18 December (Part 2) - Your obedient servant
I was never sure what to make of Bexley’s former Chief Executive Will Tuckley.
Was he just very good at covering up for the Council’s bad guys and gals or was
he a bad guy in his own right?
By the time he took over the poisoned chalice that is Tower Hamlets I was
inclined to think he was glad to get away from Bexley and leave the corruption behind.
Despite Tuckley being no friend of mine I found myself giving him the benefit of the doubt.
In 2011 after the obscene blog was traced to Councillor Peter Craske’s IP
address and the police decided to do nothing about it, Will Tuckley wrote to the
police to suggest I was prosecuted instead for
placing a copy of what was found on Craske’s laptop
on BiB behind a password. His idea or was he put up to it? Who knows?
More clear cut was Tuckley’s plotting with the police and Crown Prosecution Service (CPS)
to get Craske off the hook.
When Councillor Cheryl Bacon set out on a non-stop lying spree in 2013 claiming
that I along with several others ran riot in the Council chamber shouting and
waving papers I accumulated ten written statements, four from Councillors, all
of which said that Cheryly Bacon was one big liar.
Cheryl Bacon herself was not supported by anyone but herself - and Will Tuckley
who wasn’t there and knew nothing.
Will Tuckley refused to undertake any form of investigation even though one
Councillor was telling Tuckley that he should because he was being mislead.
It would be surprising if Tuckley didn’t know that he was being misled but
misplaced loyalty and a £250,000 salary package ensured Councillor Bacon’s safety.
When I made a formal complaint about the lies being told in Bacon’s defence and
not unnaturally used the word lying - but only once - Bexley Council’s response
was that the regarded my complaint as abusive and they were not going to answer it.
A large file about Tuckley’s refusal to accept a complaint or the word of the
four Councillors confirming Bacon’s string of lies a big file went to the
police. To ensure it was not whitewashed Greenwich police was persuaded to take the case from Bexley.
Greenwich police did a good job and sent their case for prosecuting Tuckley to
the CPS where it lay for twelve whole months. “Unprecedented” according to the investigating officer.
Meanwhile Will Tuckley was appointed by the Government Commissioners who were
running the failed Council, to be CEO at Tower Hamlets.
When the Commissioners were told about Tuckley’s possible prosecution,
Bexley-is-Bonkers was labelled a “fascist blog” and the warning was dismissed. A
similar warning to the Department for Communities and Local Government was more politely dismissed.
However certain wheels were provoked into motion and if one can believe the leak
that came from CPS they contrived to lose the important evidence. The real
reason is still unknown. Neither the CPS nor Greenwich police ever owned up as
to exactly how they had decided that Tuckley was wholly innocent.
But is he? He still attracts trouble wherever he goes.
In Tower Hamlets a plan was hatched by a property developer to erect a 63 storey
tower. The Council’s planning committee rejected it - twice - but was overruled
by Boris Johnson when Mayor.
Nothing very out of the ordinary you might think but two weeks ago the Sunday
Times revealed evidence - and the audio recording to prove it - a £2 million
pound bribe was being dangled before Councillors.
Bearing in mind that Will Tuckley was sent to Tower Hamlets to clear the place
up, indeed he set up a team to tackle it
with that very name. you would think he would be haring off to the police
station as quickly as when he wanted me prosecuted for several things I had not done.
But no he didn’t. Maybe loyalty to his masters took precedence over honesty.
It was six months before he tipped off the police and even then only when
various advisers pushed him into doing so.