At first sight, this one is straight from Comedy Central. Greece is in a bit of a pickle. It’s had a bit of a problem with corruption, and with how its politicians spend public money.
So who better to call in for a bit of advice than a special hit squad from Tower Hamlets?
Here’s a tweet from Stepney’s Tower Hamlets First councillor Mahbub Alam.
“The delegation team” meeting with MPs & officials #Greece #Athens #Syriza @TowerHamletsNow @CllrOliurRahman pic.twitter.com/iceSPpMBqG
— Cllr. Mahbub Alam (@MahbubAlam01) March 27, 2015
Yes, that’s Deputy Mayor Oli Rahman, two of his cabinet colleagues, Shahed Ali and Shafiqul Haque, as well as Mahbub, sitting there facing Greek MPs in Athens two days ago. Thanks to Alam, here are some other photos from their trip: 
Where to start? As Private Eye’s Rotten Boroughs editor Tim Minogue remarked on Twitter last night….wtf. First, the hat. In the first picture above, it’s resting on the head of the deputy mayor, Oli Rahman. He says it was a gift from George Galloway. 
Indeed, he does look like a mini-George and Oli was once upon a time one of his Respect councillors in Tower Hamlets. In fact I’m told that Oli, like George, has also taken to cigars. I’m not sure if he’s started wearing leotards yet, but you never know. 
There are other links to Galloway with this trip as well. In that fourth picture above, showing a tasty meal in Athens on Thursday night, you can see sitting at the far end of the table on the left hand side as we look at it, Kevin Ovenden. A socialist philosopher mathematician, he was for very many years the left hand side of Galloway’s brain (the right being the slightly more creative Rob Hoveman).
Kevin has been in Greece for some time and is no doubt excited by the rise of the Syriza party there, but I’m assured this Tower Hamlets delegation was not his doing. It was all Oli Rahman’s idea, Oli told me this morning. He called me from a Greek train slightly distressed after one of their wider group had just been robbed of their wallet.
So why are they out there and who’s paying for it? When asked about the latter on Twitter last night, Mahbub (who has a fondness for travel, especially if it’s supported by public money..), had this to say:
@catoverton_99 @VisitGreecegr @TedJeory We are here at our own expense and in solidarity those in Greece resisting austerity & fascism — Cllr. Mahbub Alam (@MahbubAlam01) March 27, 2015
They flew out on Thursday and are due back tomorrow. Also with the four Tower Hamlets councillors is Haringey’s Labour councillor, Isidoros Diakides (left), who is co-chair of the London-based Greek Solidarity Campaign. There are also officials from the NUT and Unison with them, including the Tower Hamlets council branch secretary John McLaughlin
Yesterday, they all met a group of Syriza MPs in Athens, the party’s head of international affairs, a local mayor and a member of the Greens. As one Tower Hamlets politico said to me yesterday, it’s difficult to understand who exactly is advising who.
However, while it’s easy and perfectly reasonable to mock and laugh, there is a serious side to this. Greece has a serious problem with racism and a growing one with fascism. Golden Dawn are neo-Nazis.
Last year, there were cries of “scandal” after a Greek court acquitted two farmers of shooting 28 Bangladeshi migrants who had been claiming back pay for their strawberry picking work. Very good accounts of the story are here and here.
Oli told me this morning there are some 700 Bengali businesses in Athens alone, many of which are struggling with the austerity measures. Oli thought that most of the Bengalis in Greece did not have Greek passports, merely indefinite leave to remain there. I asked whether any those he had met there wanted to come to the UK. He said if some were “given the possibility to, they would come”. However, he added many others simply wanted to pursue a life in Greece.
He said the Greek MPs and the Greek Bangladeshi Chambers of Commerce wanted to hear about how the racism of the Seventies and Eighties in the UK had been defeated. Oli said the MPs were amazed and impressed that people of an Asian immigrant background had conquered such prejudice and were now running a major London authority. “They were fascinated about that,” Oli said.
I asked Oli what he’d been most impressed with so far and he highlighted a movement set up by Syriza MPs called ‘Solidarity for All’. Each Syriza MP donates 20 per cent of their salary to it for humanitarian causes such as food distribution.
That’s wonderful, I said. I asked him whether he and other councillors in Tower Hamlets would do that, ie donate 20 per cent of their allowances to such causes. At first he said the deprivation in Tower Hamlets was nowhere near the scale of Greece. I pointed out there were food banks crying out for money. I said he’d be setting a fine example.
