A 20-minute video that explains the multi-billion pound scam that will bankrupt half of ALL UK councils in the next five years

Uk Reform better have a plan to fix this after the May 2026 council elections!!!

From here:

This Is Why 9 Councils Are Bankrupt

In the frame are useless and expensive IT systems run by companies like Capita, unregulated LOBO loans and the big 4 Consultancy firms (Deloitte, PwC (PricewaterhouseCoopers), EY (Ernst & Young), and KPMG) who charge £1,500 per day for strategic ‘Treasury’ advice, and charge again to put it right when it fails.

The outcome is failing councils with billions of debt, cutting services because of interest payments on debt that soaks up a huge chunk of ratepayers taxes – half of all councils will be bankrupt within 5 years.

“Nine UK councils have declared effective bankruptcy since 2018.

Over £5 billion in debt.

And when I followed the money, I found a pattern: the same companies kept getting paid while your local services collapsed.

One man allegedly bought a private jet, a country estate, and a yacht — all with council tax money.

A single IT project went from £19 million to £216 million. Treasury advisers took kickbacks to sell councils toxic loans. And the consultants investigating these failures? Often the same firms that helped create them.”

“The nine councils that declared bankruptcy: Northamptonshire (2018), Croydon (2020, 2021, 2022), Slough (2021), Thurrock (2022), Woking (2023), Birmingham (2023), Nottingham (2023). Combined debt: Over £5 billion Council jobs lost since 2012:

600,000+ Councils expecting bankruptcy in next 5 years: 50%of ALL councils.

An extract from the transcript about a company called Capita. Serco (contracted by the Department of Justice, also gets a dishonourable mention.

“disaster. From 2006 to 2019, Birmingham

7:56

had a 475 million pound contract with

8:00

Capita, 13 years. And at the end of it,

8:03

one counselor admitted that elected

8:05

members had quote little idea how much

8:08

the arrangement was costing or what is

8:11

going on. £475

8:13

million over more than a decade. And the

8:17

people who were supposed to be

8:18

overseeing it didn’t even understand

8:21

what it was that they were paying for.

8:24

Birmingham eventually brought those

8:26

services back in house, but not before

8:28

Capita had extracted nearly half a

8:31

billion pounds from the city

If you’ve never heard of them,

8:46

count yourself lucky because you’ve

8:47

almost certainly interacted with their

8:49

work. They handle everything from TV

8:51

licensing to NHS administration to

8:54

council services. Their track record is,

8:57

let’s say, consistent. At Barnet Council

9:00

in London, Capita signed a 322

9:04

million pound 10-year contract in 2013

9:07

under something called the One Barnet

9:10

program. The idea was that outsourcing

9:13

everything to capital would save money

9:15

and improve services. Great. Except

9:18

internal audits later found there was no

9:21

documented IT disaster recovery plans.

9:24

Technical errors on capital systems

9:27

caused staff underpayments. The council

9:29

eventually demanded £4.12 million in

9:33

compensation for delivery failures

9:35

before bringing 370 staff back in house

9:39

and terminating the contract early.

Evo and oracle are in on the scam:

“Birmingham lacked the in-house expertise

6:39

to properly oversee what Oracle and EVOS

6:42

were doing. They couldn’t act as what’s

6:45

called an intelligent customer, someone

6:48

who actually understands what they’re

6:49

buying. So what did they do? They hired

6:53

external consultants to help. The same

6:56

consultants who were already billing

6:58

them. The same consultants who had no

7:00

incentive to flag problems because

7:02

problems meant more billable hours. By

7:05

late 2023, the council was spending

7:08

£500,000

7:10

per month on temporary staff just to

7:13

manually do what the computer system was

7:15

supposed to handle automatically.

Then there’s the OBO fraud:

“Lobo stands for lender option borrower

12:26

option. It’s a type of loan that

12:28

approximately 240 UK councils currently

12:32

hold totaling to 15 billion.

12:36

Here’s how they work and how they’re a

12:38

trap. When a council needs to borrow

12:41

money, the safest option is usually the

12:43

public works loan board. It’s a

12:46

government lending facility with low

12:48

fixed interest rates, currently around 2

12:50

to 3%. Lobo loans offered what looked

12:54

like a better deal, a low initial rate

12:56

that could be adjusted later on. Banks

13:00

including Barclays, Royal Bank of

13:02

Scotland, Dexia and Commerce Bank sold

13:05

these aggressively to councils through

13:07

the 2000s. The catch, the bank can raise

13:10

the interest rate whenever they like.

13:13

The council can only refuse by repaying

13:16

the entire loan immediately, which of

13:18

course they can’t afford to do

“Many, many, many councils

13:26

are now paying7%

13:28

or more. The estimated excess interest

13:30

cost across all councils,

13:33

145 million every single year. Oh, but

13:38

it gets shadier.

13:40

These loans weren’t sold directly by

13:43

banks. They went through Treasury

13:46

Management Advisor,

13:48

companies whose job was supposedly to

13:51

help councils make good financial

13:53

decisions. A parliamentary investigation

13:56

found something remarkable. When

13:58

Butlers, a Treasury adviser owned by

14:00

Interde dealer broker IAP, recommended

14:02

Lobo loans to councils. IAP ended up

14:05

brokering 84%

14:08

of those contracts. When sector treasury

14:11

services owned by Capita, yes them again,

14:13

advised councils, a company called

14:15

Tullet Pre Bon (a subsidiary of ICAP)brokered 62%.

14:19

Standard brokerage fee £24,000 per £10

14:22

million borrowed.

Here is a description of the LOBO loans system rom Brave AI:

“LOBO loans (Lender Option Borrower Option) are long-term borrowing instruments used primarily by UK local councils and housing associations. They are essentially fixed-rate loans with embedded financial derivatives that give the lender significant advantages.

• Lender’s Option: The bank can increase the interest rate at predetermined dates (e.g., annually), usually when market rates fall.

• Borrower’s Option: The borrower can either accept the higher rate or repay the entire loan in full—often within 48 hours—though this may involve substantial break fees.

“These loans typically last 40 to 70 years and were popular in the early 2000s due to low initial “teaser” rates, which made them appear cheaper than government-backed Public Works Loan Board (PWLB) loans.

“ However, they have been heavily criticized because they often result in significantly higher interest payments over time, especially during periods of low market rates. “

Local elections would have allowed voters to boot out the corrupt idiots who paid all these kickbacks, but that right has been denied to many in he name of ‘rergansiation of council boundaries ad lection expenses.

Th costs for corruption and the stupidity of current elected officials dwarfs any election expenses and denies the right of the people to elect people that might avoid council bankruptcies.

Onwards!!!

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