Following on from Lutfur’s cab claims, next up are the taxi fares Deputy Mayor Cllr Ohid Ahmed billed to the taxpayer in 2011 and until June 2012, just to make his life a little easier.
His annual allowance for his role is £25,000, and he lives in Oban Street, Poplar, which is about a 10-minute walk to the Jubilee Line at Canning Town station and a 12-minute walk to East India DLR.
Yet he has twice billed us more than £100 for functions at the Houses of Parliament.
One was a return trip from the Town Hall in Mulberry Place on Feb 10, 2011, that cost £121. Now, it takes about 26 minutes by DLR and Tube to Westminster for a return fare of £4.20. And lo and behold, according to AA Route Planner, by car it takes…26 minutes! And, according to this online minicab quote, a return taxi fare would ordinarily cost £50. So this means, our supposedly cost-saving council is using an extortionate limo service, or our supposedly cost-saving deputy mayor has been keeping the meter running while he attends his very, very important meetings in Westminster.
His second trip to Parliament was on July 14, 2011, when he ordered a cab to collect him from his home and then return him to the Shadwell Centre for £122.
And I wonder what the barons at Unison feel about him charging taxpayers £140 for a return trip from Mulberry Place to their Euston Road HQ on Dec 14, 2011. Maybe, like millions of others who have no choice but to suffer it every day, Ohid just dislikes the Northern Line.
| Date | Fare | Venue | Comment |
| 22.10.10 | £17.17 | Ocean Estate | Photocall |
| 13.12.10 | £52.13 | House of Commons | |
| 15.12.10 | £25.89 | Cable Street | |
| 10.2.11 | £121.71 | House of Commons | Return to Mulberry |
| 12.2.11 | £106.43 | Baden Powell House, SW7 | Return to Oban St |
| 22.3.11 | £63.75 | Brick Lane | Return to Mulberry |
| 28.3.11 | £50.61 | Bethnal Green Tech College | Return to Oban St |
| 28.3.11 | £30.68 | Bethnal Green Tech College | Return to Oban St, seems to have been charged twice – see above? |
| 26.4.11 | £59.44 | Shadwell Childrens Centre | Return to Mulberry |
| 11.5.11 | £52.90 | Ocean Youth Centre | Return to Mulberry |
| 16.5.11 | £86.14 | London SOAS | Return to Oban St (1-way, Lutfur also went,returned separately, Lutfur’s total was £64.08) |
| 14.7.11 | £122.65 | House of Lords/Shadwell centre |
Oban St to House of Lords/House of Lords to Shadwell Centre |
| 14.7.11 | £3.30 | Shadwell centre | Return to Oban St |
| 2.8.11 | £51.69 | Pudding Mill Lane DLR | To and from Oban St |
| 9.11.13 | £22.18 | Bethnal Green Police Station |
From Oban Street |
| 6.9.11 | £36.11 | House of Commons | From Oban St |
| 9.11.11 | £90.85 | London Councils, London Bridge |
To and from Mulberry |
| 11/1111 | £59.45 | City Hall | To and from Oban st |
| 12.11.11 | £66.93 | Mansion House | To and from Oban St |
| 14.12.11 | £140.89 | Unison Centre, Euston Road | From Mulberry return to Oban St |
| 28.3.12 | £68.44 | Government Hospital | From Mulberry return to Stepney Green |
| 18.4.12 | £33.97 | Royal London Hospital | |
| 17.5.12 | £32.74 | The Royal regency, Manor Park |
This seems to be a function/wedding type venue |
| 17.5.12 | £56.34 | O2 Centre | Collected from the Royal Regency |
| 14.6.12 | £29.74 | The View, E3 | Collected from Oban St, returned (7pm) Chrisp St |
| TOTAL | £1,482.13 |
I wondered how deep this particular rot went.
My comments on the last thread seem particularly relevant: “As I’ve said before and will say again, it’s piggies in the trough, so deep you can just about see their tails. Odious, despicable, and when will it end?”
Welcome to Tower Hamlets; third world politics on every level. Ballot-rigging, corrupt officials and precious little accountability.
Tim.
Hi Ted. Keep them coming. The more that people know the better.
Thanks Ted. Given the experience of my dealings with THH there’s actually profligacy and waste at every level. One othercomment, when I FOI Tower Hamlets Homes, I usually receive un-auditable/un-verifiable spreadsheets + spin [for example Mr Crompton claiming ‘great savings’ and then being unable to quantify them: http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/wkconsulting_and_leasehold_servi#incoming-258693 and following] which ‘confirm’ whatever snake-oil is being peddled.
So, it would be interesting to see photocopies of the signed receipts, take witness statements from the drivers and tie up the amounts with tax declarations. In other word, an actual audit of whatever’s been presented in the ‘spreadsheets’.
It might work out cheaper in the long run to rehouse some of these hardworking, competent, diligent elected officials.
In my mind’s eye I have a vision of hoards of bengali voters re-electing these guys as they have only read about them in the bengali section of the “only good things happen in Tower Hamlets” East End Life or by watching supportive programs on the various bengali satellite channels. I hope I am being naive.
I hope somehow we can avoid Tower Hamlets going further down this road of electing on racial lines. My worry is that folk are voted for candidates based on the colour of their skin or their surname. The voting on the basis of “he’s one of us” will lead to the ghettoisation of this borough
Jhno,
Easy there. Such common sense will have you labelled a racist …
Thankfully, not all races solely favour their own in such a blatent manner. It’s a privilege reserved for the certain few (who also claim the double-privilege of Political Correctness to protect them.) See my comments on third-world politics above.
Tim.