Blog posted 01 October 2015

               CORNWALL WHISTLEBLOWERS

In response to the people of Cornwall no longer being protected against wrong doing by organisations like the Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, Cornwall Council, Devon & Cornwall Police and others, or if you work for any of the aforementioned organisations and others and would like to share what you know in the public interest and protect your identity, please contact me on writing via Geoff McLaughlin, 34 Timber Close, St Austell, Cornwall. PL25 5NZ. You do not need to state your name or personal details.

Sadly we in Cornwall are not being protected as we should and the media no longer reports what we, the public, should know. We therefore need to protect each other in order to correct this imbalance and for the greater good.

If you are an employee and you know your employer is doing things that is wrong and is not in the public interest you have a greater duty to your family, your friends and the people of Cornwall.

Pictured is Cornwall Council’s Mr Simon JR Mansell MBE FCILEX

Blog posted 28 September 2015

     CORNWALL COUNCIL’S VEXATIOUS POLICY EXPLAINED.

The moment Cornwall Council’s Mr Fixit Simon JR Mansell MBE introduced the Local Government Ombudsman Factor to the Information Commissioner Office as to why I should be denied Freedom of Information requests, the ICO’s hands were tied. That unless the ICO could prove the decisions by the LGO were wrong the ICO had little choice but to accept and agree with the Council’s reasons for not replying to my FOI requests.

This combined with the PHSO and the CQC has created an ‘Appalling Vista’ type situation.

That Cornwall Council’s reasons for invoking a modified ‘vexatious’ policy under Section 14 (1) of the FOIA was in some way due to my inability to accept decisions made years earlier by the LGO.

The introduction of a ‘vexatious’ policy is probably the most abused and dishonest way for organizations to avoid answering difficult questions. I recall my landlord Sanctuary Housing twice invoked a vexatious policy on me to avoid answering questions about a criminal Mediation Scam it had organized and funded and was covertly conducted by TPAS in a public place, a cafe, without the proprietor’s consent, or my consent to enter into binding mediation.

Sanctuary Housing Association is the largest social housing Landlord in the country with some 100,000 properties, and the Tenant Participation Advisory Service (TPAS), a glorified protection racket for Landlords, frequently advises Government. Not the kind of organizations one would expect to be short of funds but organizations which needed to bury my complaint as quickly and as dishonestly as possible.

The mediation scam remains unresolved to the day despite 2 Sergeants and 2 PCs from Devon & Cornwall Police at St Austell Police Station attempting to set me up to remove blogs from my website involving Sanctuary Housing, and, as a consequence, blogs about the Council. The IPCC ruled in my favour.

Cornwall Council first invoked a ‘vexatious’ policy on me in 2014 due to its inability to answer complaints and within in its own timescale. It then closed a number of complaints unresolved and blocked me from making further complaints for 1 year. This year it invoked a ‘vexatious’ policy to avoid answering FOI request but later applied it too broadly to exclude information I was entitled to receive. To overcome this the Council then introduced a modified vexatious policy, moved the goal post, to avoid answering questions by assassinating my character and by introducing ‘the LGO factor’ and the excuse I had upset Council members of staff .

The fact these members of staff had wilfully engaged in unlawfully rigging Welfare Priority Assessments for the Council and had personally abused my late wife was not taken into consideration by the ICO. Also not taken into consideration was the fact the Council sent me a threatening ‘Letter of Defamation’, itself vexatious, in 2014, advising me not to repeat the names of 2 members of staff on social media again.

To date I have now named and shamed 6 Council members of staff and a member of the NHS Trust on social media in excess of 500 times without being served papers for Defamation. That it is the Council who is responsible for upsetting its members of staff by not acting upon its ‘Letter of Defamation’ to protect and defend their reputations. This because the Council has no stomach for scrutiny. I consider the ‘Letter of Defamation’ is vexatious because the Council sought only to threaten me.

