Table of Featured articles. Click on them to read

Freshwater Polluted - Large Property Group deprives Tenants

CMI deprive Widow  of £40,000 + by changing investment without authority

FSA Question Informed Investor

Do You Seriously Want to be Defrauded ?

The Truth - Why Endowment Policies are Failing

Inland Revenue use nasty tactics

Islington Borough Council - Legal abuses

The Pimps of The Financial World

 Ally Soper's Political Corrections

cacWhere is the money Invested in the Life Assurance Company of Pennsylvania ?

Benefits Fraud ? This is being caused because of the Benefit Laws

PENSIONS THE REAL REASON FOR THE FAILURE

The practice of intimidation and negligence does not only take place in the private sector.
A disturbing case involving Islington Borough Council has also been brought to our notice. This involves a tenant of over 15 years standing.

Obviously every lease with a council has a clause in it whereby the landlords must keep the premises in good repair and once notified of a defect should repair it. Such a defect are holes in the roof. In the case we are going to relate the holes in the roof were reported to them in August 1999 and now, FOUR years later, as of September 5th 2003 the repairs have not been completed.  Although a Mr Hudson actually turned up on September 4th 2003 to inspect the property.  In that time considerable damage has been to the tenant's property, her heating bills have increased and she has ended up under the local health authority for stress and anxiety which made it impossible to work.

Now the Islington Borough Council are taking her to court to evict her for not paying £2.70 per week of her rent. Over a period of over a year the legal department of Islington Borough Council have refused to deal with her representatives on the pretext that they have no authority to do so. Such authority was sent by the tenant over a year ago.

Further they have a practice of erroneously serving council tax summons on people and they refusing them access to defend their cases in front of magistrates.
This they did to the same tenant in June 2000 and although the tenant and her representative immediately went round to Islington Town Hall and lodged a complaint no action has been taken.

Even the Mayor of Islington, Joe Trotter, at that time informed the tenant that he was passing the matter to Louise Round, the head of the legal services at Islington Borough Council. Louise Round has failed to respond in the same way as her department has failed to respond to the tenant's claims for damages to her property, excess heating & cleaning bills and compensation for the stress caused and the medical condition created by their actions.

The tenant's claim is for in excess of £30,000 whilst the eviction is over £2.70 per week! The people who are guilty of this state of affairs are :
Louise Round- Director of Law and Public Services and her assistants
Raj Pathak and Ms Thalmarajah as well as Chris Brunning in their  Northside Housing Office. 

As of the 18th of November 2003 an agreement was reached whereas the London Borough of Islington withdrew their eviction order and agreed to pay £3000 to the tenant. Further a recorded conversation was held between the legal department  of Islington Borough Council and the tenant's representative in whichthe Council agreed that the tenant retained her parking space outside her abode and any amounts outstanding were to be taken from the £3000. 
Unfortunately for the tenant the document she signed on November 18th 2003 just said that she could re-apply for her parking space. 

Throughout the period of dispute there had been a sign on the Citroen car saying that the parking space was subject to a dispute and any action was sub judice. The so-called parking representative a Mr Riley in the Northside office was kept informed about this by the tenant's representative

 He was also contacted by the legal office of Islington Borough Council about the agreement and the price to be paid. So what does this Riley do? He orders that they car is to be taken away and crushed.
This happened on the morning of November 21st , just three days after the agreement was signed.

On noticing the car was gone the tenant phoned round and also spoke to the police. The Police were so disgusted that their officer stated that he would use it in police lectures. Riley's first comment was that " He had forgotten to order the crushing to be stopped!" The legal office of the London Borough of Islington also tried to ascertain what had happened.

The legal office have now written to state that they take no responsibility.  

Around the estate where the tenant lives one can regularly see burnt out cars, smashed telephone boxes and the Lamb Hotel ( established 1855) has had to shut because of the local vandals. 

It is obvious to our reporter that those vandals are only taking their example from Mr Riley, the car smasher from Islington Borough Council.

He had been clearly notified of the legal position over many months, but feels that he can bypass the legal system and both remove and smash third parties' possessions. In case our article is considered racist by Ms Round ( see below) we must protest that we are unaware of Riley's colour, creed, political bents or his sex. We only know that, with the knowledge of the tenant's medical condition and the efforts made by all to assist his actions are not in tune with this season of goodwill.

This article is being sent to the Islington Borough Councillors, the local Member of Parliament and the Mayor of London.  We want to know how Islington Borough Council can explain why this man still works for the London Borough of Islington, or if they condone his actions. If any readers of this article can give further details of this type of action in the London Borough of Islington please call ourselves.

The following is a letter received by fax on our article!!!

Dear Mr Davey

Re: LBI v Tenant — CKI 13900

I have been passed copies of your recent correspondence with Mr Raj Pathak.

