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Predators stalk the corpse of London’s failing private fire firm

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Not their vehicle but the symbolic state of AssetCo. Pic courtesy: TheScottishSun

Like encircling vultures, bidders across the globe are now looking  at the dying corpse of AssetCo, the floundering private fire company, for a cheap buy  as it shares hover around-3-5p mark.

Virtually all the bidders are potential asset strippers looking to buy cheap and then re-sell the company for a potential fast buck. Here is the full list, as far as I can glean. They have some interesting baggage as well.

Still with a bid on the table – but nowhere near the earlier offer of 14-21p a share- is Arcapita Bank  a Bahrain based company run by a wealthy Saudi.

The bank has run up big losses because of the credit crisis and lack of easy credit from financial institutions for private equity speculations. Its latest accounts (2010) post losses of $559 million. It is currently refinancing a $ 1.1 loan by raising cash from shareholders.

It makes its money in US, UK, Singapore and Far East and the Gulf by investing in firms for about seven yrs, restructuring them, and reselling them at a profit. (can be anything from clothing, aircraft manufacturers, retirement homes, dentistry and electricity).

Its most controversial investment is in Cypress Communications, a US high tech company, providing firewalls for US companies. Its bid became embroiled in a row when Arcapita’s chairman, Mohammed Abdukaziz Al Jomaih (27th wealthiest  person in Arab rich list) was accused of secretly financing Osama Bin Laden. His name is on seized list obtained in an anti-terror raid in Bosnia. He claims that he is not the person on the named list but that it is someone with the same name who is conveniently now dead.

Despite this Arcapita found itself forced to sign a National Security Agreement banning all but US nationals holding top posts in its acquired company and only US citizens able to handle sensitive network and security info. Don’t believe me. Read it at  http://bit.ly/j0z0gO .

Abdulaziz Hamad Al Joiah is vice chairman. Another Saudi Arabian. MD of Aljomaih Holding Co and director of Bank Al Bilad, Riyadh. He is chairman of Principle Insurance Holding – a Muslim car insurance company targeting 2 million Muslim drivers in UK –run on Takaful principles – a sort of Muslim mutual co-operative.

Another bidder tipped by Bloomberg is Florida based Seacor Holdings. The Fort Lauderdale company with international interests in supplying  the offshore oil industry  suffered a bad knock  in the wake of Obama’s ban on drilling in the Gulf of Mexico after the BP oil disaster. It is trading at a loss and has had to warn shareholders of potential future losses. Not a good bet.

According to City AM there are two other interested parties. Investindustrial, an Italian based company, that invests in a wide range of companies ( from chemical companies to Ducati motor bikes) from Italy, China, Thailand and USA  and again is interested in making short-term gains.

The only British firm is Consilia Partners from  Manchester. It describes itself as a turn around company  and AssetCo would join an Ipswich catering equipment distributor and an Egyptian marble company in Cairo as its other investments, according to the Manchester Evening News.

 None of this seems to me to bode well- particularly as AssetCo is facing a new creditor, the Northern Bank, with a demand for £1.3m. What seems more likely is  a serious tip-off from City Hall – that the London Fire authority may prefer AssetCo to go bust, go into the hands of an administrator, and be picked up by Capita or Serco , both mega British companies that target public services ripe for privatisation.

Otherwise the idea that the London fire brigade’s extensive fleet of engines will fall into the hands of an Arab company whose boss was once suspected of funding al-Qaeda; an US company in trouble over the Gulf of Mexico oil spill; an Italian firm with a reputation for quick fix investments or a Manchester ” turn around” firm is hardly the best news for Londoners.

Website hits top 50,000

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Since its launch some 18 months ago I have been pleasantly surprised at the growing number of hits on this website.

 Originally intended to co-ordinate all my stories across different publications after I left the Guardian, the site has taken on a life all of its own-particularly since the beginning of this year.

