What will Liverpool council do about the Liverpool Direct Limited ã10m overcharging?
Liverpool Direct Limited has been a controversy for years now.
Today we lift the lid on a secret report that lays bare the level of public money that appears to be being thrown down the drain on the joint venture.
The report would appear to give the council the ammunition to either drive a very hard bargain with BT or pull out all together.
Yet the council itself has gone beyond damage limitation with its statement and just about stops short of rubbishing a report that has cost hundreds of thousands and taken months to compile.
BT claims it has not seen the report to correct any alleged inaccuracies.
Today they both share something - the acute embarrassment that this report has been made public.
It will only confirm the worst fears of many. The ball is firmly in the council's court now, what will it do with Liverpool Direct Limited?
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David Bartlett
City editor of the Post and Echo covering politics, regeneration, and urban affairs.
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@Katie54: get back in here, and keep the pressure on! Someone has been emboldened to leak the report to David B. Now we, above all you, need to give him reasons to do follow-ups. I think a few questions asked of Joe Anderson & Paul Brant might not go amiss. The Labour group is in a very tight corner - not of its choosing in fairness. It must make cuts & savings - McIlhenney has been put in to spill the blood. But as we know, McIlhenney negotiated the LDL contract; McIlhenney is now LDL CEO; McIlhenney is also acting CEO in Liverpool; and for all I know, McIlhenney is dating Joe's daughter(s). At the very least, a local Select Committee should open up the scrutiny process. Failing that, We the People should.
This contract is rotten to the core and must be srcapped asap.
The City is looking for large savings and here we have a contract bleeding the city dry. This is supposed to be a joint-venture but all its done is make money for BT.
Mack the Knife should resign for this outrage and a full investigation should begin to find out how this has been allowed to happen.
I seemed to have some problems posting comments to articles or even here, with my old name, so have re-registered. Maybe it's the length. So this is part :
I think the article's great, David - I hope there's more to come.
You're right about the limp response of the council - puzzling, since this is a mess created by the Lib Dems. Scandalous and shameful. As Ronnie says, the problem is our temporary CEO. It's starting to look as if BT are trying to run the council. Jokes apart, the appointment of McElhinney needs to be looked at again. I know they got a legal opinion on this, but I suspect that the question put to Ms Booth was framed very narrowly, and wonder how much background information, context, etc. she was given. The same applies to the District Auditor, who approved the appointment.
On the question of compensation - apart from the fact that the contract is not with BT itself, this is sabre rattling. The original contract will surely have the standard clauses about providing proper information, value for money, etc. etc. , and they clearly obstructed any attempt to get any of this, so they should be in breach.
Sorry, it won't accept the rest.
I am wondering who Katie is having a conversation with?
Anyway, let me have a conversation with you the reader.
Mistake No 1 was made by Joe Anderson in appointing McElhinney as interim chief exec.
Mistake No 2, was Joe having the arrogance or ego, to think that this appointment would not store up unhappiness in the media, amongst his own group and amongst Party members both in Liverpool and elsewhere.
Mistake No 3 was in underestimating people - journalists and others, and thinking he could get away with it, unchallenged.
Mistake No 4 was in Joe standing idly by and allowing McElhinney to settle old scores.
Mistake No 5 was in Joe thinking that people would not seek their revenge.
Mistake no 6 was Joe Anderson refusingt to listen and not having the courage to admit his mistakes.
Mistake no 7 is in Joe Anderson staking his leadership on this entire issue.
What puzzles people who wish Joe well is why has he stuck his neck out so much with mcelhinney? What has Mcelhinney got on him?
Why does he defend activities which, some might argue, border on the criminal?
Joe needs to listen more, he needs to consult wider, he needs to stop listening to Mcelhinney only and get out of his bunker mentality, otherwise he is finished politically. He may continue to lead Labout in Liverpool, because none have the courage to challenge him, but his reputation and that of Liverpool Labour will be in shreds.
And all because he forgot his values and appointed someone who has no place in public service.
I agree with The Kid, largely.
