News

Wokingham Enterprise Limited called a waste of public money

By Laura Herbert
October 24, 2012

A taxpayer-owned firm set up to oversee the town’s regeneration has been branded a waste of public money after it was suddenly put on hold without warning.

Wokingham Enterprises Limited (WEL), which Wokingham Borough Council launched two years ago, is now dormant as bosses say “it has achieved everything it set out to achieve”.

WEL was set up to purchase land in Peach Street, Market Place and Rose Street from developer Rock Investment Group.

It is one of three council-owned businesses which also include Optalis and Wokingham Housing Limited.

The Liberal Democrats, the Wokingham Society and commentators on getwokingham have all now questioned the mothballing of the company.

Damiano_Tommassi posted on getwokingham: “So hard to know what’s going on. I was never comfortable with WEL oOptalis being set-up in the first place – we have a council, it was responsible for these
things, I didn’t see a reason to set up two new companies.

“The fact it’s being made dormant now, having achieved nothing, is suspicious, and suggests the whole thing was a waste of time and money, so far as the taxpayer goes.”

The council’s trading and enterprises sub-committee agreed to transfer WEL’s activities to the council so it could become a dormant company on Monday. Dormant companies have no accounting transactions, but can be reinstated for trading in the future.

During the meeting Councillor Prue Bray, leader of Wokingham Liberal Democrats, questioned why the decision had ‘come out of the blue’.

Cllr Anthony Pollock, who chaired the meeting, said: “As you are well aware the regeneration has gone through a number of different phases and we have now signed the contract.

"It seems appropriate to take the decision that is on this paper tonight.”

He added: “We have not given up on WEL.”

Following the meeting, Cllr Bray said: “The activities of WEL have been shrouded in mystery from the start.

"The Conservatives spent a lot of money setting the company up and paying directors, but we don’t really know what they have been doing.

“The Conservatives have made WEL dormant, but we don’t know whether that is permanent, and they haven’t explained why it had to be done so suddenly.

“This is no way to treat taxpayers’ money.”

Last month directors of WEL and the council’s executive member for regeneration Cllr Alistair Corrie talked to the Wokingham Society about the company.

Peter Must, society chairman, said: “There were questions raised about the value of WEL since its inception in terms of additional value it is bringing to the town and council.

John Pike, who spoke at the meeting, said: "It had given value in terms of advice and financial management but I don’t think
everybody was totally convinced.

"We have got no great expectations of it being resuscitated.”

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Most recent user comments 12 of 12

DT, nice to see you sticking up for the poor badgers - it's murder I tell you!

badger44, Farley Hill
25/10/2012 at 17:40

WEL had a very specific role and has done that.

It was able court tenders by developers, select one and agree a contract without mandatory scrutiny from the public and National Audit Office which would have been the case had the council acted directly. This company is also not required to list all expenditure over £500 and provide contract details on request in a given window of time.

I have had an ongoing dispute with the council on exploiting this loophole.

There is a petition to change this just google kaz4wokingham scrutiny. Sadly very few Cllrs have signed it. Only one in fact. Mark Ashwell. He is however happy to carry on with the contract blind as is.

I have a denied freedom of information request going through appeal over the £100m contract. We should not let it's public dormant state put us off finding out how it spent our money and what deals it made to commit our money.

We know developers donate millions to the national Tory party. Locally it's very hard to be sure there is no financial influence from developers since donations must be over £1500 to be listed.

I suppose if I were a developer I would most likely attend their fund raising dinner functions and chat about how these poor children need somewhere to live.ositive public sentiment too.

Kaz4Wokingham, Wokingham
24/10/2012 at 22:22

Kaz4Wokingham, Wokingham
24/10/2012 at 22:19

WEL to be made dormant after all of the costs to set it up:-

- The cost to set up a company 100% owned by the council to do what the council should be doing anyway. - The cost to recruit and pay external directors - The cost to maintain a separate identity for accounts, website for several years etc - The cost to pay councillors to be directors who are already paid to be councillors - The cost of all the time spent by some of the best minds in the councils to set this all up and then make it dormant company. - The cost of making it dormant and transfering assets back to the council.

What a shambolic, chaotic, confused leadership Wokingham Borough has - there is, it seems, no sense of public accountability for spending residents money.

Residents demand a proper scrutiny of what happened.

One last thing – if this council committee is making all the decisions what are we actually paying the councillor directors to do – just put their hands up in the board meetings?

Phil Challis, woodley
24/10/2012 at 14:26

Mavdo - I respect your opinion (and your well-written comment), but have to say that on the majority of points I believe Labour and the Conservatives largely would make exactly the same decisions, and both would tell you "we can't keep borrowing and borrowing; that we need to be careful when we decide to build houses; that central government shouldn't make all the decisions for everyone else; and that we shouldn't all pay higher taxes to spend, spend, spend". Indeed, hasn't borrowing increased under the current government?