My thanks to all those who have come to read the blogs and also those in search of some of the pictures used to illustrate the site. By far the biggest interest has been in a joint of roast beef – used to illustrate traditional Tory right-wing values. This alone attracted 20,000 hits.

The coverage of London Fire Brigade and the impending collapse of the private company, AssetCo attracted some 5,000 hits – with a big following among trade unionists at the Fire Brigades Union and a lot of interest from private share buying sites, as they saw their investment collapse.

Similarly coverage of Barnet Council and the scandal surrounding its bust private security company has been attracting anything from 300 to over 1,000 hits.

The launch of Armchair Audit – a blog that audits the people making the cuts – led to surge of intrerest in Brian Coleman, the Barnet councillor and chair of the London fire brigade – he has attracted over 2600 hits. And  the government’s  double standards on green issues -attracted over 900.

 Labour’s failure to tackle the interest payments on the huge loans left by Tony Blair’s donors – attracted the largest number of blog hits – now over 4000 – it helped it got links from Guido Fawkes, Conservative Home, Political Betting and Nick Robinson’s blog on the BBC. So many thanks to everyone and keep on coming.

Rough Justice : When pro bono is not pro bono

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Rough Justice for Tony Hunt

UPDATE: Today (Tuesday) Mr Justice MacDuff intervened in the case to halt the costs hearing against Mr Hunt  this week to allow a full appeal by  his lawyers into whether he should be liable for the £500,000 bill from Hogan Lovells.

 

This week in a cramped room in Clifford’s Inn a 69 year old former magistrate will in all likelihood be made bankrupt by the legal system. The tragic story of Tony Hunt- a man wrongly convicted then cleared of a rape charge that was not brought by his accuser, AB, until seven years after the event is written up by me in the Sunday Telegraph  this week  – see –  http://bit.ly/kJH3W1 .

The “mistake” Mr Hunt made was to seek to clear his name after spending two horrific years in the sex offenders wing of Winchester gaol by seeking damages in the civil court from the woman, egged on by her woman friend and Hampshire Police, who accused him of rape.

The case at the time became a cause celebre because it was seen by women as a ground breaking ruling to prevent men acquitted of rape pursuing their ” victim” in the courts. When he lost there was general jubilation for fear that if he had won it would put off women from bringing cases against rapists.

 But now another side has emerged that is as deeply disturbing. Tony Hunt applied for compensation as you might if you have been wrongly imprisoned – but was turned by the Home Office. Evidently you need incontrovertible proof of innocence, notoriously difficult to prove in rape cases which are rarely witnessed, to get any money.

 So he reluctantly turned to the civil courts where he was advised-despite the later judgement – that he had to sue his accuser and not the police or the Crown Prosecution Service – to get any money.

But the real shock was to come after he failed. The woman who had accused him was desperate for cash to defend herself. She had gone to her MP, Julian Lewis, who, impressed by her plight contacted the solicitor general, Vera Baird, who, in turn, rang Hogan Lovells, a very expensive  firm of international City lawyers, who decided to take her case.

 They decided to act for her free of charge or  pro bono.  But just a few weeks into the case they suddenly changed their position to acting for her under a conditional fee arrangement. This made no difference to her, but it meant that if Mr Hunt lost, he would face huge bills.

This is precisely what has happened. A year after the case they are demanding £500,000  from him – knowing that he has no funds. The fees would have been nothing like this if a Winchester lawyer had taken the case anyway, but the multi-million pound company charge a lot for solicitors and engage expensive barristers. Now they have pursued him to a costs hearing – it has taken several days so far- while at the same time winning prizes and public acclaim for pro bono work, including runner-up at the prestigious Wig and Pen awards, for this case.  Hunt’s lawyers have failed to convince the judge to take account of this curious dual approach.

These are some of Hogan Lovell’s on the record explanations for this behaviour “Any money recovered from Mr Hunt will, in the first instance, be given to AB to balance the costs she incurred with her original firm of solicitors.  Any money that might be due to us would be donated to charity.  We do not profit in any way.”
 