You should note that cases in the Magistrate’s Court regarding Council Tax matters are dealt with by the Finance and Property Services Department and, accordingly, your complaint to the Mayor dated the 8th February 2002 and received by me on the 9th February 2002 was referred to that Department by me on the 10th February 2002. Similarly, Right to Buy issues are the responsibility of the Housing Department and I have passed details of the allegations you have made to that Department.

Notwithstanding that many of the issues you have raised in your article do not relate to the work of this Department and have little or no relevance to the proceedings for possession instigated by the Housing Department, I will endeavour to provide you with a response to all the issues you have raised in your article on the website by the end of the week.

The article on the website is defamatory of the four named council officers. The words "Have you tried that amazing restaurant in Highgate Village? It’s called ‘The Last Days of the Raj’” cause me great concern. Not only are they defamatory of Mr Pathak but they are threatening and suggest that serious harm may befall Mr Pathak. They also amount to harassment within the meaning of the Protection of Harassment Act 1997. I believe your comments may also be motivated by race which would render the harassment under the 1997 Act racially aggravated pursuant to Section 32 of the Crime and Disorder Act 1998.

The Council has a duty to ensure the welfare of its staff and is unable to tolerate the comments made on your website.

The following information is provided pursuant to Paragraph 2.3 of the Practice Direction to CPR 53 and this letter should be treated as a letter before action prior to a defamation claim being made.

1. The Council alleges that the words “The people who are guilty of this state of affairs are…”, together with the general tenor of the article, convey the notion that the named officers have behaved improperly or negligently in the course of their employment;

2. The Council alleges that the words ‘The last Days of the Raj’, together with the general tenor of the article, and apart from being pejorative and insulting, convey the notion that Mr Raj Pathak has behaved in a way which has been improper and/or otherwise negligent so as to put his contract with the council at risk.

If you do not confirm by 5.00 p.m. on Wednesday the l0th September that these defamatory/racially motivated comments have been removed from your website, the Council will take such action (including an injunction under the Protection from Harassment Act 1997, the Crime and Disorder Act 1998 and for defamation) without further notice to you.

Mr Pathak is no longer dealing with this case and you should address no further correspondence to him. Mr Jonathan Wragg is now dealing with this matter and all further correspondence should be addressed to him.

Yours sincerely,
 

Louise Round
Director of Law and Public Services
 

Response to Louise Round
From the Editor: www.ukinformedinvestor.co.uk

As editor of the Informed Investor I have read your letter to Michael Davey and can only presume you have some sort of racist fixation. Our article was completely based on fact and we have seen the full correspondence on this matter.

It is obvious that until August 20th 2003 no one in your department had  dealt with any of the points put to the London Borough of Islington both by the tenant  and Drummond & Co. If that is not negligence or something far more serious then please advise us what it was.

Whilst you select the staff that work for you telephone calls to both Ms Thalmarajah and Mr Pathak were dealt with in an arrogant and offhand way and we have the right to comment on this. If it is defamatory it is because their actions have warranted such. As for your paragraphs about harassment we have no idea about the ethnic background of your staff and even if we did it  would never alter anything we write about the facts. My own background would actually make it impossible for me to utter any racist feelings against Mr Pathak or any other minority race. We believe that you are so busy trying to 
bluster your way out of the way this case has been conducted that you are  just
trying to sidetrack onto a non-existent situation. 

If you can not tolerate the comments made on our site then we shall be  pleased to report that you have corrected the situation and we shall then be pleased to commend you on admirable actions. I look forward to doing such, for I am sure that you too want to see a fair and just outcome.

Martin Geppert
Editor www.ukinformedinvestor.co.uk
and syndicated sites

Send your grouses to:

Help Other Consumers !

Help other consumers avoid the same pitfalls that you have experienced... 

• Email your grouses to the Private Enemy No.1 column totally public, free, searchable database

The entire world can read your grouses !
 

See the  Selected Grouse

Help Yourself !

Send your complaints to businesses... 

• You provide the e-mail address (you must register with an informed investor email account)

• The business is notified that your complaints have been posted for public view at Private Enemy No.1

Giving you, the consumer, greater clout in getting a better result to your grouses !

You may remember some time ago that we promised you more about landlords who utilise the law to maximise profits. One such group has for many years become the scourge of the elderly.  They are Daejan Properties Ltd. part of the Freshwater Group.     Those who are a little older may remember that William Stern, who was married into the the Freshwater family was the biggest bankrupt of his time.  We mention this because the case we are relating to you included the unfortunate elderly lady losing her savings with Mr Stern's failed insurance company Nation Life.
 

