Purchase of 10 Douglas Road, Colwyn Bay

Dear CCBC,

Please provide ALL information you hold with regard to your
attempted purchase of 10, Douglas Road, Colwyn Bay.

This must include:

1) Copies of the minutes of any meetings in which the purchase of
the property was discussed.
2) Information regarding what the Council want the property for,
why this house in particular?
3) Information on how the purchase is to be funded.
4) The decision process the Council used to decide it was worth
putting an offer of £120,000 on a property only reasonably worth
around half that amount on the open market.
5) The decision process the Council used to decide to attempt to
bribe a private purchaser who had also made an offer on the
property in an attempt to get him to withdraw his offer and then
keep silent about the Council's bribe.
6) How much the Council eventually agreed for purchase of the
property.
7) Details of any consultation with any external bodies, groups or
persons regarding the property.
8) Any other information not included in the above bullet points.

Steve Hunt

Conwy Council,

You are reminded you have BY LAW 5 days to comply with this
perfectly legitimate request for information.

You are already under investigation for numerous breaches of THE
LAW - I shall not hesitate to report you once again should you
willfully break the law yet further.

Steve Hunt

Mr Smith,

Whilst I digest the remainder of your reply, please could you
explain your response to points 4 and 5:

Point 4: "The premise of the question is not accepted" - what do
you mean by this? are you denying that the Council initially
offered £119,000 (as confirmed by Nigel Crabtree of Stirling Estate
Agents) for the purchase of this property?

Point 5: "No information is held" - that is clearly a LIE - since I
already have copies of emails from your Gareth Peters (with full
headers tracing them back to CCBC's computers). Are you then
stating on public record that it was Gareth Peters ALONE who
decided to try and bribe Arthur Jones with £1,000 of taxpayers
money? - IE there are no instructions from anyone higher in the
Council for him to attempt to bribe Mr Jones to keep quiet about
the Council's underhand dealings?

(copies of emails etc. can be viewed here:
http://voicesofcolwynbay.blogspot.com/20...
)

Please clarify the above two points and answer them fully - until
such times as they are, this FOI request remains outstanding, and
will be reported to the ICO as such.

Steve Hunt

Dear Mr Smith,

Point 4:
So, let me see if I understand you correctly: in layman's terms,
are you stating that the Council was prepared to pay around twice
the current market value for 10, Douglas Road in 2009, as if the
Council wanted to buy the property later on from whomever may have
owned it in the future, it would have incurred considerable extra
costs to the Council and/or the market value may have increased
significantly? So the Council made what perhaps might be understood
as a 'strategic purchase'?

Point 5:
I have copies of emails from your Gareth Peters to Arthur Jones
offering him payment in the sum of £1,000 on condition (quote)
"* that no offer is made by you, or your family, for the property
and that any previous offer is withdrawn
* that Conwy County Borough Council exchange contracts with the
Vendor of the property
* that neither you or your family release any detail of our
discussions between us or the sums being offered by any party to
any third party"

That email was sent on the 16th October at 15:10 (timed at 16:10 on
CCBC's mailserver) from the Council's mailserver named
mailgate2.conwy.gov.uk at IP address 193.62.43.119 (which has been
traced and confirmed back to CCBC)

SO, Mr Smith, do you deny that your Gareth Peters sent the email
containing the above to Arthur Jones?

With regard to the word "Bribe", which I use advisedly, without
malice or intent, I refer you to any standard English dictionary
for the meaning - since you seem to be unfamiliar with it. The
meaning of "Bribe" can be summarised thus: "anything (usually of
value) given or serving to persuade or induce a persons behaviour
or actions"

CCBC Offered Mr Jones £1,000 (IE something of value) in an attempt
to influence the behaviour of himself and his family (IE that they
should NOT make an offer on the property or release details of
discussions between the parties - as seen in above in the email)

Please explain how you consider this DOES NOT perfectly fit the
standard definition of "Bribe"

Yours lovingly at this festive time of year,

Steve Hunt

Dear Conwy Council,

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

I am writing to request an internal review of Conwy Council's
handling of my FOI request 'Purchase of 10 Douglas Road, Colwyn
Bay'.

Specifically, point 5 has NOT been answered. The Council is proven
to have carried out the actions described, as proven by the emails
in my possession, and now reported elsewhere in the media.

As set out in the Council's own constitution, the Council CANNOT
embark on such a course of action without it either (A) being in
line with existing Council Policy, or (B) there having been a
meeting of the full Council to discuss and debate the course of
action intended. In either case (A or B), the information I request
must by Law be recorded in such a manner as is retrievable under
the provisions of the Freedom of Information Act.

The FOI request is perfectly legitimate and reasonable - I require
a copy of the decision process used - which will either be a copy
of the relevant part of the Council's established Policy or a copy
of the minutes of the meeting of the full Council where it was
debated and decided that the Council should attempt to bribe Mr
Jones in the sum of £1,000 for him to withdraw his offer on the
property and keep quiet about the pay-off.

My understanding of the Law is that the Council is NOT allowed to
embark on a course of action in any other way (than A or B above) -
if I am wrong, please do correct me and direct me to the relevant
piece of legislation that covers the procedure the Council used? -
plus provide a copy of any documents etc. that were used in
whatever alternative procedure the Council used to determine it
should attempt to bribe Mr Jones.

Somebody, somewhere, within Conwy County Borough Council DID decide
to attempt to bribe Mr Jones, all I am trying to discover is under
what directive this decision was made, or in the alternate that an
individual autonomously made the decision outside of any official
directive, who that person was.

In relation to point 4 of my request, whilst it may be true that
£60,000 was not the market value, certainly the Council's offer of
£119,000 was clearly considerably in excess of what could be
considered by any reasonable person to be near to the true market
value. In any case, you have failed to explain how the Council
determined that £119,000 + costs was a reasonable sum of money for
it to spend on the property, given it is clearly way in excess of
the true market value.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is
available on the Internet at this address:
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/pu...

Yours,

Steve Hunt

How much longer is this internal review going to take? - 10 weeks
so far...

Steve Hunt

Mr Smith, as you continue to willfully break the law, I shall
naturally be making yet another formal complaint to the Information
Commissioner.

The information I seek MUST BY LAW exist and be recorded, and
therefore MUST BY LAW be released under the provisions of the
Freedom of Information Act.

Steve Hunt

I am still waiting for this information, which you DO hold and MUST
by law release.

Steve Hunt

So you ADMIT you DID try to BRIBE mr Jones then with taxpayers
money?

Regarding your reference to 'delegated powers' - this is irreleant
in this case. For point 4 of those 'powers', the purchase of 10
Douglas Road was not subject to CPO, and for point 11, the capital
value was well in excess of £5,000 limit.

I understand this matter has now been investigated by the Councils
external auditors KPMG, who have found the council were WRONG to
attempt to BRIBE a member or the public with taxpayers money.

I look forward to reading the full report by the Auditors when it
is published.

Yours sincerely,

Steve Hunt