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Tory Barnet Council's "One Barnet", "Easy Council", "future shape" privatisation model is in disarray.

Inadequate supervision of the council’s Icelandic Banks investments and enormous cost overruns of the Aerodrome Road Bridge have lost the Council tens of millions of pounds.  

Most recently, the Met Pro security contractor scandal has come to light, showing: 

· there were no checks that MetPro was licensed with the Security Industry Authority

· there were no checks that MetPro staff had undergone Criminal Records Bureau checks

· there were no checks on MetPro’s insurance and financial status

· the council had not followed basic contract procedure rules

· there is no complete register of all corporate contracts

· auditors could give no assurance that the same thing wouldn’t happen again 

It is therefore clear that this issue is symptomatic of a wider problem at Barnet Council, not being a “one off” as other failings and this investigation have proven. As Barnet is intending to contract out a huge swathe of services, the risk to the public purse of inadequate contract letting and monitoring is obvious to all.

Email Eric Pickles ...

...We need a public inquiry into Barnet Council’s contract arrangements