ms Fowles, chief executive of the local NHS who died of cancer at the weekend. In tribute, Mr Bluh suggested that councillors should try and have a reasoned debate. It was advice that few — including Mr Bluh and his own cabinet — chose to follow.

During the first item on the agenda — confirmation of the minutes of the last meeting — Mr Perkins delivered the first of many ranting political lectures. Indeed, one of the three consistent features of the evening — the others being the number 21 bus and Mr Bluh’s now infamous smug arrogance — was Mr Perkins’ aggressive contempt for all those he disagreed with.

Next up were questions from the public. In response to one question Mr Young admitted that the £2M benefits to the local economy claimed for the Radio 1 Big Weekend were ‘partly speculative’. In response to another question, Mr Bluh claimed that ‘due process was followed’ when investing almost £½M in Digital City (UK) Ltd. He also said

As far as I am aware there is no Audit Commission investigation.

Awareness may not be one of Mr Bluh’s strong points.

Next were general questions from the councillors, during which Mr Wright got very hot and bothered over the matter of naming streets and announced he was referring the matter to the borough solicitor. The names of streets seemed to worry Mr Wright more than how the council spends our money.

After ¾ hour it was on to the main item for the evening: the council budget. According to Mr Edwards his budget was ‘brilliant’. Naturally, Mr Montaut disagreed and proposed an amended budget, for the same cost but different services. Much knockabout political squabbling then followed, with Mr Perkins and Ms Foley in rather a lot of words accusing the opposition of being stupid and Mr Bluh taking the ‘nice try but should have done better; much better’ approach, and the red nest trying to make up for lack of numbers by shouting all their speeches.

Most bizarre moments of the evening for me were Mr Bawden making a speech opposing a budget needing a higher council tax, even though that wasn’t what the opposition had proposed, and Mr Ali delivering a political speech that made almost no mention of budget plans but wouldn’t have been out of place in a general election hustings for his candidature in Devizes.

However, perhaps the most telling point was when Mr Wright observed that an essential element of civic pride is ensuring that basic things, like keeping the streets clean, are done and done well. To this Mr Bluh responded

The Tabernacle stones and canal are about the bigger picture and Swindon moving forward.

For Mr Bluh running a council during a financial crisis is clearly more about vain legacy projects than serving the basic needs of Swindon.

Lobbying

Is there an election coming? I ask because Mr Bluh — even though he comments similarly himself — is behaving as though there isn’t. Mr Montaut and Mr Wills have both expressed concern over the amount of money being spent by Swindon Borough Council on Westminster lobbyists: £129,400 over 18 months.

In a time of economic hardship, where council employees are experiencing real-terms pay cuts and day centres for the elderly are being shut down, Swindon can ill afford to pay for luxuries like a lobbying contract in London, when there are perfectly acceptable, cheaper alternatives to getting central Government funding – like using Swindon’s two MPs.

Now, leaving aside the distinct failure of said two MPs to do anything of use for Swindon in Westminster — Ms Snelgrove isn’t known as the government’s representative in South Swindon for nothing — and that it may well turn out to be money well spent, the council’s finances are in a dire state and every penny spent should be thoroughly justified.

Alas, it seems that Mr Bluh doesn’t believe in justifying how he spends our money.

This attack is the last gasp from two failed Members of Parliament who have not delivered for local people. Their comments are designed purely for the forthcoming election and have nothing to do with the future of the borough.

I’m sure Messrs Montaut and Wills made their comments with the elections in mind. That doesn’t mean they’re not legitimate concerns. And more importantly, concerns that the electorate of Swindon might wish to have answered.

With the council short of money, yet having spent almost £½M on the Radio 1 Big Weekend and almost another £½M on wifi, Mr Bluh needs to try far harder and actually justify the money his council administration takes from us, rather than just responding with arrogance and contempt.

If he doesn’t, the electorate may decide that Mr Bluh too will have nothing to do with the future of the borough.

More scrutiny required

It’s been brought to my attention that Mr Bluh’s been defending and promoting the efficacy of his not-so-little wifi deal. At a meeting of Swindon Borough Council’s Scrutiny Committee he almost showed a little humility. Almost.

He acknowledged the significant level of debate on the subject of the proposal to deliver a Wi-Fi network across the borough, particularly in relation to the decision-making process in reaching an agreement with Digital City (UK) Ltd

It would be rather shocking if he’d not noticed the very extensive debate.