It is one of the most perverse injustices of all when you have a wilfully blind LGO protecting a corrupt Council using absolute discretion not to investigate serious allegations. The problems remain unresolved, they fester and the public remains without protection from further abuse. An LGO so perverse that she ruled in the Council’s favour before I had even been given an opportunity to respond to the Council’s reply to my complaint. Something most Ombudsman would find perversely unjust and wrong.

The Council’s assertion that the named and shamed are in some way ‘victims’ is grossly offensive when one considers the Council and its staff have knowingly abused and discriminated against many mentally ill and vulnerable adults who should have been supported and protected.

I close with a statement I understand was made in Parliament. The LGO “Operate the most perverse and publicly criticised system of administrative justice in the world”, unquote.

Blog posted 20 September 2015

The Abuse of the Mentally ill in Cornwall. An Open Invitation

Parliament has now used 5 so called “Independent Public Advocates” to protect a corrupt Cornwall Council and Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust who have jointly abused and neglected the human rights of the mentally ill and the vulnerable in Cornwall, and have engaged in criminality. This has also included the willful blindness of Cornish MPs, Cornish Councillors and a local Tory media.

If any member of Government, Parliament, MP or Cornish Councillor disagrees with the above statement, then please state your reasons to : geoffscameras@btinternet.com

(The 5 being the LGO, PHSO, CQC, ICO and the IPCC) (An “Appalling Vista”)

Blog posted 18 September 2015

THE ICO IS THE LATEST SO CALLED PUBLIC ADVOCATE TO CEASE PROTECTING THE PUBLIC.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) today ruled that Cornwall Council was right to declare me ‘Vexatious’ and deny me Freedom of Information Request and Reviews.

That although Cornwall Council and the Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust abused my late wife, and others, and abused her human rights and denied her a fair and honest Welfare Priority Assessment, and denied her the care and support she should have received up until she died within a year later, Cornwall Council is right to consider me ‘vexatious’ and does not therefore have to answer why the Council and the Trust have lied profusely, why the Council disregarded Council Policy and Procedures and how many mentally ill and vulnerable adults has the Council and the Trust jointly abused and discriminated against. All of these things being in the public interest but all subject to a continuing cover-up indirectly by the Governments so called public advocates who are no longer “Independent” or protecting the public but protecting central and local Government.

I regret the Information Commissioner Office (ICO) is no longer protecting the public.

In September 2014 Cornwall Council sent me a ‘Letter of Defamation’ advising me not to name 2 Council employees on social media again and who I alleged were party to rigged Welfare Priority Assessments by the Council and the Trust. In reply I named all 6 Council employees and an employee of the Trust. If the Council and the Trust and it’s employees truly did not abuse my long term mentally ill wife, and others, and did not abuse her human rights, why has the Council, or the Trust for that matter, not taken me to court ? Why will the Council or the Trust not protect and uphold the reputations of their employees if I am wrong ?

How can I be considered ‘vexatious’ when it is the Council and the Trust which abused my late wife and other mentally ill and vulnerable adults, and intimidated me with an empty threat of defamation ?

It will shortly be the 1st anniversary of the threatening letter from Cornwall Council and the only path left, having attempted to do it the proper way by seeking help from my then useless MP Stephen Gilbert, my new unhelpful MP Steve Double, the ICO, the perverse LGO, a willfuly blind PHSO and a deaf CQC, is to escalate the matter nationally and in the interest of all mentally ill and vulnerable people in our country.

Blog posted 14 September 2015.

Did SANCTUARY HOUSING suggest a tenant was “Dangerous” and was an alleged pedophile to stop the BBC showing a program about a SANCTUARY HOUSING and TPAS Mediation SCAM ?

The following is a cut and pasted entry from a weekly email sent to Sanctuary’s Managing Director Simon Clark, CEO David Bennett CBE etc..

