Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Financial Irregularities
shepwayvox
Irregularities in Cllrs expenses claims and paying P & R in breach of the Council’s contract both happened in 2018/19. Dr Susan Priest was the Head of Paid Service at Folkestone & Hythe District Council after taking over the top job on the 1st April 2018.
In 2018/19 sixteen of the thirty Folkestone & Hythe District Council Councillors claimed expenses. Councillors are entitled to claim expenses incurred in the performance of an approved duty.
In June 2019 while the accounts were open for inspection by the public, the Council released the data on sixteen Cllrs who had claimed expenses. However, their published data, (the penulitmate column); which can be found ⇒ here does not agree with their accounts for 2018/19, nor does it agree with what they released while the accounts were open in May & June 2019.
Now the data the Council released while the accounts were open shows there are a number of irregularities. Taking these in alphabetical order of surname, means former Cllr Malcolm Dearden (Con) claimed £35.
Malcolm Dearden Expenses 2018-19 now it is clear that former Cllr Dearden claimed for his ICO registration. However, at the time it was the responsibility of the Cllr not the Council to pay for registration with the ICO for data protection reasons. The law changed on April 1st 2019 meaning Cllrs became exempt from paying the fee to the ICO. So why did the Council reimburse former Cllr Dearden, when they did not need to?
Former Cllr Len Laws claimed £335.63 in 2018/19, yet the Council say he claimed £435.18, a discrepancy of £99.55. Also Cllr Len Laws reclaimed his ICO registration fee, just like former Cllr Dearden. Again we re-iterate it was the Cllrs responsibility to pay this fee not the Council’s.
Former Cllr Rory Love OBE claimed £3,203.49 in 2018/19, yet the Council says he claimed £3,668.79, a discrepancy of £465.30. Also he reclaimed his ICO registration along with former Cllr Laws above and former Cllr Dearden. The law on this was unequivocal Cllrs paid for their ICO registration NOT the Council.
No data was received for former Cllr Susie Govett from the accounts, yet the Council claimed she received £37.50 in expenses for 2018/19.
So in half the case, there are irregularities in Cllrs expenses claimed in 2018/19.
None of the Cllrs have over-claimed we believe. This looks more like a Council cock up in their addition.
Back in June we published a chart of all the allowances and expenses claimed by Cllrs in 2018/19 and that came to £335,557.36. This data came from the Council’s accounts while they were open for inspection by the public. However, the Council’s accounts for 2018-19 at page 48 say that £337,000 was claimed in allowances and expenses by Councillors. £21, 000 of this was expenses according to the accounts for 18/19. Yet above the Council say that Cllrs only claimed £9,785.50, a discrepancy of £11,214.50.
And the Council claim on their website that they paid Cllrs £324,689.20 as you can see from the first chart. So we have three figures all produced and published by Folkestone & Hythe District Council.
It is known that 2018/19 was not the Council’s finest hour when it came to finances. This is made clear in the East Kent Audit Partnernship report released on the 3rd Oct 2018 heard behind closed doors. This report “established the Council’s payment processes (invoices being submitted by the contractor (P & R) direct to the councils finance departments) did not reflect the process set out in the contracts (with each of the councils). This resulted in contractor (P & R) submitting invoices which are not valid under the contract”; and being paid in full. The amount of this irregularity is in excess of £200,000.
The Council has never explained the three different published figures for the final sums for Cllrs allowances & expenses in 2018/19, which were:
£335,557.36.
£337,000
£324,689.20
Nor have they explained how the came to pay P & R in breach of their own contract.
None of these irregularities should have happened with public money. Both of them are being less than candid about how these irregularities have occurred. For this we believe they should both step down as it is clear that the Peter Principle – the cream rises until it sours – applies to them both.