He welcomed debate on how best to resolve issues of process that will allow the Council to take advantage of similar commercial opportunities that might arise in the future

As the evidence that this will be an opportunity rather than a liability has not been made public, I’d rather processes were in place to ensure secretive deals like this weren’t done in future.

[He] stated his certainty that the Wi-Fi network would prove to be a great success, one that would not only produce a financial return that would underpin service delivery for the benefit of residents, but one which presented an exciting commercial opportunity for private and public sector businesses and organisations in Swindon.

And why should I or anyone else in Swindon trust the business judgement of a politician and has-been lawyer? As it seems this decision was made in secret by no more than five people there’s clearly not a lot of trust around.

It was therefore essential, he felt, that the Council was prepared and able to pursue viable commercial opportunities, such as the Wi-Fi network, as they presented themselves.

A new internet provider in one of the best connected towns in the country doesn’t sound like the most sure-fire winner to me.

[H]e agreed that more openness generally was to be welcomed but he maintained that, if the proposal had been debated in an open forum, the “deal would not have happened”.

One of the purposes of open debate is to ensure that certain deals don’t happen. Nobody beyond a select few has been allowed to scrutinise the information that would allow them to form their own view as to whether this was a deal that should have happened.

He was aware of concerns about the decision making process and assured the Committee that the process would be reviewed.

And what happens if the review shows the process was flawed? Will Mr Bluh personally stump-up the almost £½M that has been gambled on the three start-up companies providing the wifi service?

However, he remained convinced that the proposal, which he was sure would be to the benefit of the council and its residents, could not have been successfully concluded if it had been made public any sooner than it was.

But it’s not really public even now. We have no detail of the basis on which Mr Bluh and associates made this decision — it remains a secret deal.

Councillor Bluh assured the meeting that the Council would not be required to make any further financial commitment to the Wi-Fi scheme beyond the initial £450k loan.

The council had no commitment to make the initial £450k loan, but a select band decided that it should. Why should we believe that if the company came back begging for more money, Mr Bluh wouldn’t choose — in secret — to stump-up yet more of our money?

Many questions have been asked so far about this deal. Some questions about the process by which this decision was made raise serious issues. Mr Bluh’s answer to almost all of them seems to be ‘Trust me, I know best.’ Until he provides more informative answers the scrutiny should continue.

What regeneration will Swindon get for £4.5M?

And how much direction to that regeneration will £150,000 buy? I ask those questions because £150,000 is roughly the size of the ‘package’ being offered for the chief executive of the replacement to the New Swindon Company.

• £120,000 salary
• £15,000 bonus
• Removal and storage costs
• Up to £4290 for temporary accommodation
• 6 months weekly travel costs
• Legal & estate agents fees plus stamp duty
• £750 for ‘adaptations in the home’
• Up to £8000 for relocation expenses

That’s roughly 10% of the new company’s budget of roughly £4.5M over 5 years going to its chief executive’s pay.

According to Mr Bluh

This is an exciting opportunity to lead and direct the regeneration and transition of Swindon, placing it on the national and international stage as a location open to inward investment.

Unfortunately Mr Bluh has been saying much the same thing for many years. There’s been far too much talk of visions, leadership and direction, but a woefully small amount of action, even allowing for the havoc wreaked upon the regeneration plans by the poor state of the economy.

We are seeking someone who has the appropriate leadership and entrepreneurial qualities and the ability to gain the support of public and private sector investors and the local community to deliver success.

‘Deliver success’? And whose version of success will that be? Surely it should be for this new company to support the public/local community and private sector investors to deliver success, not the other way round.

This is a pivotal time to shape the future of Swindon and in the process make your mark.

And that mark needs to be something considerably better than decorated hoardings around demolition sites, which is just about the only mark the New Swindon Company has left on the town.

This new company has a long list of things to do. It includes some such as a ‘University project’ that should be dead with the current state of government finance. Roughly £1.3M of our money is to be spent in the company’s first year, and a total of roughly £4.5M over five years, with a mission:

‘To deliver prosperity and a town everyone can be proud of.’

Given the parlous state of public sector finances — both nationally and locally — we need to get considerably better value for our money than the regeneration has been so far.