“It is for the Costs Court to determine what are fair and reasonable expenses for Mr Hunt to pay for the defence of AB against his legal action.  Mr Hunt can appeal the ruling of the Costs Court.”
 
“The Courts have made these cost orders against Mr Hunt because he has lost at every stage. AB has done nothing but defend herself from his claims.”
 
“At any time Mr Hunt could have stopped his litigation against AB.  The choice has always been his.”
 
“The door to negotiation has always been and remains open.” 
 
“The use of a conditional fee arrangement created a level playing field for AB to defend herself against Mr Hunt.   Each is exposed to the potential of having to pay their opponent’s costs if they lose.”
  I am no lawyer but it seems to me Hogan Lovells have tried to have their cake and eat it. They have received public plaudits for their pro bono work but are now going to bankrupt the guy under  an arrangement they haven’t actually highlighted during the Wig and Pen awards ceremony.They admit they don’t need the money, even AB , I am told, is not bankrupt. And if we follow their argument, Mr Hunt, had no right to defend himself once he realised that he was up against expensive solicitors, if he couldn’t afford the bills. Rough justice indeed.

Update: Now AssetCo’s financial saviour quits

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AssetCo's state of finances: Pic Courtesy:www.onenewspage.co.uk

 Scott Brown, the Australian financial whizz kid brought in to shake up the collapsing private fire company, quit AssetCo yesterday, it has just been announced.

His departure is the latest blow to the firm which owns and services London and Lincolnshire’s fire engines and provided a strike breaking auxiliary workforce in the dispute with the London Fire Brigade over shift patterns last year.

It came as shares fell to just 3.93p – a new low – which must mean the company is not long for this world.

Appointed only last October the 43-year-old was meant to help turn the company round and plan an expansion of its activities.

The official statement from AssetCo described his departure as part of ” the orderly transition in its finance area  ”  claiming “Mr Brown’s immediate duties and the finance structure is being managed day-to-day by a senior interim manager, who is reporting directly to Interim Chairman, Tudor Davies. ”

 Frankly this is balls. An orderly transition would mean that the company would already have someone  appointed in  his place – not some interim manager who probably has been appointed at the last moment.

 I talked to him  briefly on his mobile when the company was having to raise extra finance – and it was quite clear from the conversation that he saw the company having a big future – once it had got rid of hotchpotch of manufacturing firms  it acquired in the 1980s and could expand by offering its services to other fire authorities and abroad.

More to the point he is  shrewd enough to quit before it goes bust. A check on the land register shows he has a large house in Barnes, south London which he and his partner Elizabeth Hackett-Brown bought for £1.425m in 2009 with a mortgage from HSBC. He won’t want as a director  to  put that at risk if the company goes bust.

 He also is the key man negotiating with the banks – so I just wonder how well the negotiations for extra cash are going.

I have a feeling that it won’t be long before  London Fire Brigade’s shiny engines will be in the hands of the administrators.

Assetco and MetPro: Stains on London’s political masters

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Coleman and Assetco: stain on London fire Brigade

Metpro-stain on Barnet Council

Politicians at the London Fire Brigade and Barnet Council should be hanging their heads in shame for awarding multi-million pound contracts to two private contractors, MetPro and Assetco – one of which is now bankrupt and the other only valued as junk  stock .

Both scandals have featured on this site before but the situation is going from bad to worse.

An extraordinary statement from Assetco -owner of London and Lincolnshire’s fire engines and a strike breaking auxiliary force for London’s firefighters – basically admits that it does not have the cash any more to meet capital repayments needed to run its contracts with London, Lincolnshire and the Middle East.See http://bit.ly/mP5WFa .

The key paragraph reads:  “The main issue that the business is facing is the capital repayment profile not matching the long-term nature of the Company’s contracts. Whilst the Company is cash generative and can meet its interest costs, it does not generate sufficient funds to meet all the repayment of capital as currently scheduled. The banks are supportive regarding the short-term financing situation and are awaiting our proposals on a financial restructuring but in the meantime we are in breach of our banking arrangements.”