And then I think he got it. He said he would add a line to a motion he’s already submitted on the issues in Greece for the next council meeting. That should be an interesting vote.
So something good might well come from their diplomatic efforts. Overall, good on them for going.
On a lighter note, I asked Oli if he’d heard anyone using the word “malaka” around him. “I don’t speak Greek, mate,” he said, “but I think so, yeah.”
Bless.
Have these people no shame? Sill question, scratch that. I wonder if they will be declaring received hospitality?
Things must be very bad if in Greece if they’re invitimg this bunch of idiots and unelected morons to offer any assistance. As they say in Greece – kati vromaei!
The answer is they have neither a sense of shame or irony either. This is all going to backfire, particularly for Syriza. What is the right wing Geek press going to make of this.
Yes, indeed a Silly Question. The obvious answer is NO that have no shame and do not know what shame actually means.
How is any of this actually helping Tower Hamlets folk ?
Curious Cat.
Dear God.
@TGR – what’s the rule regarding receiving and declaring hospitality of monetary value as publicly elected…someone? I mean is the mark to declare receiving hospitality valued over a fiver the rule? Lets here the rules and then I’ll enjoy the speculation.
Unelected morons need not declare presumably but yeah, village idiots…
And what is it with that stupid looking hat? What moron would look to emulate George Galloway? He’s hardly a style icon! He’s known more for his skills at herding weak minded sheep like undividuals by blowing smoke where the sun don’t shint – but any filthy means, being a complete hypocrite, and being despised by 99% of the UK. Especially the Jewish community, as he’s gone against them to suck up to other communities and obtain votes. The tw*t in the hat springs mind. Stick to selling cheap IT equipment, and stop making suck a fool of yourself councillor!
Hopefully Galloway will be joining the ranks of the unemployed after the election.
I laughed aloud at the sentence
What moron would look to emulate George Galloway?
Being a mere mortal I honestly do not know. Perhaps someone badly in need of urgent NHS psychiatric treatment ?
CC.
Does their command of Greek extend to klepto? What’s interesting is who or what initiated the whole thing and do the Greeks know about the current situation in Tower Hamlets?
What possible “advice” do they have to offer? How to run elections to stay in power? I suspect all communists are born instinctively knowing that.
And do I believe they paid for that out of their own pockets? It probably came from the bank accounts none of them have…
Where are the Commissioners?
#toolittletoolate
The cost will be of interest here. I can’t see any of them paying for the trip themselves.
On Oli’s Facebook page on 26 March, he says: ‘I will be leading a delegation of strong team of 12 members, to the Greece, Athens at the invitation of the current government.’
The 12 members apparently included a number of ‘union and community representatives.’
It is unusual to be invited and then have to pay the costs.
What gives these people the right to claim to represent Lbth? Sine of them aren’t even elected. Surely if this was legitimate, it would be a cross party and possibly more diverse group?
Not one female, nor non-Bangladeshi in this group. These fools should hang their heads in shame. Look it up it the dictionary, it’s near shyster! Let’s hope that fois are submitted, and the right questions asked regarding expenses, hospitality, scope of visit, what was discussed and what promises and/or agreements were made. I can only hope that some hear the calls from across the border and bugger off for good!
I think what is needed here is a FoI to get to the bottom of how this thing started and who is paying. I will start a request in the morning.
@Dave Roberts – bless you man for cutting through bulsh*t! Get the FoI and share it here!
Well done. Please share the results….
At the moment, the FoI of Tower Hamlets isn’t answering the phone!
Presumably the outcome of this may have local consequences
http://www.lgcplus.com/news/politics/greenwich-newspaper-battle-heads-to-high-court/5083787.article
It’s funny, I always assumed that people became councillors to benefit where they live. Yet these people do it for the money, the percieved power, the cachet, or the ability to rubber stamp their friends’ dodgy chicken shop applications and divert funds to their own crooked divisive and often criminal groups run by their crony companions. They should remove the salary, and demand that anyone applying to stand is of sound moral fibre, though that would probably result in about 50% of Lbth councillors being struck off. Quite a few MPs Also!
Don’t get me started on that crook Pola Uddin. She should have been stripped of her title and slung in the slammer years ago. What sort of message do we send when we fail to act upon criminal behaviour like hers! I really do despair!
