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Cover up - Concealment - Conspiracy? - You decide.
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TOPIC: Cover up - Concealment - Conspiracy? - You decide.

Cover up - Concealment - Conspiracy? - You decide. 5 years, 5 months ago #1

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East Renfrewshire Culture and Leisure Trust (ECRLT) which was planned in June 2014 and came to fruition in 2015 was the brain child of East Renfrewshire Council.(ERC)

It was designed to be an arms length organisation, an ALEO, and would in theory save the council a shed load of money in things like, VAT, Taxes etc.

It was registered as a Limited Company and a Charity.

A board of trustees were appointed and a chief executive was selected and appointed.


Screenshot2018-09-0309.24.41.jpg

Anthony McReavy

Re: Cover up - Concealment - Conspiracy? - You decide. 5 years, 5 months ago #2

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Lorraine_Anthony_TrustSigning.jpg

Chief Executive of the council signing the Trust papers with Mr McReavy

Re: Cover up - Concealment - Conspiracy? - You decide. 5 years, 5 months ago #3

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However controversy was not far away.

The Trust has apparently been loosing money on a large scale, and ERC have required to provide three six figure cash injections, write a letter of comfort to assist them to break even and satisfy the auditors, and only in August write a further letter of comfort to the trust of unlimited funds until September 2019 in order that they can remain afloat.

In 2018 they refused to publish minutes of their boards meetings, claiming that they had not been approved at the following board meeting, and they did not require to have them approved or publish them.

However pressure was building with a complaint about to be raised with the Freedom of Information Commissioner and the minutes suddenly were produced.

Surprisingly one set of minutes indicated that when visiting the Board meeting the ERC Chief Executive had stated that there was concerns over the trusts finances.

At this months council Audit & Scrutiny committee a representative from Audit Scotland flagged up that the council should be paying particular attention to the finances of the Trust.

There have been a number of Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to the trust and the feeling of those submitting is that Mr McReavy appears to be reluctant to disclose any information, that it is felt should be in the public domain.

Re: Cover up - Concealment - Conspiracy? - You decide. 5 years, 5 months ago #4

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Now we will come onto the main issue.

On 27th September 2018 Audit Scotland produced a report regarding ERC.

This was being discussed at the councils Audit & Scrutiny Committee.

The Chair is Stewart Miller (Leader of the Conservative group) and his deputy is Barbara Grant (also a member of the Conservative group).

Near the bottom of page 120 at the end of a long list this was displayed.
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Re: Cover up - Concealment - Conspiracy? - You decide. 5 years, 5 months ago #5

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The question was asked by another Conservative on the committee as to why this man has been provided with a salary increase, given the financial failing of the trust was this a reward for failure.

Cllr Grant originally said that was not a matter for that forum (A&S) and was quickly reminded by the chair that it was a matter for Audit & Scrutiny.

Which elicited a reply that they (the board) would not have given it if they did not feel that he (McReavy) was worth it.

It then transpired that the award was made by the board of ERCLT and not the council, although it is the council that would have to pay the increased salary.

It also appears that no approval was sought or required from the council, they simply had to comply with the instructions of the ERCLT board.

Re: Cover up - Concealment - Conspiracy? - You decide. 5 years, 5 months ago #6

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The first question that arises is why did Cllr Grant not inform her group leader and chair of the A&S committee of this salary increase?

We can speculate as to the reasons, but it may be that Cllr Grant is not on talking terms with her chair and group leader?

No matter what the reason was it does not reflect well on the level of communications within the Conservative group and the question has also to asked, why did Cllr Grant not wish the subject discussed at that meeting?

We then submitted a FOI request regarding the salary increase and this document was produced by ERCLT (Mr McReavy)

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