The things we know for sure about this current government are the policies it has introduced and the mistakes it has made. It has reduced the tax rate for the very richest; seen its chief whip resign for (I would postulate) showing his true feelings towards the common man; literally lost us hundreds of millions of pounds on some shocking decisions; tried to sell the forests(!) and trying to murder badgers for no good reason; announcing an energy bill that, within minutes, had been discounted as illegal, for a number of reasons, and impossible to implement.

It's possible that, following a different result in the last general election, we could have seen the exact same performance from a different set of out-of-touch millionaires - I don't presume that any other party is necessarily any better. But I can't believe anyone else could've made a worse job of it, or of representing me, my family and my community.

Damiano_Tommassi, Wokingham
24/10/2012 at 13:51

@DT, the annoying thing is that I tend to agree far more with the underlying principle of many Tory policies than I do with Labour - eg that we can't keep borrowing and borrowing; that we need to be careful when we decide to build houses; that central government shouldn't make all the decisions for everyone else; and that we shouldn't all pay higher taxes to spend, spend, spend, in particularl to pay for things that we possibly don't really need.

But I do agree with the principle of fairness, and that seems lacking in the implementation of their policies. In the implementation it constantly seems to change to "do as I say, not as I do" - seemingly the principles don't apply in any way to anything that the MPs or Councillors do for themselves. Then you further break down the policy implementation, and you find that those that can least afford it (and even those who can't vote) will be getting hardest hit in the long run, whilst those that can most afford it don't get hit because they are treated with kid gloves in case they disappear completely and all their tax revenue is lost. In this group, I include not only "the rich", because that group is relatively small and not often cash weathly to any real significance anyway, but also huge companies that do everything to avoid significant taxation.

But back in the world of local government, we have exactly as Cllr Maher has said - our council are finding vast sums of money where we don't see the equivalent benefit, whilst washing away chunks of that money into companies that have provided no benefit to taxpayers run by ex-and current councillors and their friends, while cutting well used services on which some people rely, and putting costs up significantly on those that remain, sometimes by many hundreds of percent. This isn't right, and if opposition councillors actually actively campaigned on these issues, we might have an oppostion that would cause all this nonsense to finally stop!

mavdo, Wokingham
24/10/2012 at 13:35

mavdo, I'd give you 6k myself for that comment if I had it; sadly we're in a shocking recession, and our national government has lost hundreds of millions of pounds on aircraft carriers, west coast trains and various other shocking pieces of 'omnishambles'.

Anyone want to speak-up in support of our local (or national) government? Anyone? Or are we all in agreement with Cllr. Tahir Maher?

Damiano_Tommassi, Wokingham
24/10/2012 at 13:19

My supposition is that this Tory administration in Wokingham has failed. It has failed to serve its residents or to act in their interest.

Let me recount some of their actions: Closure of Fosters care home in Woodley; Removal of dog bins (to save £65k); Attempted privatisation of libraries; Refusal to build toilets in Woodley Town centre; Plans to rebuild Wokingham Town centre at a cost of £87m (without asking residents if that is what they wanted money spent on); Funds taken from the youth in Wokingham to help them find jobs; Travel tokens taken from the elderly; A poor attempt to pay cllr.s as Directors for a job they were elected to do anyway;

I revise my statement and conclude that the Tory administration in Wokingham has failed.

Cllr. Tahir Maher, Earley
24/10/2012 at 13:13

You two seem to have all your ducks in a row, so I'll leave you to realise the synergies while going forward I realise the potentials and maximise the benefits of the aligned and collaborative working models.

When do I get my £6k?

mavdo, Wokingham
24/10/2012 at 12:36

Paul - "It seems appropriate to take the decision"

House!

Damiano_Tommassi, Wokingham
24/10/2012 at 11:32

I have 'realise' and 'shared vision' on my Bull***t Bingo card. Just need a cheeky 'going forward' and I'll win £5

Paul Daniels' reattached finger.
24/10/2012 at 11:29

"The Council and the Company (WEL) have agreed to actively realise a shared vision by:

-the successful regeneration of Wokingham Town centre and other areas of the borough

-the establishment of a dedicated property company that will promote key land and property locations in Wokingham in the long term and

-to introduce a partner that will ensure the continuous and ongoing re-investment in the Wokingham Town Centre and other areas of the borough"

Now to my knowledge, it has not achieved these things. Does that mean that I can, fairly and categorically, say that Councillor David Lee, leader of the council, has lied when he says "they have achieved everything they set out to achieve"?

http://www.getwokingham.co.uk/news/s/2122470_controversial_regeneration_company_put_on_hold