Consultants’ report is latest damning review of Croydon’s badly-run council. By STEVEN DOWNES
Colm Lacey is to be removed from the board of Brick by Brick, the council’s loss-making house-builder, while funding for new schemes is to be frozen and all land transfers halted, under recommendations from consultants published today by Croydon’s bankrupt council.
Colm Lacey: removed from the board of Brick by Brick, the company which he mismanaged so badly
The report, from Price Waterhouse Coopers, is the latest fiercely critical review of the Labour-controlled council’s badly-run investment and development schemes.
In the case of Brick by Brick, the council has poured more than £200million into the firm since 2015 but has not received a penny back in profits or loan interest and repayments – a key cause of the council being forced to declare itself bankrupt with a Section114 notice 10 days ago.
The consultants criticise the poor financial management of Brick by Brick, where Lacey, a former council exec with no experience or background in running a commercial development firm, was appointed as its founding managing director and chief exec. Lacey is one of just two directors currently on the board at Brick by Brick, the other being chairman Martyn Evans.
A meeting of the council cabinet this week is expected to approve the removal of Lacey and Evans from the board, to be replaced by two senior figures in the reviews that have been carried out in Fisher’s Folly since the council’s finances went into a tailspin in May: Duncan Whitfield, Southwark’s director of finance and governance, and Ian O’Donnell, the CIPFA accountant who found 75 areas of the borough’s governance that did not meet best practice.
Lacey is also an employee of Brick by Brick – thought to be on a salary of at least £150,000 – though his position may be untenable after a reading of the PwC report. Some accountancy and business experts suggest that, given the parlous state of the company, he could be disqualified from holding directorships in future.
Martyn Evans: recommended that he be removed from board of BxB
The PwC consultants do not go into that.
But they do write, “Since its inception in 2015, [Brick by Brick] has been entirely dependent on funding from [the council] and to date (September 2020) has total borrowings of £214million.”
Referring to the 2019-2020 business plan, which Lacey himself presented to the council, the report’s authors say that Brick by Brick “… stated an ambition to deliver c.500 residential units per annum, targeting the completion of 14 sites already in development (307 units).
“Planned sales of £132.3million and a profit of £10.3million (7.8%) should have allowed the commencement of repayment of debt to [the council]. No interest or loan capital was repaid to [Croydon Council] in [Financial Year 2019-2020. [Brick by Brick] attributes this to a number of factors including delays due to covid, development issues and delays with actions sat with council departments (such as Planning).”
The PwC consultants are clearly less easily fobbed off with Lacey and Brick by Brick’s excuses for failure than the company’s owners, the council and Labour councillors. “We believe covid was a relatively minor causal factor given the year ended on 31 March 2020. We note there is no reference to a [Financial Year 2019-2020] impact in [Brick by Brick’s] March or April Board minutes.”
The PwC report is the latest damning review of mismanagement in Croydon
They continue, “The board lacks a qualified Finance Director. In addition, the business’ in-year financial reporting processes have significant gaps and must improve substantially.
“In many of the documents we have reviewed, the loans have breached their final repayment dates, and as a result [Brick by Brick] is technically in default on those loans. This is despite the fact that [Brick by Brick] continues to request further drawdowns against the loans.”
The PwC report makes no mention of the £6million in loans taken out by Croydon Council at the start of this calendar year to buy up two dozen flats from Brick by Brick, flats which Lacey’s company had been unable to sell as it was not registered as a recognised supplier of shared ownership homes.
The PwC consultants have, however, spotted how the council provided Brick by Brick with a secret subsidy by selling off chunks of public land at well-below true market value. Six sites were sold to Brick by Brick for as little as £1 each – an issue on which Lacey lied to a council scrutiny committee in February.
“The council has sought to comply with obligations under Section 123 of the Local Government Act 1972 in relation to best consideration for any land which transfers to [Brick by Brick]. However, there are inconsistencies and differences in the approach that the council and [Brick by Brick] have used in valuing the land, and where there are material valuation differences these should be better understood and resolved.”
The options for dealing with Brick by Brick – none expected to return to Croydon Council Tax-payers’ the money they have shelled out on the failed house-builders
For the time being, the council wants to continue providing funding to Brick by Brick on its many as-yet-unfinished building sites, but it will not be releasing any other plots of land for other schemes.
The consultants lay out the possible options for the failed building company, from continuing trading to winding it up or selling it off.
None of the outcomes will be particularly palatable to the bankrupt council that is in desperate need of the £110million which had been promised by Brick by Brick’s founders – led by former CEO Jo Negrini, and backed by councillors Simon Hall and Alison Butler, who together with their leader Tony Newman continued to proclaim BxB as some kind of success story, by any measure.
But as the PwC report states, “All of the options result in the council writing off substantial loan funding and accrued interest.”