An elderly widow had lived in her flat in central London since 1951. Throughout that period she had always paid her rent on time. Originally she had a series of leases but in the latter years of her life she had become a statutory tenant. She had always been on good terms with her landlords and had found them helpful. As with older blocks of flats in Central London these Victorian blocks came under the eye of the new breed of landlords.  In 1987 the widow's husband passed away. He had always looked after the family arrangements. At that time the block of flats, known as Bickenhall Mansions covered a large area in Baker Street with over 200 flats.

In the early seventies the then landlords split the flats up under groups of about 30 and created different owning companies.
 Those companies were then sold on and each flat had a 125 year lease on it. Here the fun began because there were three different types of residents. There were those who had purchased their flats, those who were owning flats and letting them, and there were leasehold and statutory tenants. Each of these had different involvement's, which created many problems.

Without going too deeply into that we shall now concern ourselves with a group of 32 flats, of which our widow's was one. They had in 1987 belonged to a property group called Local London. At that time the Housing Act, which gave tenants the right to buy was in place. Local London desired to sell the 32 flats and offered them for tender in groups of 5/6.  Our Widow and another neighbour approached the selling agents with the intention of purchasing their flats. However Local London did not wish to sell them individually. The tendering did not reach the required amounts and Local London went about trying to sell all 32 flats at a cut-down rate to another property group.

In 1988 they sold the 32 flats to Daejan Properties Ltd. At no time did they offer the flats to the tenants as proscribed by law. It was ascertained that the widow's 6 room flat had been sold for £120,500. This was with the widow as a statutory tenant. It's open market value without the widow's tenancy would have been in the region of £500,000 at that time.

 The Widow and her solicitors wrote to both parties stating that she wished to purchase her flat as proscribed by law. The then solicitors for Daejan Properties Ltd (who were later struck off by the Law Society) stated erroneously that statutory tenants had no such rights. The law stated that they did. Then a majority of elderly tenants approached Daejan Properties Ltd. to purchase under their rights. Daejan's reply was to state that they had not bought 32 flats but 32 single flats and they did not have to offer them to the tenant's group.

This was again untrue and substantiated by the selling agents.   The plan was obvious. Most tenants were elderly and there would be substantial profits if they were to leave or die. Further to the inconvenience of the tenants extra penthouses were being built on top of the building. The weight of which were to cause problems at a later date.

In the meantime the widow was 75 years old. Her flat was being neglected by Daejan Properties Ltd. and she had to get a court order for the landlords to rewire the flat because of dangerous electrics. Eventually the workmen came to rewire. At the same time, because of the penthouse development, the flat was on the outside covered with scaffolding which had an outer tarpaulin and all outer windows were then sealed with a see-through polythene. The result of this was that for some nine months the tenants had no air and were subject to dust and debris.

The workmen, who had come to rewire, ripped up expensive carpets and broke expensive chandeliers causing some £20,000 worth of damage. They assured the widow that all this would be put right. It never was. For two years the widow's pleas went on deaf ears. The destruction of her flat had been witnessed by local councillors, who visited the flat whilst campaigning to be re-elected.

After 2 years the widow took legal advice and was advised to refrain from paying rent until the cost of the damage had been recouped. This she did under s.4 of the Defective Properties Act. In turn Daejan Properties Ltd. sued the widow for rent which was well under the £20,000 damage caused by their agents. At this time the widow, now well into her eighties, was suffering from Alzheimer's disease and was medically and legally judged not to be able to look after her affairs. Her son was appointed " guardian ad litem".

Her son answered the summons with a counterclaim for some £370,000. This was made up of the £20,000 owed for damage to her property under the Defective Premises Act and a further £350 of equity in her flat, which Daejan Properties Ltd. had deprived her of (The difference between the purchasing value and the open market value). From the moment that her son was made guardian ad litem he had received no communication whatsoever from either the courts or Daejan's solicitors.
 

Then one day in November 1993 both the widow and her son were informed by the resident agent that Daejan Properties Ltd. had received judgement to have her evicted. The son appealed against this decision as the counterclaim had not been heard, but was informed by the judge that it was his duty to find out.  So after 43 years an 82 year-old widow with Alzheimer's disease was evicted from her home. Daejan Properties Ltd. had in a few short years of harassment scooped an extra £350,000 plus of value. Nice work if you can get it? Multiply this by the other 31 flats and the many thousands of properties on their portfolio and you start to dream of the profits that have made the Freshwater family the 26th richest in Britain. ( Sunday Times list).
Both before and when the widow was moved her son provided their solicitors with a forwarding address for any future dealings. This address was provided twice both in 1993 and 1994. Again the son heard nothing from Daejan Properties Ltd. or their agents. The Widow moved to another flat near Hyde Park for 12 months and then to a house with her grandchildren from April 1995 - December 1996, eventually passing away in April 1997 after a short spell in a residential home.