I quote : “14 September 2015, I today report the further consideration of the malicious statement by a ‘Director of Sanctuary’ in 2012 who falsely accused me of being “Dangerous”, and within what context it may have been meant. I have also further considered why the BBC decided not to show the shot film footage and story compiled by the BBC Spotlight team in early 2013, which you knew about Mr Clark. Based on information I found out about this year that an alleged pedophile once lived within the Timber Close flats community, and the fact I once had to call the police because some house residents were attempting to kick my front door in thinking I was that alleged pedophile, I believe this was the event the “Director of Sanctuary” was referring to. That you Mr Clark then later suggested to the BBC that I was an alleged pedophile to stop the BBC showing the programme which concerned the Sanctuary Housing & TPAS Mediation Scam. Although Regional Director, and Bennett’s pet, Richard Keeley was found to be a liar by an internal investigation by Sanctuary, the meaning of “Dangerous” was not investigated. Also falsely being accused of being “mentally disturbed” and having “mental health issues” does not make someone “Dangerous”. Unbeknown to me the alleged pedophile actually lived next door to me up until he died. Interestingly when some house residents returned in the evening on the day they attempted to kick my door in, they attempted to kick his door in instead. Until such time as Sanctuary can explain the context in which it’s “Director of Sanctuary” considered me “Dangerous” I will continue to assume both he and you Mr Clark have willfuly and wrongly accused me of being a pedophile to your own perverse advantage.”, unquote.

Blog posted 09 September 2015

The following comment was removed by the Tory owned Cornish Guardian this morning despite the comment being true and accurate.

The “story” concerned a whitewash by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) to praise and protect the Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust on behalf of Central and Local Government which is hardly by “a team of Independent inspectors”.

“Wow, a story up-loaded by the CQC itself in a Tory owned newspaper, without a human interface according to the newspaper owner himself, involving a public advocate body, the CQC, which is no longer “Independent” or protects the public and has been corrupted by Government to protect it and its local Government Bodies such as Cornwall Council and the Cornwall Partnership NHS Foundation Trust from failures, negligence and the true cost of austerity.”, unquote.

Lets be honest the Government and its corrupted public advocates could not win an egg and spoon race without the use of superglue.

Blog posted 07 September 2015

         THE CORRUPTION & ASPHYXIATION OF THE CORNISH PRESS

When the Tories planned to turn Cornwall ‘blue’ in the run up to the 2015 general election, was acquiring nearly all of the Cornish newspaper titles, below, by Local World, part of that plan ? and did that involve corruption by an out going Office of Fair Trading ?

Was this one of the reasons why then MP Stephen Gilbert closed his constituency office a month before the election ?

The following 2 titles were not part of the above OFT package, but are Tory owned.

“We will harvest content and publish it without human interface”, unquote, David Montgomery, owner of Local World.

Montgomery’s vision was that press officers from the police, hospitals, councils, schools, businesses and other organisations should be invited to provide the majority of stories usually by self-service and given a large measure of control as trust developed.

This to some showed little understanding of, or respect for, quality regional content that often begins with readers pleas, claims or complaints against those very same organisations. That such a vision did not allow for the exposure and coverage of regional scandals and controversy.

If the OFT thought it fair and democratic for a county to be saturated by a Tory Press in the run up to a general election then the OFT really was corrupt and deserved to go. The trouble is Cornwall is now lumbered with an undemocratic Tory media which will only tell the people in Cornwall what they want the people to know. The likes of a corrupt Council, NHS Trust, Police Force etc. are not going to-up load what they would rather the people not know.

Article posted on 23 August 2015

THREAT OF DEFAMATION BY THE CHARITY SANCTUARY HOUSING

Dear Mr David Bennett CBE

Further to my email of 18 August 2015 to Sarah Warren, National Head of Customer Services, Sanctuary Housing, and others, I now address the threat of defamation.

You will recall Sanctuary’s lawyers Wragge Lawrence Graham & Co LLP, was paid by the Charity to ‘act for Sanctuary Housing Association’ and threaten defamation for an article I had written on my business website on 03 January 2015. That although I was clearly the author of the article Wragge & Co, on behalf of the Charity, made the website Hosting Company solely responsible for the article and for it’s accuracy, and threatened to sue the Hosting Company unless the article was removed.