Have a look at the Love Wapping blog to which I give a connection for the details of Lutfurist groups that have had there grants stopped. I will look at the ones that were limited companies and do some digging.
Once a company ceases to exist, its bank accounts should be shut down and all activities on its behalf by the former company officers or employees are ultra vires and those carrying them out personally liable.
Unfortunately we can’t get rid of her. She’s there for life. Well worth a look at http://www.lovewapping.org for a tongue in cheek approach to how to stop voting fraud in Tower Hamlets. First Nigeria, next Tower Hamlets.
One of the organisations that was denied funding is allegedly the Women’s Education and Health Trust that was supposedly removed from the register at Companies House on the 30/4/13. A search of both Companies House and The Charity Commission draws a blank on anything of that name yet it seems Rahman gave them thousands of pounds. Any further info?
The company in question was registered at Companies House under the name WOMENS EDUCATION AND HEALTH LTD, company number 07488282, dissolved 30/04/2013.
The Companies House struck this company off the register on 30/4/2013 because of non filing. This company never filed the accounts. It would be interesting to know what happened to the grant given to them.
More importantly, what checks did the Council do on this,and other companies that had not long been in existence and had no financial track record before and after granting the money.
That company is a bit strange. It was registered at 39 Piggot St E14 7DH. The directors were
Imarana Begum DOB 1991
Mahubaba Hassan 1967
Nazia Hannan 1990
Sophie Barnett 1963.
I can’t find any trace of them anywhere else and as it is possible to start a company in the UK without proof of identity the whole thing could be a fraud.
If people don’t want to post information here I can be contacted at spanfoods@gmail.com which is my company.
Companies House (which is run by a private company on contract to the government) have repeatedly told me in writing there is no legal obligation to check anyone’s details.
Consequently it is possible to find several different director’s identity numbers for the same director.
————————————–
WOMENS EDUCATION AND HEALTH LTD
39 PIGOTT STREET
LONDON
E14 7DH
Company No. 07488282
30/04/2013 STRUCK OFF AND DISSOLVED
Date of Incorporation: 11/01/2011
Company Type: PRI/LTD BY GUAR/NSC (Private, limited by guarantee, no share capital)
Nature of Business (SIC): 82990 – Other business support service activities not elsewhere classified
Last Accounts Made Up To: (NO ACCOUNTS FILED)
Last Return Made Up To: 22/07/2012
——————————-
SECRETARY: BEGUM, AMINA
Appointed: 01/09/2011
Address: 8 WEST INDIA HOUSE WEST INDIA DOCK ROAD E14 8HB
Directors – common address: 39 PIGOTT STREET E14 7DH
BARNETT, SOPHIE
Appointed: 11/01/2011
Nationality: BRITISH
Date of Birth: 03/03/1963
BEGUM, IMRANA
Appointed: 01/09/2011
Nationality: BRITISH
Date of Birth: 28/04/1991
HANNAN, NAZIA
Appointed: 11/01/2011
Nationality: BRITISH
Date of Birth: 23/01/1990
HASSAN, MAHABUBA
Appointed: 11/01/2011
Nationality: BRITISH
Date of Birth: 21/01/1967
07/08/2012 TM01 APPOINTMENT TERMINATED, DIRECTOR APHSANA BEGUM
Data obtained from a public register.
Curious Cat
=> Dave Roberts,
If you want to track-down the directors, then my advice is for you to visit the address of the company secretary AMINA BEGUM (date of birth 02/02/1970) who was also a director of a now bankrupt company called NEW TEC TRADING LTD (07451024).
Mrs Begum was the only official of WOMENS EDUCATION AND HEALTH LTD to use her home address. It therefore seems she is likely to be a truthful person. Visit now whilst you know her current address. Delay and you may lose the trail to the 4 directors.
@Dave Roberts – what’s the latest on FoI? Have you emailed them also? Keep us posted man!
Can’t get through on the phone so I have made the application by email.
I was warming to your human empathy for a bit. Till you called him a wander. You patronising wander
Off topic. I’ve just learned that Rich Mix venue is under threat of closure by London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The dispute is over the repayment of an amount of money that Tower Hamlets is demanding be made in one go, which would result in the closure of Rich Mix. I can’t believe, LBTH is spending taxpayers money to close the venue the local community is benefiting from.
More info at: https://www.change.org/p/the-mayor-and-london-borough-of-tower-hamlets-council-don-t-put-rich-mix-at-risk-of-closure.
