Chief Executives Investigation Into Hitesh Patel's Directorship of Digital City (UK) Ltd

FOI Subject In Full:

Investigation carried out or commissioned by the Chief Executive
(Gavin Jones) and/or the Deputy Chief Executive (Celia
Carrington)into the Directorship of Digital City (UK) Ltd held by
Swindon Borough Council Director of Business Transformation Mr
Hitesh Kumar Patel.

Dear Swindon Borough Council,

Companies House records indicate that Swindon Borough Council
Director of Business Transformation, Mr Hitesh Kumar Patel, became
a Director of Digital City (UK) Ltd on the 15th of September 2009.

I can find no public record in existence which indicates Mr Patel
disclosed his Directorship to Swindon Borough Council before it
entered into a 'public/private partnership with Digital City (UK)
Ltd despite Mr Patel co-authoring a 'cabinet briefing' note on the
12th of October 2009 concerning the provision of a Loan to Digital
City (UK,) Limited for the Purpose of Establishing Wi Fi Network
Across the Borough of Swindon.

On the 10th of March 2010, at a Swindon Borough Council Cabinet
meeting Councillor Peter Greenhalgh asked Mr Patel to confirm that
he was a Director of Digital City (UK) Ltd. Mt Patel's Directorship
of Digital City (UK) Ltd was openly denied despite him having
recently updated his 'Linked-In' profile to say:

"Board Director
Digital City (UK) Ltd (Wireless industry)
November 2009 — Present (5 months"

On the 12th of March 2010, (two days after his directorship was
publicly denied) a 'TM01' form, (termination of Directorship) was
electronically submitted to Companies House terminating Mr Patel's
directorship at Digital City (UK)Ltd.

I understand the Chief Executive of Swindon Borough Council, Gavin
Jones, immediately ordered that a detailed report be completed
which would set out clearly, and accurately a chronology of events
that addressed, but was not limited to, the following points:

1.The issue of when Mr Patel became a Director of Digital City.

2. Why Swindon Borough Councillors were misadvised that Hitesh
Patel was not a Director of Digital City (UK) Ltd when the public
records and Patel's own Linked-In profile clearly show that he was,
and that he knew that he was.

3. That Hitesh Patel was a Director of Digital City ahead of the
formal decision taken by Swindon Borough Council to lend £450,000
to the company.

4. Whether Mr Patel's Directorship of Digital City (UK) Ltd
compromised his position as 'prime negotiator' with Digital City
(UK) Ltd,(with Patel being on Swindon Borough Council's side).

5. Whether Mr Patel's undiclosed Directorship at Digital City (UK)
Ltd effectively pre-assumed the future decision making of the
Swindon Borough Council Cabinet members regarding the loan of
£450,000 to the company and the council becoming part-owners of the
company.

Please supply a copy of the report.

Yours faithfully,

Geoff Reid

www.talkswindon.org

Dear Sharon Druett,

Thank you for including the link to the Special Cabinet Report
dated 31 March 2010. Although the general public are well aware of
the Special Cabinet report it does serve to illustrate why refusing
my request using a Section 36 Freedom of Information Act 2000
exemption would be an inappropriate use of that exemption.

I note that the Chief Executive of Swindon Borough Council
instructed his deputy, Celia Carrington to investigate Hitesh Patel
within the following, closely defined parameters:

6.2 The scope of the investigation was:

• To investigate the circumstances in which Hitesh Patel formally
became a director of Digital City (UK) Limited;

• Whether he, or anyone else, was aware that this had happened;

• Why he named himself as a Director of Digital City (UK) Limited
on his professional network website;

• Whether he deliberately misled Cabinet on 10 March, by not
revealing that he was already formally a director.

The council is considering refusing my request by using a
'prejudice-based exemption'.

To correctly refuse my request using a prejudice-based exemption
Swindon Borough Council must first show that a disclosure of
information would, or would be likely to, cause the harm identified
in the exemption - (in this case: 'Prejudice to effective conduct
of public affairs'.

If that prejudice can be established, the exemption may be engaged
but Swindon Borough Council must then go on to apply the public
interest test.

As it is my understanding that the scope of the Chief Executives
investigation was deliberately narrow, focussing solely on the
conduct of Hitesh Patel, so that future publication of the report
would not, in fact, prejudice the future conduct of public affairs.

Claiming a section 36 exemption would be inappropriate and would,
in my opinion, further harm the publics willingness to trust that
Swindon Borough Council conducts its public affairs openly,
honestly and transparently.

I am concerned that Senior Officers at Swindon Borough Council wish
to prevent publication of the Chief Executives Investigation into
Hitesh Patel's Directorship of Digital City (UK) Ltd because
publication will further highlight the many significant disparities
between Swindon Borough Council's 'version' of events and facts
already available in public records.

In short, I believe Officers of the Council are concerned that the
Chief Executives report will not stand up to the robust scrutiny
which continues to be applied to the Swindon WiFi project by the
general public, and therefore seek secrecy rather than
transparency.

However, I hope to be pleasantly surprised.

Yours sincerely,

Geoff Reid

Request for internal review.

Dear Swindon Borough Council,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of
Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of my FOI request:
'Chief Executives Investigation Into Hitesh Patel's Directorship of
Digital City (UK) Ltd'.