The deal with BT was fundamentally flawed from the start (henshaw's work obviously) and has just been compounded ever since.
ironically, it is largely the fault of the Lib dems who never had the bottle to stand up to The rottweiller.
Joe Anderson has now performed the amazing trick of saddling Labour with responsibility for this rip-off.
What a political genius.
The people of Liverpool should be marching on Mcelhinney's office tomorrow.
Sorry about the "conversation" - I was really frustrated, as a comment I'd tried to post kept getting "held for approval", so I tried to post in bits.
I was trying to make some points to take this thing forward.
To start with, the shrouding in secrecy thing has to stop. At the very least the report should be considered by the Overview and Scrutiny Committee, the next meeting of which is next week (4 October) - at the moment it is being "scrutinised by council officers" - who weren't elected and aren't accountable.
They - or the now-defunct LDL Scrutiny Committee commissioned the report, didn't they?
Sorry to bang on about this again, but it's not just the contract that's the problem - it's the governance of LDL itself.
If the council, as part owner, cannot get proper access to meaningful information on the accounts and operations of the company - and in fact now jumps through hoops to ensure everyone is kept in the dark - then the joint venture itself really isn't fit for purpose, and the governing documents urgently need to be amended to remedy this or the company itself should be wound up.
Especially as the "don't make waves as it'll cost too much argument" now seems to have been comprehensively trashed.
Surprise, surprise! I fear the great citizens of Liverpool need me once again..
The other thing that needs to happen immediately is for the current negotiations with LDL to be suspended until we have a new Chief Executive, as Warren Bradley pointed out yesterday (I'm no fan, but credit where credit's due.... although it's amazing how he's changed his tune abhout LDL now he's out of power and no longer a director).
The other thing that needs to happen immediately is for the current negotiations with LDL to be suspended until we have a new Chief Executive, as Warren Bradley pointed out yesterday (I'm no fan, but credit where credit's due.... although it's amazing how he's changed his tune abhout LDL now he's out of power and no longer a director).
Hopefully I can post today, and been thinking about the leaked report, timing and our acting chief executive.
1) The report has been with the Council since June. Despite the reference to external consultants, it must be, very largely, the report by Dolan and Cosgrove.
2)From June to date is over three months - this is a very long time to be checking the facts.
3) BT say they haven't had an opportunity to comment - presumably because the report was just buried. Mind you - in the interim report by Mr. Dolan - which was retrievable on the Council website three weeks ago but now seems not to be - he stated that there was a disagreement about whether or not a "fundamental review" had taken place, as provided for in the contract. If they can't even agree on something as basic as this, then their comments won't be worth much anyway.
3)Mr. Dolan was assistant chief executive, so the only person who could have buried this report is his boss, McElhinney. Surely this means that the arrangements to prevent conflicts of interest because of his role in LDL do not work.
5) So either our CEO has breached the terms of his current position (no involvement with LDL-related stuff), or he was authorised to do so by Mr. Anderson.
Explanations for any of this?
A final point on one of my particular fixations - LDL's fixed assets: while there is an enormous disparity between what both sides say has been invested in IT, there is no mention of who owns the assets created with these massive investments.
Because, as I've said before, like the earnings for other clients, they're not on the LDL books (LDL declares no fixed assets at all). This a pity, as, apart from anything else (waste of public money, etc. etc) if they were, then it wouldn't be "small" anymore, and would have to put a lot more information in its annual reports.
I thought should explain my weird posts yesterday and today - for some reason, every time I tried to post to this blog, I got a message saying that my comment was being held for the blog owners approval - even though I know for an absolute certainty that David does not screen comments. Since other people appeared to be able to post, I got a bit paranoid and thought I'd been blocked in some way. So I registered again (katie again) but still had difficulty. Anyway, the problem now appears to have been rectified.
Apologies if I sounded a bit mad.
I think Katie's comments are fascinating and spot on.
David - you need to give her the opportunity to write a blog post on this whole issue.
Is Joe Anderson just keeping his head down and hoping this will blow over?
It wont.
Who is advising him on all this - or does he just listen to Mcilihinney now?
If so, that explains a lot!