The impact of this threat to sue was immediate and the temporary closure of my business website was threatened by Wragge & Co, on behalf of the Charity, if the article remained.

“That we request that the article in question be removed by 1pm GMT tomorrow (30/01/2015). If the article remains online at that point then we will disable the entire website until this can be resolved”, unquote.

That although the threat of defamation was not made to me directly, despite me being the author of the article and the owner of the website, the Charity did indirectly threaten my business and potential earnings and did impact negatively upon the good relationship I had with the Hosting Company and my website provider.

That the Charity did finance the suppression of Free Speech via the back door, which Wragge & Co went along with, in making the Hosting Company not only responsible for the article but responsible for the accuracy of the article.

In response to the threat of defamation upon the Hosting Company I reluctantly censored parts of the article only and after first copying and pasting it to another website where it has continued to be posted on social media in it’s original and un-censored format.

I will now repeat the parts of the article the Charity and Wragge & Co found objectionable in the hope I will, as the author of the article, be taken to court for defamation and be given the opportunity to substantiate that which I have stated. I quote :

“Featured picture this week, above, comes as a warning to would be Sanctuary tenants. It shows the consequences of external water damage to a 20 year old flat in Timber Close, St Austell. The damage was reported no less than 5 years ago and according to Sanctuary Housing the external water damage is the responsibility of the tenant to put right. The tenant is vulnerable, has long term mental disorder and is on benefits. The damage is very high up and would require special equipment.

Although Sanctuary’s Simon Clark, Managing Director, David Bennett, CEO, Cornwall Council and Stephen Gilbert MP have all long been aware of the problem, the problem remains unresolved thanks largely to the willful blindness and uncaring arrogance of the aforementioned.

This week’s “Mansell Award” is awarded to Sanctuary Housing’s CEO David Bennett who has just recently been awarded a CBE for his services to social housing. Apart from the fact the man is a criminal and the worse kind of rogue landlord in the country the award had nothing to do with the fact he is without honour and is a poor excuse for a decent human being.

For the criminality I have been personally subjected to by Mr Bennett and his perverse staff I think it more fitting if he was sacked, arrested and scrutinized in a court of law for willful fraud and deception”, unquote.

The first 2 quoted paragraphs were not mentioned by the Charity or Wragge & Co but they do serve to demonstrate that while the Charity was prepared to fund legal action it was not prepared to fund the repair of the external water damage which remains to this day, and which I find very perverse and negligent of CEO David Bennett CBE.

The above will be posted on social media and each posting will be numbered to indicate how quickly the Charity resolves this matter. I will use the photo of the water damage from the article whenever possible.

Yours sincerely

Geoff McLaughlin

34 Timber Close, St Austell, Cornwall. PL25 5NZ.

Criminally abused victim and resident of the Charity Sanctuary Housing Association.

Copyright 23/08/2015 – G R McLaughlin.

Blog entered 17 August 2015.

             THE EMAIL SANCTUARY HOUSING WILL NOT ANSWER.

The following email was sent to Sarah Warren, National Head of Customer Services, Sanctuary Housing, in reply to Changes to your Rent and Service Charge sent to me on 27 May 2015. The email was copied to Contactus@sanctuary-housing.co.uk, Simon.Clark@ sanctuary-housing.co.uk, heidi.hodgkin@sanctuary-housing.co.uk, claire.griffiths@sanctuary-housing.co.uk, office@stevedouble.org.uk, akerr@cornwall.gov.uk, simon.mansell@cornwall.gov.uk, pubaccom@parliament.uk, Laura Evans, panorama.reply@bbc.co.uk.

(Andrew Kerr, then CEO of Cornwall Council, has since left the Council without resolving one single outstanding issue since he became the CEO).

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sanctuary Housing

Estuary House

Peninsula Park

Rydon Lane

Exeter

EX2 7XE

09 June 2015

Pay Ref : ******

Dear Ms Warren

Changes to your Rent and Service Charge.