Julie, the “local community” however that is defined have never benefited from Rich Mix. It was always a vanity project and like all council run venues, look at Ocean in Hackney, never made a profit.
Councils should be there to provide the bare minimum of basic services and the entertainment industry in particular should be left to private initiatives.
I am a resident of TH and am benefiting from Rich Mix. The council does not support this venue, which is a registered charity, since 2009. And I would not mix “entertainment industry” with culture and arts hubs.
I have to use this to reply to Julie. Because you are a resident doesn’t mean that all residents are like you. Rich Mix was for a small and unprepared to pay, obviously, section of whichever community because it couldn’t survive financially. It may well be a charity but we, the tax payers, aren’t so it is going under unless it pays whatever it owes to Tower Hamlets. Simples!
The Council funded Rich Mix to the tune of £850,000 and supported it. There were even Councillors on its board. For some reason,the Council no longer wishes to fund it and is asking for the money back. Rich Mix say it was a grant, the Council say it was a loan. Despite this, Rich Mix offered to repay it by instalments but the Council want it back as one lump sum. Rich Mix says it hasn’t got enough money to repay it all at one and may go bust.
For once unbelievably i have to agree with the council.Its about time Rich Mix was closed down,too much council tax has been thrown at it.Like the council it is overstaffed with managers doing nothing.Ninety per cent of the events and activities are absolute rubbish,just catering to the arty farty crowd who gather here nightly.This place has seriously contributed to the massive rise in anti social behavior which now blights the area.Anyone who doubts this just walk around the back of the centre and see the damage in graffiti done to peoples homes and businesses,walls etc.With no action taken by the police or council.Holding a New Years Eve party here till 4.30 in the morning was not a great idea.Every week residents have to suffer sleepless nights and anti social behavior because of events here.The police and council are correct to state this,but they never act.Where are the councils enforcement officers you cry.Well most of them,instead of patrolling the worse areas are usually to be found guarding both ends of the road the Mayor resides in ,in Brick Lane.We must ensure Lutfer gets his eight hours.He’s got to look good for all those snappy snaps in East End Life.
We can remember all the local Labour luvvies Rahman himself,Galloway and ex ice skater Oona King rushing to praise and falling over themselves for patron stars when the centre opened.Not quick enough to pledge their own dosh to the project,Talking of Oona is she still pocketing a nice six figure sum as Chan Fours diversity offer!What does she do all day,you would be hard pushed to classify this as a part time job.Must be watching reruns of Hollyoaks.By the way is this channel also defendant on our taxes.What ever happens stays open or closes it will cost the tax payer dear.
To bring this post back to topic.Shahid Ali would be better of tackling the shit hole that is Tower Hamlets,dirty streets,graffiti etc rather than enjoying a jaunt to Greece.
Hopefully the bizarre trip to Greece is not being funded by the long-suffering Council Tax payers.
Just popped-in because I am keen to hear Richard Mawrey’s verdict, which – when I receive a copy – I will publish on the Internet in full. It may take a few days to finish creating (by hand) the web pages.
I spent between 4 and 5 hours reading and studying Day 29’s transcript on http://towerhamletselectionpetition.org/news/?p=99
Baroness Pola Uddin’s behaviour was unbelievably. In my opinion she is unsuitable to be in the House of Lords.
I never discovered what Ted’s new job is ….. please tell me.
Best wishes to all,
Curious Cat
Just found this one, actually someone alerted me as I never look at his blog, Dave Hill is still defending Lutfur Rahman and is predicting that Tower Hamlets First could win Bethnal green and Bow if they stand a Parliamentary candidate.
http://www.guardian.com/davehillblog/2015/apr/01/lutfur-rahman-party-could-challenge-labour-in-east-end-constituencies. If that doesn’t work just google Dave Hill.
Hill was, and as far as I know still is, one of Ken Livingstone’s biggest arse lickers who is only allowed to blog on the Guardian because his wife is an executive and his salary boosts the family income. He consistently gets it wrong on everything and his latest missive is a masterpiece of non speak.
His, and the liberal left in general’s, mistake was to back Rahman against Labour by portraying him as a traditional left wing leader who was being vilified by New Labour because he had stood up to Tony Bliar and the Condems and it was all to do with Iraq and Afganistan and institutionalised racism etc etc.