This sorry state has been brought about by its former founder John Shannon who last month was summarily dismissed by the company.

Shannon had landed the company in court facing a winding up order for millions of pounds of unpaid taxes from Revenue and Customs-something they don’t do lightly- and a huge £1m unpaid legal bill from Nabarro’s.

No sooner had these been settled by diluting the share price in a £16m offer to new investors then more grief was to follow. The share price  is now down to a junk figure of 4.65p a share –  when it once sold at 66p. Market capitalisation at £11m is now less than the value of its PFI contracts in London and the Middle East.

Yet Shannon and his former co-founder are trying to recover £1.1m from the collapsing firm while facing a counter-claim from Assetco for £8m for ” breaches of fiduciary duties”. A bloody legal battle  is on the way distracting it from its business.

 All this might not matter if they did not own all the fire engines  in the capital and Lincolnshire. But the London Fire Brigade has reacted to the crisis with breath-taking complacency. Gareth Bacon, performance management chair, believes there is no serious problem.

 Brian Coleman, who was wined and dined by Shannon as well as receiving a gift of a £350 Harvey Nicks Christmas hamper, is silent about the fate of his dining companion.

Yet consider this.Would it be appropriate for a public body to avoid paying taxes and be so reckless with its finances so it can’t repay its capital loans to banks? And for the authority to be in a such a bad way that it has had to hire financial staff to sort out the mess. Heads would roll.

Barnet Council is in a similar mess over the bust private security firm MetPro who owed £250,000 to Revenue and Customs for unpaid tax, VAT and even pay roll tax deducted from its employees.

 The fate of this company would not have come to light if it had not been so reckless by filming bloggers and members of the public without their knowledge or permission as they came to watch the council implement cuts.

But now Barnet have admitted they were UNAWARE of the financial plight of the company which got £1m of business and glowing references from them on its website  (now finally removed) and appears to have avoided any public tendering process to get the business.

There is a link to both these scandals and he is called Brian Coleman. He has been the key advocate of the government’s privatisation agenda and cheerleader for the company -particularly the disgraced John Shannon. He is also the big wheel on Barnet Council- Cabinet post for the environment- and must have had some knowledge of the bankrupt MetPro. And there is even a bit part for the complacent Gareth Bacon in all this – his division at  Dutch consultants MartinWardAnderson has made £75,000  (£12,600 a month) over just a six month period in 2010 – providing temporary finance staff for Barnet.

Can anyone do anything about this? Yes- firefighters employed by the London Fire Brigade could ask for a due diligence investigation by the district auditor Michael Howarth-Maden over the handling of the PFI contract, alleging the authority had employed a company involved in proven tax avoidance

 Similarly residents of Barnet could demand an investigation by its external auditors,Grant Thornton into the hiring of MetPro. Here the crucial question should be -how they got the contract in the first place.

It is really time action was taken – the scandalous behaviour of both firms is a stain on London’s politicians.

Wake up Red Ed, Canny Cam is running rings round you

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raise your game, red ed.Pic courtesy Belfast Telegraph

 

If I were David Cameron I would be sorely tempted to start planning now for any early election. Friday’s election results were a dream ticket for the Tories. They must have thought they had woken up in paradise. They managed to rout their coalition partners, the Liberal Democrats, on their core issue, electoral reform and get the electorate to blame them for the coalition’s broken promises. They destroyed much of the Liberal Democrats core base in Tory heartlands.  They actually GAINED council seats and councils when they were  already by far the largest party in local government.

In Wales, – Labour did brilliantly in South Wales – but the Tories are now in second place , having regained Mid Wales to add to Pembrokeshire and North Wales.  The only thing that marred the party was Alex Salmond’s spectacular win in Scotland, but there they can take comfort to see Labour stalled ( Labour’s vote held up but they lost seats because people turned to the Nationalists and not them).