The council’s interim chief exec, Katherine Kerswell, and new council leader, Hamida Ali, have had the PwC report since November 13, though last week Ali told a council meeting that she had asked the consultants to do some more work on it.
In the council’s report to cabinet, it notes that Kerswell and Ali have already met with Lacey where “the issues arising with [Brick by Brick] have been raised with the management”.
Determining the future of Brick by Brick, the report states, “will take some time”.
The report to cabinet explains, “There are over 20 schemes currently on site which have existing funding agreements in place, although some of these are past the repayment period. To stop [Brick by Brick] drawing down on those agreements could present cash flow issues with consequences that would further increase the risk to the council. It will therefore be necessary to make payments to [Brick by Brick] in line with current loan arrangements ensuring that conditions for funding are met.
“The purchase of completed units previously agreed in July…”, Alison Butler’s ever-so-convenient (for Brick by Brick) £30million deal for nearly 180 unsellable shared ownership properties, “will also need to be reassessed on a site-by-site basis and reviewed in the light of the resources available to the council.”
The PwC report, which has so far cost £125,000, also looks at other aspects of the council’s various commercial activities. It was due to have been presented to a council cabinet meeting tonight, but that has now been postponed until Wednesday.
Colm Lacey, therefore, would seem to have 48 hours to clear his desk.
Read more: Brick by Brick has paid nothing to council
Read more: ‘An accountant could have foreseen this more than a year ago’
Read more: Council forced to declare itself bankrupt
Read more: Officials to investigate possible wrong-doing at council
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NO more payments for total failure. This person should be giving away anything he’s been paid as it’s mainly our money!
These people are utterly shameless. I imagine that Lacey is already in touch with Negrini’s lawyers to negotiate his severance package.
This is not a matter of incompetence. The situation has arisen through an engineered response by those who have previously been in charge at senior levels to milk LBC of all the cash possible. Investigation needed to find out where the money has gone. Those in contempt should be brought in front of the courts.
Re BXB – “The severity of this situation has not been exposed until late in 2020” – page 104 item 8. On the contrary PWC, Inside Croydon has been extremely diligent in exposing delays, loses and the shambles at BxB for several years. I am pretty sure that Councillors and officers are amongst the readership but chose to do nothing.
Surely the time has come to wind up all the operations of Brick by Brick? There are still communities in a state of trepidation that some of the brutal, anti- environmental, anti- community schemes that were rubber- stamped by Scott might still be progressed.
There is no evidence that, even if completed, any of the half-baked enterprises will profit the Borough at all – in fact quite the reverse. The issues seem clear – stop it now, reassure the blighted areas that such is the case, seek compensation from all those who personally profited and sell off any assets.
It is one of the options being considered, according to the report, George, though it is probably the least good option, since it would probably see the council, and therefore thee Council Tax-payers, suffer the biggest financial hit of the various alternatives.
Having established that Lacey could not run a whelk stall, the task now is to extract the maximum value from those schemes which are part finished.
One important aspect of that – and unmentioned in the report – will be to resolve legal disputes that have arisen between BxB and its contractors.
But the notion that the moribund company and its discredited managing director might still bring forward a raft of new schemes for planning permission – as Lacey was attempting to do even as recently as last month – should be dismissed immediately.
The best option needs to be worked out. Local communities affected by B x B’s developments should be consulted about unfinished developments that could be altered if locals think appropriate and maybe a competition opened for innovative design ideas from architects and engineers.
“The consultants criticise the poor financial management of Brick by Brick, where Lacey, a former council exec with no experience or background in running a commercial development firm, was appointed as its founding managing director and chief exec”.
And yet, the council leaders who took the decision to appoint a person with no experience in commercial development walk away scot free!
I feel sorry for all staff who are victims of this convoluted saga,and who will lose jobs as a result.
In spite of the failings of Brick by Brick, I can’t help reflecting……. why Councils should ever have to resort to setting up these “arms length” companies ?.
Once upon a time, they had Architect’s or Technical departments with architects, quantity surveyors, building surveyors, structural engineers, clerks of work, and all the admin and backup teams needed to design and get new housing and major refurbishments built. Plus Housing development teams to commission the work, and in-house finance teams to manage the funding flow. Some projects were outsourced.
It worked. Fully accountable to the Council and Councillors. Projects delivered without need for unrealistic expectations and statements as to delivery speed.
Councils should be allowed to restore such direct delivery “in house”.
Jo Negrini set this company up, egged on by Alison Butler and Paul Scott.
She then employed her mate who worked with her in her previous job to run the company (he had zero experience running a development company or indeed anything in the private secrtor).
The company then bankrupts Croydon Council.
Why is Sean Fitzsimons not booted off the council? He is head of scrutiny and has completely failed to scrutinise brickxbrick or anything else for that matter. A waste of space.