Sandwell Council 'in danger of going back to discredited days' says former leader
A Black Country council is at risk of going back to its "discredited days", its former leader has warned the new boss.
Yvonne Davies, who quit as leader of Sandwell Council last year after being suspended by Labour over alleged anti-Semitic social media posts, claimed the authority had "gone backwards" since she left in an open letter to new leader Rajbir Singh.
Councillor Singh became the fourth council leader in the space of five years in May following a turbulent period when the authority was dogged by scandal.
Ms Davies suffered an ignominious end to her short tenure as leader after tweets she posted in 2017 and 2018 emerged and she was then suspended.
She said she had been cleared of anti-Semitism by the Co-operative Party, aligned to Labour which she is also a member of, and that she was unhappy at being "branded with such a despicable slur".
The ex-leader said she had started to make changes to ensure elected members were running the council and claimed Labour Party figures had previously wielded too much control at the authority, a view shared by former Labour deputy leader and West Bromwich East MP Tom Watson.
The controversial Wragge report on council land deals in 2016, which detailed allegations against former deputy leader Mahboob Hussain, put a stain on the council's reputation from which it has yet to fully recover.
An Express & Star investigation revealed last month how Sandwell Council was set to hand school transport contracts to Mr Hussain's son Azeem Hafeez, a former council employee who was also named in the Wragge report, before Councillor Singh stepped in to delay the decision. He denied any wrongdoing.
Councillor Singh has pledged to unite the borough's Labour group. But Ms Davies warned the authority was in danger of slipping backwards.
The Conservatives took eight seats on Sandwell Council at May's elections to give the party its first councillors in the chamber for almost a decade.
Ms Davies said in her open letter: "It was my opinion that the root of many of the past problems lay in the interference of the Labour Party hierarchy in the running of the council, creating a culture in which Labour councillors believed that their primary duty was to the Party hierarchy and not to the people of Sandwell.
"This represented a perversion of public service accountability and risked creating fertile ground for corruption, with party officials having potential to use favour and patronage, alongside fear and intimidation, to get local elected members to do their bidding. It can lead to use of public funds for political ends, and to the buying-off of officers deemed to be too challenging
"If the current situation is as it’s being portrayed leader you are at serious risk of taking us back those discredited days with the ocuncil’s leadership at risk of paralysis and only able to move on the say-so of Labour Party regional office.
"I would urge you to speak out on these matters, to stand up to any malign political interference in council business and to have the courage and conviction to provide the moral backbone that the council so desperately needs."
The Labour Party has been contacted for comment.