I refer to your letter dated 27 May 2015.

Before I address the 2015 – 2016 period I would first like to deal with the current 2014 – 2015 period.

With regard to the Grounds Maintenance Specification (GMS) for 2014 – 2015, please provide me with an explanation as to why I did not receive a copy of the GMS despite me asking CEO David Bennett CBE, Managing Director Simon Clark and Group Board member Judge Rosemary Crawley in writing every week since June 2014.

Please also provide me with an explanation as to why “Laundry Equipment – Non Contract Maintenance” appears on the 2014 – 2015 schedule for Timber Close.

Please also provide me with an explanation as to why the current Eligible Service Charge of £3.10 was reduced in March this year to the forthcoming July 2015 – 2016 Eligible Service Charge rate of £2.63, despite myself and the majority of residents still having to pay the higher rate.

With regard to the new 2015 – 2016 Eligible Service Charge period please provide me with a full breakdown of the services and charges indicated in the schedule, and please provide me with the GMS for 2015 – 2016 as soon as possible as well as any other information I am entitled to.

For the sake of clarity I would also like a copy of the Rent/Eligible Service Charge for the 29 houses for the 2014 – 2015 period, and a copy of the 2015 – 2016 period, which, up until a few years ago was provided to every Timber Close resident. Please also provide the same in respect to the houses owned and maintained by the Charity in Gover Road.

Simon Clark has refused to provide me this information in the past because he considers the information would not be classed as my personal data and he is therefore not at liberty to supply it to me. A long winded way of saying what was provided to every resident a few years ago is now confidential. Which is of course pretty disturbing in an age of transparency.

If you are of a similar mind I would ask you to simply provide my MP Steve Double with the requested information.

With regard to the weekly Service Charges you will be aware I have continued to pay this ” Under Protest” since 2009 when the charity ceased to provide a weekly maintenance service for many months despite taking weekly Service Charge payments, then resorted to criminality to cover-up the neglect and fraud.

This then led to an unlawful external mediation Scam funded by the Charity with approval from CEO Bennett, and which remains unresolved to this day. That the Charity has continued to make me a victim of a crime, and has continued to steal from myself and the residents to this day.

Only last week the Charity failed to perform the weekly grounds maintenance tasks specified in the 2013 – 2014 GMS, resulting in the residents paying in excess of £120.00 for the stated 2 hours work which was not carried out.

You should also be aware my current Service Charge payments are paid into an Escrow Account until such time as the Charity resolves outstanding issues since 2009, reimburse me the monies it was not entitled to take or demand, or take me to court.

Whilst I appreciate the Service Charges over recent years have been reduced in recognition of the serious allegations I have been making since 2009, the reductions also confirm myself and the residents have been willfuly, systematically and unlawfully robbed by the Charity.

Before addressing the Rent issue, which has increased every year in contrast to the Service Charge reductions, which I can only assume is not just another creative way of stealing from us, I would like to remind you of the shambolic 2012 – 2013 period. I do so because I still do not understand how a lot of very clever professional employees of the Charity all got it so badly wrong. That if similar mis-information was rolled out through-out the country and was not challenged the Charity would have benefited very nicely from it’s own mis-information.

I suppose the litmus test, metaphorically speaking, must always be that if mistakes and errors constantly benefit the one making the mistakes and errors it is probably more by design than by accident, like most cases of fraud.

You will recall soon after the introduction of the shambolic 2012 – 2013 period in June/July 2012, I challenged it and the Eligible Service Charge of £4.24 then had to be fully reviewed and was eventually reduced to £3.70, due partly to the inclusion of “Lifts – Engineering Inspection, Laundry Equipment – Non Contract Maintenance”, on the schedule, neither of which were applicable to Timber Close, and that an internal memo later suggested the reduction should have been more than 54 pence p/w per resident.

I can only assume the following 2013 -2014 period reduction of the Eligible Service Charge from £3.70 to £3.13, had more to do with that memo and that myself and the residents should have received a more accurate and honest reduction during the 2012 – 2013 period.

