Procurement

Freemasons in Local Government: How Secret Membership and £5bn Procurement Fraud Risk Are Undermining Trust in UK Councils

December 12, 2025 // 1 Comment

The government’s own anti-corruption documents and fraud figures leave little doubt: local government is now a frontline battleground against fraud and corruption – and [...]

Folkestone’s St Eanswythe Gets Her Head Back—At Last

October 14, 2025 // 1 Comment

After sixteen months without a face, St Eanswythe is finally making eye contact with Folkestone again. The council says the Radnor Park statue is restored; the town sighs [...]

Council Fails Own Rules: £81,974 Paid to Three Contractors with No Public Contract Record

September 8, 2025 // 0 Comments

Part 10 of Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Constitution is explicit: “All contracts of a value of £5,000 or more are to be included on the Council’s [...]

Dumb, Dangerous and in Charge: Reform UK’s Procurement Tantrum Should Terrify Every Voter in Kent

July 14, 2025 // 3 Comments

What happens when you hand the toolkit of the state to people who don’t even know what the spanners are for? In Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, Robert Pirsig [...]

Folkestone & Hythe District Council Fails to Spend £11.88 Million on Promised Projects

June 29, 2025 // 1 Comment

Folkestone & Hythe District Council has left £11.88 million of budgeted capital spending unspent over the past two financial years. This money was earmarked for [...]

Kent County Council to Cut £75m Under Reform UK: Potholes, Transport, and Migrant Services Face Review

June 15, 2025 // 1 Comment

Kent County Council (KCC) has a gross annual budget exceeding £2.5 billion but is burdened by hundreds of millions in debt, its newly elected leader Linden Kemkaran [...]

Kent County Council Signed Contracts Worth Hundreds of Millions Without Public Checks

April 8, 2025 // 0 Comments

This article is currently under review following receipt of a formal response from Kent County Council (KCC). We are in the process of carefully considering the information [...]

Part 2: The Peculiar Case of Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Procurement Practices

February 20, 2025 // 2 Comments

Updated 08:00 – 21/02/25 When examining the payment data for suppliers where contracts began before they were officially awarded, numerous anomalies emerge. These [...]

A Peculiar Case of Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Procurement Practices

February 18, 2025 // 0 Comments

Updated 14:05 on 19/02/2025 How Can Six Contracts Start, End, and Then Be Awarded? A Peculiar Case of Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Procurement Practices In [...]

More contract irregularities even under new Green led administration

November 4, 2023 // 1 Comment

Who cares, who really cares? It is not as if we can say our Cllrs care. They are all too often reactive to situations, not proactive. Under the old regime we wrote frequently [...]

More financial irregularities?

July 16, 2023 // 6 Comments

Recently we asked the question about the contract issued to Jenner (Contractors) Ltd by Folkestone & Hythe District Council, regarding Ross House. Ross House: Is this [...]

Part 2 Ross House: Is this another dodgy £1m contract?

June 26, 2023 // 2 Comments

Ever since the Council bought Ross House for £1.8m, in April 2018, it has eaten money and had so many issues, the 16 flats inside the building are now probably the most [...]

£61m of contracts across eight Kent councils started before they were awarded

April 26, 2023 // 1 Comment

An analysis of eight out of twelve Kent Council’s shows that £61,317,807 worth of contracts were started before they were awarded, according to publicly available [...]

Princes Parade: Financial mismanagement of Faithful & Gould contract

February 28, 2023 // 5 Comments

Updated 6 March @ 07:40am According to the Council’s procurement guide under Value for Money it states: Value for money is a balance of quality, price and delivery and [...]

You’re my Mate

February 13, 2023 // 4 Comments

“You’re my mate and I will stand by you” sang Right Said Fred, on their single released on the 6 August 2001, and no doubt Folkestone & Hythe District [...]

Incompetence: Power without accountablity

February 8, 2023 // 1 Comment

Purchase Orders (POs) are either the prevention of all evil, or the creation of all evil in local government, and elsewhere. At Folkestone & Hythe District Council, they [...]

Yet More Contract Irregularities at Folkestone & Hythe District Council

October 17, 2022 // 2 Comments

Once again, there are issues with Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Contracts Register (17/10/22) (Quelle surprise). The Council’s Constitution at Part 10 [...]

More Financial Irregularities at the Council

October 1, 2022 // 3 Comments

It took two hours and four minutes before Cllr Lesley Whybrow (Green) Cabinet Member for the Environment pointed out that the s151 Officer, – Charlotte Spendley [...]

All four suspended officers have now left the Council

September 15, 2022 // 3 Comments

Updated 15/09/22 @21:37 So it has come to pass, after two and half months since we published the fact that four Folkestone & Hythe District Council officers; who were [...]

Offshore Companies based in Tax Havens own the Procurement Portal used by our Council

September 9, 2022 // 0 Comments

The road to hell, so they say, is paved with good intentions. So it was on the 25 Sept 2019, at full council, Cllr Lesley Whybrow (Green) (pictured) moved in Opposition [...]

Council whistleblower vindicated over contract irregularities

September 7, 2022 // 3 Comments

In a guest post back in June 2022, a Council Officer whistleblower claimed there was a lack of governance and internal controls within Folkestone & Hythe District [...]

And yet more contract irregularities at our Council

August 24, 2022 // 2 Comments

And yet again it happens. Three further contracts have been let which are in clear breach of Folkestone & Hythe District Council’s Contract Standing Orders (CSOs). [...]

Council take incompetence to a new level putting lives in serious danager

August 5, 2022 // 2 Comments

Folkestone & Hythe District Council have taken incompetence to a whole new level. In doing so they’ve placed the lives of women, children and men at significant and [...]

Data matching shows £7.2m of likely council procurement fraud over four years to family or friends

July 9, 2022 // 4 Comments

Recently while the sun was shining, and the birds were singing – well not on Princes Parade – Folkestone & Hythe District Council took the decision to suspend [...]

£658,771 of contract irregularities on just three contracts

June 13, 2022 // 0 Comments

‘Fraud‘ says The local government transparency code 2015 (the Code), ‘can thrive where decisions are not open to scrutiny and details of spending, contracts [...]

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