Former Cllr Alan Clifton-Holt’s Expenses Anomalies.

Former Conservative SDC Councillor Alan Clifton- Holt  expenses appear to have some serious anomalies in them; which may well need further explanation and investigation, by SDC.

The overall year expense sheet see→ Mother sheet and the monthly sheets see → Monthly Expenses Sheets show that Alan Clifton Holt claimed £27.00 mileage. This was for a journey to EKSDC in Hastings on the 04/04/14. This the mother sheet states was his total mileage claim in the financial year 2014/15.

However on closer scrutiny this appears to be incorrect. Alan Clifton Holt travelled to Folkestone by car on the 14/04/15 and claimed £9.00 for his journey.

On May 7th 2015 the local elections were held and Alan Clifton Holt was not re-elected. He was in office until 11/05/15 according to SDC’s website.

On the 16/05/15 Alan Clifton Holt travels to the Civic Centre and is paid a further £9.00 for his journey when he is no longer a Councillor. This seems very odd to us at Shepwayvox. Also that his mileage states he got paid for £27.00 when that should read £36.00 and if we include the £9.00 for a trip he should not have been paid for as he was not a Councillor, that makes £45.00.

On the Mother sheet it is clear that Alan Clifton Holt was paid £124.70 for public transport. However, the Shepwayvox team, can see no evidence of any receipts for this travel whatsoever. Also Alan Clifton Holt was it appears paid £1839.14 for attending a conference, where we do not know, when we do not know. Whether it was a political conference or not we do not know. Again there is no auditable evidence proving he went to any conference. SDC’s own sheet clearly says Alan Clifton Holt was paid, see →Annual_2014_-_2015_Members’_allowances_and_expenses (1)

So, 27 + 124.70 + 231 + 1839.14 = £ 2,221.84.

This figure is incorrect as Alan Clifton Holt was paid monies when he was no longer a Councillor. He was paid a further £9.00 on his car/mileage allowance and paid for public transport and a conference when no receipts – it would appear – were submitted.

We the team at Shepwayvox would like to know how the monitoring officer, and the other persons responsible for Governance at SDC could have missed these anomalies. We would ask them to check them and widen the Inappropriate Expenses Claims Investigation to all Councillors as it appears that the more we look at the sheets the more anomalies we find in many of the Cllrs claims.

Shepwayvox