 Only in the North where Labour’s  stellar performance did a similar demolition job on the Liberal Democrats ( some of the swings in Newcastle at 22 per cent were equivalent to old style Lib Dem by-election gains) were the Tories not in the picture.

While Labour’s 800 gains look respectable effectively they piled up votes in Liverpool , York Humberside, the North East, and the East Midlands. The victories in the South, Gravesham and Ipswich, were isolated. They failed to get back Dover, lost seats to the Tories in Dartford and Hemel Hempstead and failed to make a serious impact in Watford, Thurrock and Harlow. Gloucester, a bell weather election seat, saw its council go Tory.

 If there was an election tomorrow  Ed Miliband would get the Labour vote up but in many cases it would just increase existing Labour majorities or take Lib Dem seats. And that will not be enough to win. The Tories with more Lib Dem seats to gain already have an advantage, let alone their simple but wrong narrative that the cuts are all the fault of Labour. So while Ed’s strategy to get back disillusioned Lib Dems has been a good start, it is only a start.

The party needs to do two things. Find out what the Tory’s new-found friends in the South and Midlands really want from government and the issues where the Tories are really vulnerable. Labour will not win by only talking to itself. Ask why there was success in Gravesham but not Dartford.

Labour need to up their game and go on the offensive. Polite pussy footing around and sympathy will not win elections. Unless they take the Tory narrative head on and work out an alternative and believable narrative of their own they will get nowhere.

If they don’t do this they will be written out of the  script. They needn’t just use conventional media – which is slowly dying – to get their message across, they have the whole internet at their disposal and it’s free.

So get your act together, Ed. A new nose job is not enough to get you through the door at Downing Street.

Dirty Tricks at the green ministry

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The true Conservative green logo: Replace the tree with a belching exhaust pipe.Pic:courtesy auto.howstuffworks.com

Six weeks ago I  had a particularly critical look at the antics used by David Cameron and Boris Johnson to delay tough new air pollution rules to avoid the Mayor having to pay out £300m in fines to the European Union. (see http://bit.ly/f2wB4j)

Now word via Whitehall has come to me  that a recent government initiative to curb ” red tape” to help business is about to be used as a further battering ram by the coalition to undermine  the so called commitment by both parties to a greener Britain.

My old Guardian colleague Allegra Stratton has already exposed the government’s move to incorporate all 278 environmental laws into the review (http://bit.ly/j6eVY6) . And it has  alarmed environmentalists.

Whitehall sources are telling me that the way civil servants in the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs have been instructed to review the laws is extremely detrimental to green campaigners.

Effectively they have been told to concentrate on the BURDEN green legislation and regulations place on business and ignore the BENEFITS it brings to general health and well-being.

And this is from two ministries, business and energy and climate change , headed by two of  the Liberal Democrats in the Cabinet, Vince Cable and Chris Huhne.

Given the review cover issues like climate change, national parks, wild life protection, waste regulations, to name but a few areas, the only people  thrilled by this will be  libertarian think tanks like the Adam Smith Institute and the Tea Party faction of the Republican Party.

If we pursue this line of argument we would never have bothered with energy conservation, banned lead in petrol ( they  all cost money to business in the short-term) and been quite happy to keep landfill going and see animals and plants become extinct. Luckily some of this stuff – like phasing out landfill , clean beaches and air pollution, depend on  directives from the EU, so even the most brown nosed civil servant in Defra is going to have difficulty telling his political bosses it is OK to forget the benefit to the environment.

And the government seem to have forgotten that not all business will be pleased if it is successful. There are 880,000 jobs in the environment industry dependent on existing regulation.

 As Adrian Wilkes, chairman of the Environmental Industries Commission, points out: “This is a potentially major threat to the UK’s environmental industry, which lives and dies by the regulatory framework. Government intervention is a vital ingredient in the creation of the environmental markets of the future.”

