Court fines and council tax are most common problem debt in UK
Magistrates’ fines and council tax bills are driving increasing numbers of people into problem debt, an advice charity said on Tuesday, as low wages and the increased cost [...]
Debt misery is not chance: it is by Tory design
It is not very often that ShepwayVox will stray into national politics, but this could not go unreported. As several national newspaper noted on or after the [...]
Hypocrisy?
If a councillor is in arrears with their Council Tax payments is it a purely personal matter or something of wider public interest? The Government believe it should be the [...]
Penetrative Testing
Once SDC Cllrs have signed up to the Data Register their next legislative requirement is to be penetrated by their processor; SDC IT staff. Their computers must [...]
Transparency And Accountability
The Government’s desire to place more power into citizens’ hands to increase democratic accountability and make it easier for local people to contribute to the local [...]
Information to be published annually by SDC
There is Data that SDC must publish annually, so this piece will not be a short piece. What is this data local authority land grants to voluntary, community and social [...]
SDC Employees and their Pensions
The Times has reported this morning [01/09/15] (paywall) that: The legal cornerstone underpinning the entire edifice of bank accounting is defective, according to a QC’s [...]
Do they or Don’t they?
I paid SDC for their contracts register when the books were open. This is what they gave me. It is exactly the same as you can find in a previous blog entitled SDC Contracts [...]
Stop the Knock
In 2014/15, Shepway District Council instructed bailiffs to collect debts from individuals and businesses on 3647 occasions – up 141% in two years. The number of debts [...]
SDC Legal
Legal Cases are usually not spoken about by our Council or many other Councils up and down the land. I did an FOI to Shepway about ALL legal cases but received back only [...]
Facebook Right or Wrong?
It has come to my attention that Cllr Susie Govett UKIP New Romney has held a constituency surgery by using Facebook. See below. Shepwayvox contacted the ICO and were [...]
Anomalies in SDC Accounts Part 2
Cllr Russell Tillson (pictured below) was formerly an elected Shepway District Council Cllr for Dymchurch. He lost his seat in the recent elections of May 2015. Former Cllr [...]
SDC Cllr Allowances
Below are the allowances received by SDC Councillors for the year April 1st 2014 to March 31st 2015. The sum total claimed by ALL councillors was £335,370.37 see SDC Cllr [...]
SDC Contracts Register
Like all council’s Shepway District Council has a Contracts register, so that they do not lose track of them. The Contracts Register currently shows that SDC has 141 [...]
Not a lot of people know that
Attached at 1,2,3, are copies of Shepway District Council’s Investments held in instant access deposit accounts from1/04/14 – 31/03/15 including interest rates [...]
Mass Data Purge
I have sent this FOI requests see below. It is about a mass data purge of information . I argue that disclosure of the data purge information would facilitate the [...]
Anomalies in SDC Accounts
As of this morning – 10/08/15 – the have made a complaint to both the Head of Finance of Shepway District Council [SDC] and the Auditor – Grant Thornton [...]
SDC and its company Oportunitas Ltd
SDC set up a company by the name of Oportunitas Ltd, registered at Companies House, after the elections new directors were added for obvious reasons and available to view for [...]
Shepway District Council Debt Levels
As of the 31st March 2015 Shepway District Council had debt levels of sixty two million, three hundred thousand pounds (62.3m). While discussing the accounts during the 20 [...]
Criminals in our Council Chamber? You decide.
Shepway District Cllrs are Data Controllers. As a data controller one must by law, be signed up to the ICO Register of Data Controllers. To not sign up is a criminal offence, [...]
ICO Data Register
As you may or may not know Councillors wear up to three hats in the normal course of their activities. As participants in Council Committees and decision-making, they are [...]
No Good Deed Goes Unpunished
The Bradstone Association chairman, David Taylor, had heard enough complaints about the overgrown rubbish-strewn conservation area nestled in Westbourne Gardens, Folkestone. [...]
Where there’s muck there is brass
Dog Fouling is a very lucrative business for SDC and their NSL. Local authorities, district councils, parish councils and other bodies with statutory powers all have several [...]
Whitewash
I do not the number of developments Shepway District Council Planners are currently looking at all I do know is that it will be of no use for local people to object. In [...]
Taylor Wimpey Houses on the Garrison Site
It was inevitable. Planning application Y14/0300/SH Shorncliffe Garrison passed at the Development Control Committee on the 24th March 2015. I doubted if the Council [...]