Bankrupt Southampton Labour Council Using Your Money To Cover Up Their Failures |
The Councillor Chair of the new Audit Committee at Southampton City Council is from the same Southampton Labour Party that has bankrupted the Council. But it's even worse than that...
As reported by Southampton Independents in early 2023, the Labour-run Southampton City Council was warned that it was on the brink of bankruptcy by the Chief Financial Officer, who then resigned and did not attend the budget meeting of the Council.
The Labour Party's Leader of the Council at the time is now Southampton Test MP Satvir Kaur. She led the Council to the precipice, and then quit at the end of 2023.
The Captain who sunk the Council's ship then abandoned it - not the done thing really in a maritime City. And then once elected as an MP, Kaur quit the Council completely.
Satvir Kaur left a trail of destruction in the Council finances and amongst the Council officers. She also chose the members of her Cabinet, including the Cabinet Member of Finance, who we shall come to in a moment.
The Chief Executive Officer Mike Harris also quit in 2023, citing health difficulties relating to the job.
So to sum up, who quit during 2023?
- The Leader of the Council
- The Chief Financial Officer
- The Chief Executive Officer
And the Cabinet Member for Finance during all of was Labour Councillor Steve Leggett, and to emphasise, who was chosen by Satvir Kaur.
Labour Councillor Steve Leggett Former Cabinet Member for Finance |
Councillor Leggett was then sacked by Kaur from the Cabinet before she resigned as Leader. Kaur also falsely claimed in 2023 that it was a "lie" that the Council was bankrupt, contradicting her own finance officer and many media reports.
The Council is still struggling to balance its budget. It has been given permission to sell off its assets by Government to pay the daily bills - a so-called "capitalisation direction". And the Labour-run Council also tried to hide its dirty secret that it had asked the Government to put our Council Tax up by 15%.
So has the Council turned over a new leaf? No, it is looking to cover up its failures to protect the Labour Party, instead of confessing to its failings.
In 2024, a new "Audit Committee" was created at the Council.
You may say that this was too late. You would be right. The ship's bow was already teetering on the brink of the water. having been sunk by Kaur and her Labour cronies.
How seriously should we take this "Audit Committee"? Not very, we suggest...
Let's play a game shall we?
Question: Well... can you guess who the Chair of the Audit Committee is...
Labour Councillor Steve Leggett Chair of the New Audit Committee |
A quick check of the agenda and minutes of the Committee and you can see that it is...
Answer: The one and only... Labour Councillor Steve Leggett!
Talk about Southampton Labour councillors marking their own homework!
Our founder Andrew Pope has written to the officer in charge of the governance, the "Director of Legal and Governance and Monitoring Officer", whose name is Richard Ivory. Mr Ivory is the only officer of the three statutory senior officers who is still with the Council after all of the above changes.
Pope suggested to Mr Ivory that the Constitution of the Council should state that the Chair of the Audit Commission should not be from the same party. Perhaps it should be an independently-minded councillor, instead of the same councillor who took the Council to the brink, from the same political party.
The Director of Legal stated that it was councillors that decide who the Chair is, and that:
"ordinarily and by convention the Chair would be from the Administration"