The Crystal Road scheme is a pilot (in haste I actually wrote polit there at first – hopefully not a bad omen) project being tried by Blackpool Council in conjunction with the Homes and Communities Agency, intended to set a benchmark upon which their speculative £35m Foxhall blitzkrieg can be based.
Crystal Road is home to many neglected guesthouses and the project involves the council buying them up, converting them into modern family accommodation and either renting them out or selling them on a shared ownership basis.
All in all it seems a fairly honourable scheme. But perhaps it isn’t.
Last week I received communication that one of these properties was owned by a prominent Conservative councillor, who has just been compulsory purchased for £200,000 when the average price of property sold there in the last 10 years is £92,553.
I’ve done my own research and all I can find is that the Council’s consultants, Keppie Massey, have negotiated to buy out number 25/27 Crystal Road (a three-storey end terrace property) for £180,000. This property comprises of three self-contained flats and a maisonette and supposedly has an income of £20,200 per annum.
It doesn’t, on the face of it, fit the bill for the Crystal Road scheme which I believed to be about renovating abandoned and failing guest houses to provide accommodation for working families on low incomes. Buying this building doesn’t create any additional accommodation by doing up an old guesthouse, it simply modernises flats that are already there and in use.
Perhaps these images are a clue as to which councillor might have owned it. Seems awfully convenient, doesn’t it?
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My god, why are the council buying these, all they need to do is create a strict scheme that makes sure none of these hotels turn into a HMO and are instead converted into family home / town houses and let the private sector do the rest.
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Ah but this property was already three flats and a maisonette, and according to council documents was creating an income of £20,200 per year from Assured Shorthold Tenancies.
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Phil i dont know which councillor but if there is ac ouncillor involved, surely action can be taken against them? This surely stinks!
Enlighten me please.
cheers H.
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Well, Ian Fowler runs Boxer Scaffolding.
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lol, I might have known, that scum rag.
Well perhaps this will be his faux pas that will lead to the end of a Gary “Glittering” career in local politics? lol
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The meeting at which the CPO was approved was allegedly attended by the husband of the property owner. The said owner apparently declared an interest in being married to the owner then voted in favour of it!! I cannot confirm this as I cannot find minutes of the meeting. However, Gasjet “journo” Sheila Parkinson was present at the meeting and has yet to report on it!
Roll on the local election in 2011. Boxer Scaffolding, Kensington, VIP trips, CPO scams the whole truth will be laid out to the electorate.
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I am salivating at the thought!
It does say on the Blackpool Conservatives site that Susan Fowler’s family background is in hotels so perhaps these properties were left to her in a will since they were not purchased within the last 10 years (I have checked).
Still looks dodgy that that particular road was selected for this “pilot scheme”, and even more dodgy that a property owned by a councillor, that was in good order and was let out as flats already has been CPO’d for an inflated amount!
If of course this property was owned by a councillor!
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As for the Gasjet journalists being there, they wont publish this unless Peter Callow releases it to them as some sort of expose!
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I looked for the minutes of the meeting too, but it was one that was recommended to be closed to the public I think.
Wonder why?!
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My understanding is that the property was owned by Cllr. Susan Fowler.
However, I do not recall seeing it in the register of members interests when I checked it just over a year ago!
Boxer scaffolding was of course!!!
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lol this gets better!
FOUL player by the FOULERS! lol
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It’s a shame there’s almost nothing on the Blackpool council site about the Crystal Road project.
But if they are using the project as a vehicle for acquiring the assets of “favourite” councillors at super-inflated prices then I am hardly surprised.
I’m astounded that if the Gasjet know about this, they have not published it.
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This could all be innocent of cause just a bit of financial luck for the Fowlers, yeah right. However even if it was whiter then white at a time when politicians of any colour are hated for corruption and milking the system council should not be doing this. Bell was caught taking back handers but it doesn’t look to be a isolated case become a councillor and rake the money in. It would be nice to think that the electorate would take note and stop voting for theses crooks but it would appear that conservative voters are sheep like in their voting patterns.
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Strange comment John given that people here are generally Conservative voters and are the ones actually questioning all this. Too biased to accept what’s staring you in the face on this one I think. Had Ron Bell not been mired in scandal I don’t think you’d have Gordon Marsden in this time based on what happened in the rest of the immediate area.
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I think John is paraphrasing TB, and it’s a fair point although until I took interest in this kind of issue a year or so ago I was blissfully unaware of the murky goings on within local authority and voted for the rosette so for the most part John has a point.
In 2011, however, people will be finding out about corrupt councillors.
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There are a couple of things I disagree with you on your comment Frustrated for a start philtheone readers and posters are all conservatives’ voters. They aren’t not Harold isn’t I’m not I could carry on naming others but I won’t. The second thing is that the Kensington scandal stopped Blackpool South going conservative. Bells vote increased there wasn’t much made of it by Labour or Libs both Labour and Libs votes fell. I mentioned it because time and time again people post that Labour voters are Lemming like in their support of Labour and Conservatives are far more disconcerting about who to vote for. I think the last election proved that if Kermit the frog was a candidate for Labour or the conservatives then the core Labour and Conservative voters will do the same and vote the frog in.
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If there is concerned interest it is easy to find out who the owner is.
The Land Registry will have the information.. Cost you £3 to access it though!!!
To be honest Ron Bell was caught out, there are obviously others ‘AT IT’.
Seems the council have opened a consultation document on the Core Strategy for the town..
Not sure if you need to be signed up to their consultation program to access it ( I am they sent me an email this morning) but it is here.
http://consult.blackpool.gov.uk/portal/core_strategy_preferred_option?pointId=1201302#document-1201302
May throw a little more light on what exactly they do have planned for Crystal Rd.
It is not only here they are buying up properties. I know of 3 or 4 in Rawcliffe Street 1 certainly in Moore Street and there are others. Some have been bought and left empty for over a year now. Only sign of life from the council is the security van popping round maybe once every six weeks.
One of them still has the gas central heating on 24/7 I think as I have heard the boiler firing up through the exhaust vent when walking past…
3 Guesses on who gets to foot the gas bill!!
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In response to John’s comment earlier that now is not the time for council policy to jump in bed with councillor personal interests, can I just emphasise that if this property was owned by the Fowlers, you should remember how close (at least) Ian Fowler is to the fallen Ronald Bell JP of Kensingtongate infamy.
He was Ron Bell’s campaign treasurer, I understand he was the one that took the Kensington money and he was one of three or four that dodged a disrepute charge because he wasn’t “acting as a councillor” when he accepted the cash from Kensington.
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I do agree phil even if this was in the best interest for the council there is no way that it cannot look dodge.
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