As the pieces of the jigsaw come together, the picture is scandalous The so-called Arch witchunt is another Tory smear campaign funded by the taxpayer and built on a mountain of lies

To set the scene on another Tory scandal, aided by an incompetent council CEO who is facing multiple bullying allegations and Director's of Arch who are literally playing politics with council tax payers cash, we will give readers an insight into the inner workings of 'Advance Northumberland', or as it was known ARCH.

Arch was maligned by the Tories from the get go, years out from the 2017 local elections. The attacks were part of a political plan to undermine the council's assets. In the case of Cllr Peter Jackson, that was illegal. It breached the Companies Act and it breached his own council's code of conduct. He was a director of a company worth £300m + and he still is although the value is fast diminishing with every political decision. 

Even the council's external auditor has expressed a 'significant concern that value for money will not be achieved' over the coming years. 

Three Tory councillors are playing politics with taxpayers money on a scale never known in Northumberland with no visible scrutiny or risk assessment.  

They've spent over £400,000 on additional audits and private sector investigators. One of the investigators is Crosland Consulting which Arch will absolutely not let anyone see the work they commissioned from this company. 

They spent at least £80,000 of taxpayers money on an investigation that uncovered that Arch bought former CEO house and made money for the taxpayer totally legally, that Ashington Football Club was supported by the town's largest employer Arch and that it benefitted from a spectacularly good bit of business when it sold the original football club site to Asda, that Arch attended events to generate more jobs and business for Northumberland and once bought a £58 bottle of wine in Cannes at an event where a bottle of house wine cost £58 because the town is expensive. They've investigated contractors they don't like politically and at least two come to mind, regularly smearing them through their political contacts in the Times newspaper and in their online blogs. 

So now the case to be presented that Arch is political smear operation today totally funded by the taxpayer of Northumberland and orchestrated by 4 Tory politicians and allowed to happen by a CEO at Arch transferred in from the NHS to do another CEO transferred from the NHS.

It is a smear operation because it seems to have halted its projects. Portland Park - stopped, Pipers Place, Bedlington - stopped, Blyth town investment plan - stopped, Cramlington Manor Walks investment - stopped, Prudhoe town investment - stopped, Hexham town investment stopped and a botched development in Berwick along with silence over the Ramparts EZ. 
Now for some evidence. 
Firstly, what would you say, with your open mind on evidence, if a director of the company had sent an email to someone admitting on 21st June that what was happening in Arch was 'just politics'? 21st June was first day of the official Tory witchunt in the first board meeting, the AGM. 

In isolation maybe that email is not compelling enough for you. 
But what if there was a story in a newspaper which demonstrated that Cllr Jackson was up to no good as a Director of Arch? This is the story in question

https://www.northumberlandgazette.co.uk/news/call-for-investigation-over-arch-breach-1-9196821

If you read the quotes in the story from everybody but Cllr Jackson who does regularly subscribe to the Mafia code of 'omerta'. You don't have to be Sherlock Holmes to detect a rather partisan flavour from Cllr Nick Oliver and Cllr Georgina Hill who are both central in the Arch witchunt. They are generally at pains to stress how 'independent' Crosland's investigation is but their comments are anything but independent. 

The inference drawn from the Tory reaction to this story is two fold once you pass their obvious discomfort - a) They won't investigate breaches of company law and b) they ascribe Cllr Jackson's actions as a director as something akin to 'whistleblowing'. He wasn't. He sat on the side lines picking up confidential information and never declaring an interest. He stood up at fundraising dinners attended by property developers and businesses and told the audience what they wanted to hear. That Peter Jackson would scrap Arch.   

The fact is that the only 'whistle' blown by Director Jackson is a dog whistle which was heard loudly by those who would benefit from one less competitor like Arch.

Cllr Jackson never raised a complaint about any action by Arch within the Board. Not a single one apart from an email sent to a director of Arch asking whether Labour councillors had been given Arch houses. Next week a story was posted on their smear sites which repeated the fake allegation. He regularly got sensitive papers as a board member, some of which were leaked, and they were commercially advantageous to businesses and individuals who Cllr Jackson did business with. He never raised a prejudicial interest. 

So why wasn't Jackson investigated because his actions were logged and they were brought to the attention of the company secretary? We'd love to see the Crosland report and if it was independent why keep it secret?

From the first day of the Tory administration on 5 May to 21 June 2017, Arch was operating in a highly irregular way. The Tories were gung ho especially Richard Wearmouth who remember, wasn't even a councillor until 25 May. He wandered around Arch, stopping at workers desks according to staff members. He was described as a 'lurker' over the coming days. The company started ignoring directors instructions and had commenced a 'review of its business' which you may presume was at the 'lurker's' instructions. Given Lurcio (you may remember Frankie Howard) close proximity to the scene and while he didn't become a director officially until 21 June at the AGM, could he and others have been making unlawful decisions? It is a distinct possibility and I wonder what Crosland Consulting would say about that period of time? Is this why the external auditor has issued a serious value for money judgement against Arch? These questions would have been answered if Arch had published their accounts? It's the first full year of Arch under Wearmouth and his board and the accounts have been signed off for over three months yet no tabling of accounts at Wearmouth's favourite committee, Audit Committee? What are they hiding?   

