Debt

Kent County Council Adult Social Care Debt: Nearly £4m Written Off in Five Years as Costs Rise, Arrears Grow and Cases Go to Court

November 30, 2025 // 0 Comments

Kent County Council (KCC) has written off £3,919,551 of adult social care debt over the five financial years from April 2020 to April 2025, according to an FOI disclosure [...]

KCC’s £50m Debt Repayment Misses the Real Target: £90m LOBO Loans

September 26, 2025 // 2 Comments

Kent County Council’s Reform UK administration has celebrated wiping £50 million off the council’s long-term debt. It sounds bold. It photographs well. But judged [...]

Kent councils with the biggest debts

March 21, 2025 // 0 Comments

Several Kent councils have significantly increased their debt levels in recent months, raising concerns about the potential impact on local services and the local economy. [...]

“Schrödinger’s Councils, Heisenberg’s Chaos: Kent’s Quantum Local Government Restructure Dooms (or Saves?) All”

March 21, 2025 // 2 Comments

In a nutshell, Local Government Reorganisation (LGR) is about how the powers and funding that sit with local government are organised between councils. Think of it like [...]

Leas Pavilion: “The Final Balance Sheet”

March 16, 2025 // 1 Comment

Leas Pavilion Development Ltd (LPD Ltd), the firm behind the ambitious revival of the historic Leas Pavilion—a project featuring 91 luxury apartments with coveted views of [...]

Local Government Reorganisation: “The Bin Men Cometh: A Tale of Debt, Dysfunction, and Murder in Folkestone & Hythe District Council”

March 14, 2025 // 0 Comments

“Monsters exist, but they are too few in number to be truly dangerous. More dangerous are the common men, the functionaries ready to believe and to act without asking [...]

Kent councils with the biggest debts

December 20, 2024 // 0 Comments

New figures reveal which Kent councils have the highest level of debt – and those who aren’t a single penny in the red, as of Q2 2024/25. Ashford Borough Council (ABC) is [...]

Folkestone & Hythe DCs Usable Reserves

September 16, 2024 // 0 Comments

It is always wise and prudent to put money aside for a rainy day. Folkestone & Hythe District Council (the Council) certainly put considerable usable reserves aside for a [...]

Is Property Developer Oliver Davis in financial difficulty?

April 14, 2024 // 4 Comments

After moving to a house “in an exclusive location” which cost nearly £1.4m in 2019, Oliver Davis, who likes to think of himself as a property developer, is now [...]

Shareholder in Sunningdale House Developments takes steps to protect his investment

August 1, 2023 // 3 Comments

The person of significant control of Sunningdale House Developments Ltd is, David Richard Pownceby (pictured), according to Companies House. This is the mother company, or [...]

Council borrowed £20m in 2022/23, but must repay £35m by 2027/28

May 6, 2023 // 8 Comments

Both the Greens & Labour have promised to build more Council homes in their manifesto’s during their campaign. Neither party had sight of the accounts for 2022/23, [...]

Council’s Property Development Company Otterpool Park request a further £80m

April 13, 2023 // 7 Comments

Perhaps Cllr Susan Carey was right after all when she said we should sell Otterpool Park in February 2023. I say that as the company set up to deliver the Otterpool Project, [...]

Interest payments on Council debt costs to rise by 88% in 2022/23.

February 20, 2022 // 1 Comment

Folkestone & Hythe District Council, like all other Council’s can only borrow against future revenue streams, as legislation prohibits borrowing against capital [...]

Council Tax rises to add to cost of living misery for Kent residents

February 11, 2022 // 0 Comments

Two down, three to go. It’s that time of the year Parish Councils, District Council’s the County Council, Kent Police and Kent Fire & Rescue Service (KFRS), [...]

The Grand Stainer Sting

July 5, 2021 // 5 Comments

Mortgage lenders, some of whom are household names, must rue the day they lent money to the Stainers, as they count the losses they are making on the 19 Stainer flats. Now we [...]

Encore via two offshore locations take over chasing debtors for Affinity Water

November 5, 2020 // 0 Comments

They are the UK’s biggest debt collector, Cabot Credit Management. Cabot buys debts and loans in arrears from banks, utilities, telecom companies and local authorities, and [...]

28% of all Households in the district are claiming Council Tax Reduction

August 16, 2020 // 2 Comments

Figures revealed by Folkestone & Hythe District Council Cabinet Member, Tim Prater, make it clear that 28% of chargeable households for Council tax are in receipt of [...]

Council snap up Debenhams and debt repayment rises by 184% on £60 million of commercial investments

May 16, 2020 // 1 Comment

So as our public face predicted in April 2019 the Council have bought the former Debenhams building for a mark up of 2,482% and increased its debt repayments for it’s [...]

The Stainer Mortgage Crisis

February 16, 2020 // 8 Comments

Every so often, Xmas comes early for those who believe in casting light into dark places. One such dark place is how Michael Stainer (pictured) has financed his activities [...]

Drowning in Debt

February 5, 2020 // 6 Comments

Behind all the legal shenanigans that make up a typical week at the Grand (pictured below), there is one inescapable fact. Debt……. “Creditors to right of them, [...]

The Grand Escape — or Stainer’s Surrender?

November 25, 2019 // 5 Comments

What links the two pictures below? In a word “debt” On the left is a picture of the Marshalsea, immortalised in Dickens’s “Little Dorrit”. It housed a variety of [...]

Cllr David Wimble Council Tax Arrears

June 20, 2019 // 1 Comment

Exclusive The Shepwayvox Team can exclusively reveal that Cllr David Wimble (Ind) (pictured) Cabinet Member for the District Economy, responsible for Economic development, [...]

The rise and fall of Joanna Strickland

May 13, 2019 // 10 Comments

Joanna Strickland (pictured) a twice nominated Kent Business woman in 2016 & 2018 has left a trail of debt and trouble behind her and fled Folkestone to live life in [...]

Turner Schools Folkestone: Rewarding Failure.

January 22, 2019 // 7 Comments

From all the figures now available, Dr Jo Saxton (pictured) Chief Executive and Trustee of of Turner Schools is being financially rewarded for failing her pupils, her staff [...]

The Grand: “The Merry Go round stops”

January 10, 2019 // 8 Comments

With those words, Michael Stainer knew that his final appeal against personal bankruptcy was doomed. Appearing before Chief Bankruptcy Registrar Briggs in the High Court on [...]

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