There exists a high, and continuing, level of public interest in
the Public/Private partnership which exists between Swindon Borough
Council and Digital City (UK) Ltd and, as the corporate board and
elected members of Swindon Borough Council are well aware, this
partnership was the subject of a Parliamentary adjournment debate.

Serious questions remain unanswered as to how £450,000 of
taxpayer’s money came to be lent by Swindon Borough Council to a
company which the Councils Director of Business Transformation,
(Hitesh Patel), was negotiating with on behalf of Swindon Borough
Council, but of which he was also already a Director.

Other directors and executives of the Council indicated that Hitesh
Patel had not disclosed his Digital City Directorship to them,
prior to, or until several months after, the loan had been ‘drawn
down’ by Digital City (UK) Ltd and Swindon Borough Council became a
significant shareholder in the company.

However, I possess evidence which leads me to believe that:

1. Other directors and executives of the Council were aware of
Hitesh Patel’s Digital City directorship and that information
confirming or further denying, this prior knowledge is being
deliberately withheld behind inappropriately applied Freedom of
information exemptions to unreasonably protect individuals and/or
the administration from reasonable, lawful and independent
inspection of their actions.

2. Hitesh Patel’s claim that he ‘did not know’ he was a director of
Digital City (UK) Ltd until his directorship of that company was
subsequently disclosed by a member of the public will not stand up
to open, transparent and independent scrutiny when the Chief
Executives report into Patel’s actions is finally released as a
result of this freedom of information request.

Until the requested information is transparently and independently
scrutinised it is impossible for members of the public to ascertain
whether criminal acts and a conspiracy to conceal such acts exist,
or that the withholding of such information is being done merely to
prevent the public learning further details of fiscal and legal
incompetency which may exist at the highest levels of Swindon
Borough Council than are currently available in the public domain.

I believe it was inappropriate for Swindon Borough Council’s
Director of Law & Democratic Services to be the officer who
considered and refused this information request because, on the
12th of October 2009, Mr Taylor had co-authored a cabinet member
briefing note with Hitesh Patel, (partially quoted below), which
authorised Patel, at some future date, to enter Swindon Borough
Council into a partnership with Digital City (UK) Ltd:

“That the Group Director Business Transformation will, on behalf of
Swindon
Borough Council, enter into a joint venture partnership underpinned
by a
Shareholders' Agreement with aQovia UK Limited and Avidity
Consulting
Limited to form Digital City UK Limited,

I believe that, on the balance of probabilities, Swindon Borough
Council’s Director of Law & Democratic Services and/or staff in his
office would, more likely than not, have been aware that Hitesh
Patel’s was already a director of Digital City (UK) Ltd before the
cabinet member briefing note was published and presented to cabinet
members.

At a cabinet meeting held in March 2010, Patel was challenged on
the issue of his Digital City directorship by Councillor Peter
Greenhalgh - Cabinet member for Transport. Stephen Taylor publicly
denied, (on Patel’s behalf although Patel was also present at the
meeting), that Patel was a director of Digital City.

Although Cllr Greenhalgh’s challenge, and Stephen Taylors denial,
are well remembered and documented elsewhere, the minutes of that
particular cabinet meeting do not appear to record the event. This
is one of several instances where the discussion of subjects
related to, but not limited to, this aspect of the public/private
partnership between Swindon Borough Council and Digital City (UK)
Ltd have been omitted from the published minutes of council
meetings.

The public trust in Swindon Borough Council and its ‘WiFi’ project
has been severely damaged by a belief, whether genuine or
perceived, that a culture of denial and concealment has been
employed by elected members and council officers to frustrate
public interest in, and scrutiny of the probity and competency of
officers and members involved in creating the Swindon Borough
Council/Digital City partnership.

I also note with interest that Councillor Derique Montaut, leader
of the Labour Group of Borough Councillors has stated that the
Chief executives report into Hitesh Patel’s Directorship at Digital
City (UK) Ltd should not remain secret, saying:

“I was asked by the Chief Executive not to publicly disclose any
information that was in the drafted report, if I decided to read
it. I did not agree that, if I read this report, I should keep the
contents of it secret. Therefore I decided not to read the report.”

I infer from Councillor Montaut’s that he did not wish to become
implicated in an orchestrated attempt to conceal facts which, in
his opinion, should have been made public.

I also note that despite Digital City failing to meet progress
measures set by the council, and the cabinet's subsequent
relaxation of those progress measures to such a low threshhold that
they were described in a cabinet meeting as "redefining failure as
success", the ‘WiFi’ project is now many months behind schedule if
not completely stalled.

The initial installation phase in the town of Highworth remains
unfinished and work in Swindon Town did not begin when promised.
The likelihood of the £450,000 loan being repaid in full and
on-time by Digital City (UK) Ltd seems remote and the projected
£700,000 profit by the end of year two, (December 2011), seems
unlikely to be realised by that date, if ever.

With the above in mind I believe it is entirely fair, appropriate
and in the public interest that the taxpaying electorate of Swindon
see the Chief Executives report in full, and I respectfully invite
Swindon Borough Council to take this final opportunity to review my
freedom of information request and supply the requested information
without undue delay.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is
available on the Internet at this address:

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/ch...

Yours faithfully,

Geoff Reid