So once again, just like the row over privatising the rest of the forests defeated by the campaigning group 38 degrees, the coalition has put its foot in it. Unless that is, they never really believed in the green agenda in the first place.

Why I’m going to vote NO to AV

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Putting a No Vote into the ballot box

I support progressive electoral reform. The present system does need changing. It normally delivers firm government but does not  necessarily represent the collective views of the country. The present system normally allows one party with the largest minority of votes  to implement its manifesto, but at least we have a good idea what this means when they are elected.

If we are going to move to proportional representation it will mean that we will have to trade the clarity of a manifesto for a compromise. But I am only willing to do this if the voting system – as to a large extent it does in Scotland and Wales – genuinely reflects the view of the electorate. In other words a serious dose of proportional representation.

 AV leaves us with the chance of  a botched government elected by a botched electoral system. Rather than taking into account  the votes of all the people and topping up Parliament to reflect this, it allows a small minority of people to exercise their choice twice at the expense of the majority of people who will only be able to use their first preference. In many places it won’t apply at all.

In my own seat, Herts South West, for example, Tory David Gauke, was returned with 54.9 per cent of the vote, so AV will be irrelevant here. And if it was just below 50 per cent, it would be second preferences of an independent, BNP and UKIP candidate in that order, that would have been redistributed.

In East Ham it is more pronounced with ex Labour minister Stephen Timms being returned with 70 per cent of the vote –  a majority of 27,826-the largest in the country. No AV there and 30 per cent of the  electorate ignored. Similarly  foreign secretary William Hague had 62 per cent of the vote in Richmond, Yorkshire and Gordon Brown would be unaffected in Kirkcaldy with 64.5 per cent of the vote. And also for that matter David Cameron, Dominic Grieve and John Hayes (all 58-61 per cent).

It would have made a difference in Watford (Tory gain from Labour) and won with only 34.9 per cent of the vote because all three main parties were close (the Lib Dems came second) and the bottom three shared only 5.6 per cent of the vote. But why should  your second preference  count in Watford but be barred in next door Herts South West?

Supporters of AV say it is a step in the right direction towards full PR but I wonder whether it could make matters worse. And I am afraid that the performance of Nick Clegg and Vince Cable in government does matter. They got elected on a manifesto that they stood on its head as part of the negotiations to get power, particularly in the grotesque way they pledged to abolish student tuition fees but instead tripled them.

I think they are unaware of how damaging this has been to politics-confirming the view that people will cynically promise anything to get elected  but can’t be trusted in government. No doubt at the next election they will pledge to defend the NHS and then proceed to abolish it once they are in power. Clegg has actually left people believing he is a serial liar ( reports on the doorsteps in Dacorum include people saying they will never vote Liberal Democrat again ).

They also failed in negotiations with the Tories to use a referendum to offer the public a full choice for electoral reform. So the choice is only first past the post versus  bastarised PR – AV. We are not even given a chance to vote on the system used by Scotland or Wales.

 I have been disenfranchised by these shenanigans so I will stick to the present system and wait for a government to be elected that will offer real choice for electoral reform.

London firefighter firm recruiting Brits for UAE military support

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A UAE Hawk jet -part of Assetco's training programme. Pic courtesy http://www.militaryimages.com

The company that owns  and maintains London’s fire engines  is  recruiting British firefighter instructors to train the military in the United Arab Emirates.

They are offering tax-free salaries of £46,812 a year  for  British recruits just as Abu Dhabi has joined the Saudis to help Bahrain’s  rulers  put down dissent among pro democracy demonstrators in Bahrain in the most brutal way. Reports have included torture of nurses, removal of people from intensive care units so they can be left to die and intimidation and possible murder of hospital surgeons. See this Sunday Telegraph report  http://bit.ly/fNNvug

 UAE jet fighters are  also preparing to join the coalition of the willing against Colonel Gaddafi in Libya. They are planning to send 12 fighters and are blaming their civil unrest on the Iranians.

