WALTER CRONXITE, political editor, checks the ‘facts’ where other local news outlets dare not look
Close friends: Tony Newman, right, and Steve Reed OBE, in happier times. The MP has been remained suspiciously quiet about the council’s financial crash
Steve Reed OBE, the MP who was Labour’s front bench spokesperson on local government at the time that the council for the area he is supposed to represent went bankrupt, claims that those who were responsible for crashing Croydon’s finances “have now gone”.
Given how little Reed said, or did, at the time of Croydon Council’s financial collapse in 2020, some might see his latest remarks as more than a little self-serving.
Not least because Reed had always worked very closely with the Labour councillors who were in charge at Croydon Town Hall from 2014.
They included council leader Tony Newman, whose partner Louise Szpera has been an employee in Reed’s parliamentary office at Westminster since 2012. According to the latest parliamentary register, she still works today.
Newman and his cabinet member for finance, Simon Hall, resigned their council positions in late 2020 and stepped down as councillors in early 2021.
Newman and Hall have always maintained that they had done no wrong with the over-the-odds purchase of the Croydon Park Hotel, the scandal of Brick by Brick, which borrowed £200million from the council but never made a penny profit, and the fiasco of the £70million Fairfield Halls’ bungled refurb.
Newman’s numpties: the Croydon Labour council cabinet in May 2018, 18 months before the truth about the Town Hall finances was properly exposed. Five of those pictured here are Croydon councillors today
Newman and Hall were placed on administrative suspension by Reed’s Labour Party colleagues in 2021, but they have never been subject to any further disciplinary action.
That might have much to do with the fact that through most of that time the General Secretary of the Labour Party was David Evans, a sometime Croydon councillor and former lover of Alison Butler, Newman’s deputy leader, who had overseen Croydon Labour’s local election campaign in 2014.
No action: David Evans never took further disciplinary action over Newman or Hall
Reed’s sudden bout of short-term memory loss might be even worse than anyone thought, though.
Still drawing councillor allowances at Croydon Town Hall today, more than four years since the financial collapse under the “Gang of Four” of Newman, Hall, Butler and her husband, Paul Scott, are Stuart Collins (another of Newman’s deputy leaders), Sean Fitzsimons (the much-criticised chair of non-scrutiny under Newman), Alisa Flemming (who was cabinet member for children’s services when they failed their Ofsted inspection in 2017 with such devastating impact on the council), and Clive “Thirsty” Fraser.
Also still councillors are Stuart King, Callton Young, Patricia Hay-Justice and Manju Shahul-Hameed.
Most served in Newman’s council cabinets. Several have been councillors in Reed’s own constituency, under previous or current boundaries. Some, including those who are no longer councillors, continue to exercise influence within CLPs, constituency Labour parties, in Croydon.
And it may have slipped Reed’s mind, but Stuart King is now Labour’s Town Hall group leader while Callton Young is the opposition lead on… checks notes… finance.
Perhaps no one at the low-circulation local rag that Reed was writing for bothered to check his “facts”.
The South London Press sells so few copies these days in its core patch of Lambeth, Southwark and Lewisham that they don’t bother registering with the Audit Bureau of Circulations, as most local and national newspapers do. The Catford-based SLP has negligible reach in Croydon, but since Reed got returned as an MP for the new constituency of Streatham and Croydon North in July, he’s started to produce regular columns for the once-influential paper.
It is all pretty routine stuff, titled “In My View”, in which the MP blows smoke up his own arse, boasting about what he has done for the constituency or, in Reed’s case as Secretary of State, for the environment. It might make a more interesting read if Reed included all the things that he hasn’t done for Croydon North, or for the environment.
Happy days: Reed out campaigning with Callton Young (centre), who is still a councillor, and Tony Newman (right) during a council by-election in 2016
There was a time, 12 years ago or so, when Reed even did a handful of similar columns for this website.
But it didn’t last long… Reed probably thought he had more important things to do.
According to Reed’s latest bit of self-promotion, “Croydon North has some fantastic communities…”, and he then goes on to deflect all blame for the collapse of their local council on the “14 years of Conservative failure”.
This is not the writing of someone proposing new, radical policy solutions, but more like the sales spiel of a sarf London used car salesman, hopeful that the next punter on the forecourt never notices the dents in the front bumper or the mileage on the clock.
Reed even references the housing crisis as if it is nothing to do with his political party, despite Croydon Labour’s dodgy track record with Brick by Brick and the shocking condition of council flats in Regina Road, as well as Lambeth Labour’s shoddy track record on housing in their borough – including implementing policies that had been introduced when Reed was himself council leader at Brixton Town Hall.
And Reed writes: “Croydon’s previous Labour councillors made mistakes, and it is right that those responsible have now gone.” Does Reed really think that the Gang of Four – Newman, Hall, Butler and Scott – were the only ones “responsible”? No one at the SLP thought to ask him.
And if he really is saying that his old mates were responsible for leaving behind the failed house builder and £1.5billion of toxic debt, what is Reed and Keir Starmer’s Labour Government going to do about it?
“Croydon’s current Conservative Mayor is failing our community here in Croydon North and communities right across the borough,” Reed drones on.
‘In My View’: Steve Reed’s opinion column in the SLP, where he gets his facts wrong
“Croydon’s Conservatives hiked up residents’ Council Tax by an eye-watering 21%…”, yep, and Callton Young, Stuart King and every Labour councillor ended up abstaining, rather than voting against, the Council Tax hikes. Two years in succession.
But Reed’s memory failure has struck again, and he fails to mention that, too.
Reed has, at least, been reading Inside Croydon, because he includes a phrase that this website used since its campaign that opposed Mayor Jason Perry’s 15% Council Tax hike in 2023: “Pay more and get less”.
Perhaps Reed will pay Croydon a visit in a couple of months, and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with residents when they protest outside the Town Hall against the next 5% Council Tax increase?
But don’t get your hopes up – Reed will probably forget to turn up. Again.
Reed more: Reed’s government shelves plans to help protect River Wandle
Read more: Newman should be chucked out of Labour, say activists
Reed more: Minister Reed attended unminuted meetings with water bosses
Reed more: ‘I don’t think it’s helpful you ask questions like this’ squirms MP
Read more: #TheLabourFiles: MP Reed, Evans and the Croydon connection
FREE ADS: Paid-up subscribers to Inside Croydon qualify for a free ad for their business, residents’ association or community group, just one of the benefits of being part of our online community. For more information about being an iC subscriber, click here for our Patreon page
PAID ADS: To advertise your services or products to our near 10,000 weekday visitors to the site, as featured on Google News Showcase, email us inside.croydon@btinternet.com for our unbeatable ad rates
- If you have a news story about life in or around Croydon, or want to publicise your residents’ association or business, or if you have a local event to promote, please email us with full details at inside.croydon@btinternet.com
- Our comments section on every report provides all readers with an immediate “right of reply” on all our content. Our comments policy can be read by clicking here