Much has been made of a 'police investigation' at the instigation of Northumberland County Council which is nearly one year old now. The police have categorically said on at least three occasions that 'there is no criminal investigation' despite claims by Tory politicians like Cllr Oliver that there is.

They both can't be right can they? 

Cllr Hills took to the floor in a recent council meeting to berate the new Chief Constable implying that there was a cover up and that was rebuffed by the Chief Constable. There may be unlawful behaviour happening in Arch but it is a reasonable point to highlight that the Northumberland Gazette story demonstrates that Crosland may not be looking in the right area. Why won't Arch act on these serious 'governance issues' since Lurcio is seemingly obsessed by governance during the last administration? Political smears by the Tories? 

Maybe he should be looking at events around 14 Feb 2017 when Arch took the unprecedented step of taking legal advice from the company secretary about the actions of Cllr Jackson? This episode took place right in the period Crosland was looking at so why no reference in his investigation? It is a serious breach by Jackson and could have resulted in his expulsion from Arch if he had responded to a letter sent by the Chair of the company on 16 Feb 2017. Jackson didn't respond and the issue was covered up after the election. But what happened to his prejudicial interests?  

So to the next segment of this expensive tale of political skulduggery. 

What would you say if Arch acted unlawfully when it pulled out of the contract with Galliford Try for Portland Park? 

There is credible evidence to suggest just that. We've already referred to the importance of 21 June 2017 when the new administration picked its directors of the company and the new chair, the secretive and duplicitous Cllr Richard Wearmouth (he was a councillor at this stage). It lodged the new directors at Companies House on 20 June. From 21st June, they could make legitimate decisions but all we've gotten is crude political smears.  

But why do we mention Galliford Try contract? 

The evidence shows that the contract was altered at a cost to the taxpayer of at least £7m but the true figure is being hidden by this branch of the secret council. This all happened prior to Cllr Wearmouth as a director who did not become a director and chair until 21 June. The announcement of the deal with Galliford Try hit the press on 18 June. 

There's no risk assessments given the huge financial hit on the company from such a settlement.

Arch posted a £5.5m profit in its accounts yet it lost more than that extricating itself from the Portland Park contract. How many more 'expensive decisions' by Cllr Wearmouth will be revealed in his first set of accounts?

There's nothing reported to Board meetings and this would be an extreme example of a governance breakdown of epic proportions. Can you imagine if the previous board had done this? 

It's clear that Arch is now being used as a political arm of the Conservative party which is a disgrace and hypocrisy of the highest order. It has been corrupted and it has been used to lodge baseless accusations against Labour politicians without evidence or real foundation. It is a taxpayer funded political smear operation.

  The real scandal isn't a £58 bottle of wine - it's the systematic abuse of power by a small cohort of individuals who have co-opted over £10m of tax payers cash to pursue a vendetta against a company that was set up to generate cash to offset their government's pointless, cruel and totally ideological austerity campaign. 

If they're so concerned about transparency and governance why don't they publish the Crosland Report and why don't they agree to an independent investigation into the matters listed above? 

Another strand of evidence from a third party source, a credible business representative body who stated in an email commenting on the other Tory scandal, the withdrawal of the core strategy

"The negative press, innuendo and lack of detail emanating from the transition to Advance Northumberland has clearly had an effect on the consultation. The apparent quoted ‘49 lines of police investigations’ for over a year with no news or updates have clearly impacted the interest in engaging with the consultation. As such, many believe the withdrawal of the Core Strategy to be political".

This person is not party political and they are drawing similar conclusions to this article. 

If you then consider Board minutes of Arch released under Freedom of Information with sections heavily redacted.

In the Board meeting of 25th May 2018, attended by Chairman Wearmouth, they reported that Hodgson's who were in a high value joint venture with Arch were pulling out of a project in Jesmond because of the negative publicity generated by the Arch witchunt 

This shows that the actions of the directors were costing the taxpayer cold hard cash.  

Hodgson's pulled out because of reputational damage to their company so what about the reputational damage of the Tory witchunt into Arch? So far, the public has been fed a story which is highly 'spun'. It is shocking that senior officers in the council have failed to protect the council from this concerted attack on the previous administration. Remember officers like the CEO were key witnesses to the actions as she was deputy CEO so we're looking forward to hear about what she did when the council was so 'badly run'. Officers have not let the public see any evidence of wrongdoing even though each point raised here has been documented and raised and they consistently lie about the role of Cllr Jackson as a director in Arch? 

So let's have a transparent investigation by an independent credible body. We promise that we will participate fully and I'm sure Arch and the council will do that too.

Or will they?