It cannot surely be lawful for the Charity not to correct and fully compensate residents soon after mistakes are realised rather than pocket some or all of the proceeds of that mistake. Reducing the Service Charge in the next period and reducing services or charging extra for services which were previously covered cannot make it right in the eyes of the law.

With regard to the Rent Increase of 2015 – 2016 I disagree with this increase for the same reasons I disagreed with the 2014 – 2015 rent increase in writing to CEO Bennett, Simon Clark and Judge Rosemary Crawley on 16 June 2014.

Specifically that I do not find it acceptable for the Charity to increase Rents when it has willfuly wasted many thousands of pounds keeping properties empty for too long in Timber Close due to it’s unlawful ‘ringfencing’ and deception activities for Cornwall Council.

Only recently another flat in Timber Close was willfuly kept empty for 6 months despite numerous complaints and a housing waiting list of nearly 30,000 applicants and few properties available to offer them.

With regard to the new Eligible Service Charge schedule for the 2015 – 2016 period I totally disagree with the introduction of “Communal Service Costs. Repairs to Communal Lighting inc Bulbs” with a Budget of £50.96.  Since when did existing responsibilities become new chargeable responsibilities ?

You may be aware I lodged a written complaint to CEO Bennett, Simon Clark and my then MP Stephen Gilbert in January 2015, concerning some of the flats communal solar lights not working. That I considered it a Health & Safety issue and that the lady resident below me nearly fell over one evening due to the solar light nearest to her flat not working.

When my neighbour complained to the Charity about this she was told the solar lighting was not the responsibility of the Charity.

According to my records Sanctuary’s Michael Howarth, Community Developement Officer, accepted responsibility for the solar lighting in 2009, on behalf of the Charity, when he stated  “In addition we plan to provide solar security lighting for Residents safety & convenience”, unquote.

My main gripe with the inclusion of this is that the largest and probably one of the richest social housing landlords in the country cannot take it’s existing Health & Safety responsibilities seriously until after it can be entered into the next Rent/Service Charge period.

When I worked for corporations £50.96 would have been considered petty cash and Health & Safety issues were never delayed.

What I find even more offensive is CEO Bennett is paid in the region of £314,000 a year for abdicating responsibilities such as this, not to mention the Charity money he has squandered protecting criminality by himself and his staff.

I also think it relevant to mention that a quarter of the flat residents are vulnerable single women who have all been subjected to the consequences of the covert and toxic human waste dump unlawfully created by the Charity for Cornwall Council. That throughout most of 2014 the police had to visit the flats community most weeks due to anti-social problems and criminality arising from the toxic mix of drunks and junkies constantly coming and going day and night.

I can assure you Sarah venturing out in the evening darkness with drunks and junkies roaming around in the shadows because some of the solar lights do not work would deter most male residents popping outside let alone female ones.

I am sure CEO Bennett, Simon Clark and Judge Rosemary Crawley will never forget my weekly written warnings in 2014 that someone would die here if something was not done, only for a young 30 year old woman to die here nearly 8 months later.

Perhaps they have already forgotten but I will never forget the sight of a black ambulance and the removal of a young woman in a body bag.

In closing, please also provide me with a full explanation of the new 2015 – 2016 entry “Communal Cleaning Costs. Internal Cleaning, Fly Tipping and Waste Removal”, costed at £160.16. To my knowledge “Communal Cleaning” is already provided free of charge by God when it rains, unless of course Bennett is hoping to capitalize on it.

I trust you will provide me excellent customer service Sarah Warren, National Head of Customer Services, it being the fundamental aim of what you do, and that you will be open and honest with me every step of the way to deliver a really personable service. That I am not just a number and that you will get my issues resolved.

Yours sincerely

Geoff McLaughlin

34 Timber Close, St Austell, Cornwall. PL25 5NZ

Criminally abused victim and resident of the Charity Sanctuary Housing Association.

From: Geoff McLaughlin

7 August 2015