Calls for council leader to resign after damning report on Fairfield Halls overspend published

By Tara O’Connor, Local Democracy Reporter

Calls for the leader of Croydon council to resign in the wake of a damning report on Fairfield Halls have been made by a member of her own party.

Labour councillor, Andrew Pelling, said the Labour leader should step down if she can’t prove she asked questions about the overspend in the Fairfield Halls refurbishment.

A report in the public interest carried out by the council’s independent auditors Grant Thornton was published last week.

It slammed the council for the project’s management which went £37.5m over budget.

Current council leader Hamida Ali has been a councillor since 2014 and was a cabinet member from 2016 until she became leader in October 2020.

She served under Tony Newman who led the council when overspends in the Fairfield Halls project were racking up.

Councillor Pelling said: “If [Cllr Ali] cannot prove that she asked the questions when she was in Newman’s cabinet she should stand down. I have a strong feeling she did not pose the questions.

“I don’t think that saying we were not given the information is good enough, one of the skills of cabinet is asking the right questions

“It was commonly known in the town that the project was grossly overspending.”

Cllr Ali said she only became aware of the “full problems” with the Fairfield Halls refurbishment when she became leader and “quickly raised concerns” with the auditor which led to the report.

She said: “Part of the problem the auditor found was information wasn’t shared and councillors weren’t made aware of the true costs of the refurbishment, that included cabinet members.

“My focus as leader has been on rebuilding the council and putting measures in place to ensure nothing like this could ever happen again.”

After making a call for the leader’s resignation, Cllr Pelling said he was removed from a Croydon Labour campaign group by Val Shawcross, the party’s candidate for Croydon mayor.

Ms Shawcross confirmed to the Local Democracy Reporting Service that this was true but said it was to do with questions over whether he plans to run for the Labour party or as an independent in the council elections or Croydon’s mayoral elections.

She said: “The things Andrew puts out on his Facebook and Twitter creates questions about whether or not he wants to be with us in this campaign.

“I bear no ill will to Andrew at all but he can’t he on my outer team, a group of more than 100 people, if he is planning his own election campaign, it just doesn’t work.”

Councillor Pelling has been a Croydon politician for 40 years, first as a Conservative, including five years as an MP for Croydon Central. He has been  councillor for Waddon since 2014.

But his future as a Labour councillor is uncertain as he claims his candidacy for the May elections has been rescinded subject to a re-interview this Sunday.

Cllr Pelling, who lives in the South Croydon ward, said he was determined to stand in the seat and has registered as an independent in case he is dropped as a Labour party candidate.

He said: “I want to run as a Labour candidate but if I haven’t got the selection I still have a desire to be involved in Croydon politics.”