The Upper Tier Property Tribunal yesterday (14th Jan 2019) threw out Hallam Estates appeal (you can download a pdf of decision at the end of this blog post) against the management order residents secured in July 2018. This included a penal notice which is a statement of the consequences of non-compliance’ should the landlord fail to behave appropriately. The irony of course that the instigator of this appeal, and the ‘target’ of litigation by residents since 2014, Michael Stainer (pictured with wife above), is now an anachronistic irrelevance having been bankrupted in November 2018.
Of course the Deputy Judge, Martin Roger QC would not have been aware of this when drafting his decision. He pays some attention to the attempt of the Stainers to secure an adjournment of the original hearing April on medical grounds, stating that ‘although the FTT did not doubt the information contained in those certificates [of fitness for work] the information contained in those certificates was extremely limited‘. This was a point made at some length by residents to the adjournment and in countering the appeal and related to the alleged attack on Mr Stainer in January 2018.
The Deputy Judge also acknowledged ‘the extended history of which the FTT was fully aware‘, a reference to what he refers to as ‘the history of obstruction and the risk to the achievement of the objectives of the management order presented by the applicant’s [Hallam Estates] determination to be obstructive‘.
The implication to residents are substantial, especially the fact that Hallam Estates now must pay 25% of the total service charge bill, compared with the approximately 3% it historically paid. This of course places a burden on those commercial entities still trading in the Grand and on the redoubtable henchman, Robert Richardson, (pictured) who in his role of general manager and former director of three companies registered at the Grand; which NEVER made a penny of profit, has now got to find some £50,000 a year. Now according to his Linkedin page, Mr Richardson states he is: “Consistently successful in establishing professional award-winning teams, driving Customer Satisfaction and Profitability.” Yet as we said not a single company he has ever been a director of has made any profit whatsoever. No pressure then Robert.
Finally, word has reached our ear that criminal charges against Michael Stainer, Doris Stainer and their redoubtable henchman Robert Richardson – all arrested in July 2015 and bailed, may well be laid against them all in the very near future.