As far as I can see Hill is now alone with the loonies of the Socialist Rapists Party in defending Rahman and you have to give him credit for being consistently stupid if nothing else. Have a look and lets have a discussion about a Guardian ” journalist” who doesn’t know what they are talking about. Or are there more of them?
YOU HAVE THE WRONG URL
You omitted the prefix from guardian.com (which is THE)
Instead of :
http://www.theguardian.com/davehillblog/2015/apr/01/lutfur-rahman-party-could-challenge-labour-in-east-end-constituencies
You want
http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/davehillblog/2015/apr/01/lutfur-rahman-party-could-challenge-labour-in-east-end-constituencies
Greetings
Curious Cat
It looks like the Guardian have deleted it from the link I gave but you can still get all the shit from ” Dave Hill and Lutfur Rahman”. Good reading.
It’s worth googling Andrew Gilligan and MEND where you will find several articles. Our old friend Azad Ali has popped up yet again in MEND which seems to be the latest in a list of Islamist front groups that have managed to dupe the government yet again.
@Dave Roberts – from Google just read a brief rebuttal on http://mend.org.uk/andrew-gilligan which seems to sh*t on Gilligan’s face. Perfect for this eggplant!
Leaving Gilligan aside lets get back to this article, specifically if the cost of THF trip to Greece has been funded by our hard earned tax money.
The costs of the trip, and all incidentals, just can NOT come out of public funds because public funds are for the borough’s residents benefit – its difficult to imagine what genuine justification anyone can “invent” for this latest abuse of Council Tax payers cash.
It seems like FRAUD !!! (Fraud Act 2006, fraud by misrepresentation).
Are these elected representatives planning to open a cut-price holidays (in Greece) and airline flights company for the benefit of the borough’s poor ?
What next ? An all expenses paid holiday to Australia ?
Just longing for the Tower Hamlets judgement. One thing for sure, the Commissioner is very intolerant of all forms of electoral fraud. Been reading the first half of his 192 page Birmingham 2004 judgement.
Curious Cat.
I’d happily pay their fare to anywhere in the world as long as it was one-way.
Oh that is really sweet of you. How nice. 🙂 🙂 🙂
First class or in a box in cargo underneath the passenger compartment ?
CC.
Australia wouldn’t let this group in for long. They are more picky!
They’re lying. I’ll give you the link later.
What about the unelected simpleton in the cheap beige jacket? A failed Wapping candidate I believe? I hear he may work for the council too…..
Why has he escaped unscathed? What right does this foolish Lutferite puppet have to claim to represent us? I also hear he can barely read, write or speak English. I’d love to have witnessed the Marjorie Dawes moments when our Greek freinds attempted to strike up conversations with him. Perhaps he represents village idiots? We do have more than our fair share in Lbth afterall!
AB. Google http://www.hurryupharry.org and scroll down to ” MEND CEO Sufiyan Ismail Lying”. All the information is there plus plenty of contacts and references.
You should know better than to criticise Gilligan, he is always right on the subject of Lutfur Rahman, Islamic extremism, Tower Hamlets Council corruption and related subjects. You may have conveniently forgotten that the whole thing being discussed here came from a Dispatches programme he made which was the start of the process we find ourselves discussing now.
The left don’t like to admit that they got the whole thing wrong and that Gilligan was right but that’s the way the life is. If you defend the indefensible eventually you will come unstuck as you have.
I think people should be looking at the wider questions that the situation in Tower Hamlets has raised. Clearly AB for whatever reason, probably a hatred of Andrew Gilligan, doesn’t want to discuss this but I found a good discussion on http://www.tendancecoatesy.wordpress.com.
I have always found this a sensible non sectarian left site and the current article posted I think today deals with many of the issues in some detail. I read Kenan Malik’s ” From Fatwah to Jihad ” when it came out six years ago and Malik is still developing some very creative ideas. Have a look. I would however stress the article is for people who think creatively and not those who simply mouth slogans.
Could someone please enlighten me as to whether Raushanara Rahman, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Lutfur, and is a prospective Labour councillor for Thanet South Central Harbour ward, IS actually his daughter?
Thanks a lot.
[…] The chap to Mahbub’s right wearing the dark jacket is Ahad Miah. He stood and lost as a Tower Hamlets FIrst candidate for Wapping in last May’s council elections. He’s very close to Mahbub and this was their second trip away together in less than a month. They were also on deputy mayor Oli Rahman’s delegation to Athens three weeks ago. […]