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Council boss ignores questions over failing bus shelter firm

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CROYDON IN CRISIS: The start-up firm that promised to pay Croydon £6.8m in a 10-year deal for supplying all-singing, all-dancing ‘smart’ bus shelters has been warned it could be struck off the Companies House register from tomorrow. EXCLUSIVE by STEVEN DOWNES

Katherine Kerswell, the £192,474 per year chief exec of Croydon’s cash-strapped council, has failed to respond to urgent questions about the troubled state of Valo Smart City UK Ltd, the start-up company that the authority went into partnership with in what was supposed to be a money-spinning deal to instal “smart” bus shelters across the borough.

Valo Smart City UK Ltd’s directors have been placed on notice by Companies House officials that the firm could be struck off the register and dissolved within two months “unless cause is shown to the contrary”.

The deal between Croydon and Valo Smart City was one of the first commercial agreements for the council signed under its then new CEO, Kerswell.

The First Gazette notice of the company’s dissolution was posted on the Companies House website before the weekend, and comes into effect tomorrow, October 18.

The action has been taken because Valo Smart City, which was only registered as a company in August 2020, has failed to submit any company accounts.

Long wait: Croydon’s bus passengers have gone 18 months without the promised replacement bus shelters

It is possible that the company could file its accounts and pay off its unpaid bills, but it would need to act far more rapidly than it has managed so far in its brief and undistinguished existence.

If the company is dissolved, it would leave Croydon without its much-feted corporate partner and the promised £6.8million payments over the course of a 10-year deal.

It would also leave Croydon’s bus passengers without their bus shelters, smart or otherwise.

It was just a few weeks ago that a senior executive in the council’s “digital team” responded to questions from a concerned resident that “The project has been progressing well.”

But as Inside Croydon reported last month, Valo’s rented office suite on Lansdowne Road, the company’s registered address, has been long deserted. And the company has had two separate County Court Judgements issued against it this year for unpaid bills amounting to £31,800.

Formal notice: Croydon Council’s procurement process to find new providers of bus shelters began before Valo Smart City UK Ltd even existed as a company

It is not only Valo’s Croydon offices that seem deserted. Now, it’s their pals who are deserting them, too.

A British-based company, fronted by a former Blairite minister, has in the past fortnight sought to distance itself from Valo.

UK Partnerships, whose directors include Phil Woolas, the former Labour MP, issued a very up-themselves press release in November last year, boldly claiming, “Transforming the outdoor advertising sector, UKPL, who wrote and won the tender in Croydon on behalf of Valo Smart City, Croydon’s innovative scheme introduces digital advertising to replace paper posters and provides upwards of £6million of revenues to the hard-pressed council.”

But after Inside Croydon’s reports were published last month, UKPL posted a “nuffink to do with us, guv” statement on their website, distancing themselves altogether from any involvement with Valo Smart City. Today, the UK Partnerships website itself was not accessible. “The site is experiencing technical difficulties,” was the sorry message on display.

Unaccountable: Croydon’s £192,000 chief executive, Katherine Kerswell

The issue of what Croydon does about its bus shelters remains unresolved, however, 18 months since JC Decaux dug up their shelters from the borough’s streets after their long-standing agreement with the council had been cancelled because Kerswell and her staff thought they could get a better deal – with a company that didn’t even exist when they began the tender process…

Kerswell, meanwhile, has ignored an approach from Inside Croydon to comment on the latest bungled commercial deal at Fisher’s Folly.

We emailed the chief executive over the weekend with the following questions:

Katherine Kerswell has failed to answer.

Katherine Kerswell has failed to answer.

Katherine Kerswell has failed to answer.

We reckon it could now be perhaps hundreds of thousands, but Katherine Kerswell has failed to answer…

Inside Croydon’s loyal reader will need no reminding that this is the same Katherine Kerswell who commissioned the Penn Report into the running of the “dysfunctional” council (Terms of reference, para 11: “The report will be presented to the Council”) and who has, nearly two years later, refused to publish it.

Read more: #PennReport wanted police probe into possible misconduct
Read more: #PennReport: Staff speak out about ‘scandalous’ bullying
Read more: #PennReport: Cover-ups and denial over Brick by Brick failure


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