AssetCo, the  troubled fire privatisation company, is hoping to get £40m out of a £120m deal with the  Gulf State’s armed forces to boost its profitability. It has been facing severe problems in Britain, including having to raise £26m from investors and through a  share placing. Revenue and Customs has issued a winding up order against AssetCo seeking at least £4m and they have to pay off a debt to the state-owned Lloyds TSB.

The deal was one of the last negotiated by former chief executive, John Shannon, before he resigned after a huge row  with the rest of directors over the share placing.

 Now they are  desperate to recruit  trained staff so they can fulfill it. The advertisement promises a company car, free medical cover and flights home to Britain. See here. http://bit.ly/ftpdZi

The Telegraph report on Bahrain atrocities, the AssetCo contract and job advertisement can be seen together here. http://bitly.com/i4yYFk 

Matt Wrack, general secretary of the FBU, has written to David Cameron, to protest about the deal.

He said: ” The clampdown in Bahrain has resulted in a significant number of protestors being killed. The clampdown, including martial law, is supported by armed forces from Saudi Arabia and from the UAE.
… I hope you will make it clear that it is not acceptable for them to take British public money, and also to assist the armed forces of the UAE … I hope you will insist that any company which takes on such work in future, does not also undertake work for military clients involved in the suppression of democracy.
May I remind you that, in 1963, fire hoses were turned on school age civil rights demonstrators in Birmingham Alabama. Ever since that deeply alarming moment, fire services have sought to maintain an independent role as a result of their humanitarian responsibilities. We now have a UK firm providing an essential aspect of our emergency service which has close commercial links to a brutal and anti-democratic military. All the talk from politicians about support for democracy in the Arab world is so much hypocrisy if they allow UK public services to operate in this manner. AssetCo and its directors clearly have no regard for the humanitarian role of our service, and are only in it for profit.   ”

It seems extraordinary to me that a  foundering British company is poised to make millions out of Middle East  misery and recruit desperate British people to do it.

Revealed: The £400,000 debts of Barnet’s blogger banning private security firm

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MetPro's fine lads: Owed £20,000 in unpaid wages

Documents filed by Mike Solomon, the liquidator of MetPro Rapid Response, the private security company accused of covertly filming and monitoring the borough’s bloggers, reveal that it went belly up owing over £400,000 ten days ago.

The biggest creditor is Revenue and Customs who are owed a cool £245,611.57, for unpaid tax, national insurance contributions, corporation tax and VAT.

 The company which took over £275,000 from the council taxpayers of the Tory borough to provide security and was used by the  council leader, Lynne Hillan,  to enforce a ban on bloggers filming or reporting the council’s big cuts meeting, could have been involved in tax avoidance.

The break down of the figures show that over £139,000 owed  is in PAYE and national insurance contributions and another £99,000 is VAT.

Employees are also owed over £21,000 in unpaid wages – and are top of the list to receive £8800 in payments if any money can be raised.

 The two directors of the company Kevin Sharkey and Luigi Mansi have put themselves down as creditors – saying they are owed £92,500 for loans they gave to the company. Other unpaid debts include £3400 to  their accountants, Bond Partners, the address where the company was last registered and a £4972 credit card debt to Barclaycard.

Total debts are over £400,000 while assets are just three motorcycles valued at £11,850; computer and office equipment worth £475 and security uniforms worth £1400. As a job lot Mr Solomon estimates he could sell them for £6000 plus a goodwill sum of £13,500 for anybody wanting the business.

The scale of the scandal raises questions about the due diligence employed by Barnet Council in appointing them in the first place, particularly as records show that voluntary liquidation involving the same directors has happened before. There could be a case for an investigation if a complaint was made to the district auditor about how the council tendering procedures handled their original appointment.

Since Barnet have been unable to answer a lot of questions from the public about this whole unhappy saga – may be they will feel they have to co-operate with auditors. Or may be not.