Once more however, unbeknown to the son, Daejan Properties Ltd. had obtained in January 1996 from the court a bill of costs amounting to £11,968.66p .  Did they forward this account to her son at the address provided. No, instead it appears they sent it to the address that the widow had vacated in March 1995. So when her son was discharged of his duties as guardian ad litem in April 1997 he had received no word whatsoever of the outstanding amount.

Once a person has passed away all dealings are passed on to the executors of the diseased. Therefore her son had no control over his mother's assets after she passed away. His term as guardian ad litem had by the nature of her death terminated. The document from the courts states that the costs should be paid by the son (guardian ad litem for the widow).  But do Daejan Properties Ltd. go to the executors ? No in the following October they send a processor to the house where her grandchildren are and served a Statutory Demand on her son for the costs. Such a demand can lead to bankruptcy.

Once again Daejan Properties Ltd. had changed solicitors and the son still had no contact from their solicitors at the provided address until the beginning of 2001. He carefully explained the situation and denied responsibility. But did Daejan Properties Ltd. change spots and proceed properly? No in June 2002 they served a statutory demand on an unsuspecting janitor in Somerset. The son accepted the demand, provided an affidavit in reply and attended the Royal Courts of Justice on September 10th 2002. Guess what? Daejan Properties Ltd. nor their agents appeared. The statutory demand was dismissed.

Down in sunny Somerset, where the cider apples grow, there is growing concern in regards to Benefit law. You may have seen all those adverts in regards to benefits fraud, and that you should shop someone who has not declared their earnings.

But take heed before you shop them. For it must be easier and cheaper to take them to court than to do the paperwork if they declare their earnings.

There is in operation a system called "One". This has combined all the benefits agencies together. So whether its income support, job seekers allowances, housing and council tax benefit or child benefit the various agencies inform each other.

So we have Mr X who is on job seekers allowance and housing/council tax benefits. He has no work and signs on every fortnight and our welfare state pays him and his landlord. Then fortunately he gets offered two hours work for £200. Being truthful and honest he declares it. Suddenly the job centre lists him as self-employed and do not pay him any allowance for that week, but continue to pay him thereafter. He does not lose his long term benefits and remains on the the job seekers register.

All very simple. No it isn't for it seems that down at the South Somerset District Council Offices he is now listed as no longer being on benefits. So when he gets his benefits the following week he has to make a completely new application for housing/council tax benefits. This entails filling in an elaborate form, enclosing identification, bank statements, employment statistics. The Council Staff then have to completely reprocess the job seeker as a new applicant.  In the interim demands for the full year's Council Tax go out and his landlord is informed that housing benefits have stopped.

To earn £200 and then because of your honesty to get a Council Tax demand for £640 and the prospect of having to pay an extra £300 per month in rent as well as not receiving the £50+ per week job seekers allowance is frightening. This is without the hours spent filling in forms, if they can be understood. Is this the Peter Principle gone mad?

This has been taken up and letters have been written to the head of the UK Job Centres, the Director of Resources at South Somerset District Council and with the local MP David Laws. Acknowledgements have been received by all. 

The local job centre stated that they had informed the South Somerset District Council that the applicant's claim for job seekers allowance was not terminated and there had been a continuous claim for some ten months. The Benefits Manager in Yeovil for South Somerset D.C states " I agree that this red tape conspires against those genuine people who are prepared to take work whenever they can. Those honest people become entangled in a bureaucratic web of nightmare proportions. I, and many of my colleagues, have made representations to Government about this, and other aspects of these regulations, on many occasions."

The local Member of Parliament, David Laws MP states " I think that there are two problems here- firstly it seems that an error has been made between the Job Centre and the South Somerset District Council Offices. Secondly, you are right in saying that the Government rules for benefits and incomes are very strict and they often make it difficult for people on benefits to earn small amounts of supplementary income. This is actually an issue that the District Council Benefits Manager has highlighted to me, and I have written to the Government about this matter."

If you follow what is happening down the line it is obvious that the cost of this in terms of people hours and wages etc. far outweighs the amount of revenue lost if the applicant had been dishonest.

Further evidence of the comprehension of company law and disclosure has been shown recently when an "investigator" from South Somerset District Council came without appointment to question the aforementioned Mr X, a housing benefit recipient in his 60s,  renting two rooms in a house owned by a property company.

This investigator, appropriately named Peter Fear, did not enter the the recipient's premises but the general vestibule. On the wall of that vestibule were a list of registered companies belonging to the Directors of the property company.

Mr.Fear is demanding from the tenant full details in regards the companies, their telephone accounts, their bank accounts and their accounts. These have nothing to do with the tenant who answered honestly.

Come back Arthur Daly you are a bargain to the tax payer. 
Please take this to your MP this state of affairs is ridiculous.

CAUSE FOR CONCERN £41,868 LOST THROUGH INVESTMENT BY DEFAULT