Airdrie & Coatbridge Advertiser
Row over repairs firm continues
A North Lanarkshire Council boss has been urged to sever ties with a repairs firm after it was found to have fudged its figures to make its performance look better.
An investigation into the claims, first reported by the Advertiser’s sister paper the Sunday Mail, revealed that Mears LLP had changed the completion dates on more than 13,000 repair jobs across North Lanarkshire over the past two years.
It allowed them to meet performance targets set by the local authority and look like they were fixing problems in homes and buildings faster than they actually were.
Des Murray, chief executive of North Lanarkshire Council, has denied any knowledge of the practice which Mears has now admitted was “long-standing” and had “become custom and practice over a number of years.”
Investigators also said other council staff were unaware of the practice in their audit report published last week.
This is despite internal emails showing a senior council official questioning Mears managing director Willie Docherty on the performance data in February 2022.
The Advertiser has also learned that Murray met with the Mears boss at least three times in the six months after these concerns were first raised but he claims the issues were never discussed.
A council spokesman said: “The audit report makes clear that no member of council staff was aware of the unilateral alteration of some completion dates by Mears staff.
“The chief executive routinely meets a range of stakeholders to discuss strategic issues.
“In the case of Mears at that time, these discussions focused on the council’s Ukrainian resettlement programme, as well as the delivery of essential infrastructure for elections and some elements of Covid recovery.
“There was no discussion between the chief executive and any Mears representative the issues contained in the audit report.”
A recent meeting of the full council saw local politicians questioning bosses about the findings with some suggesting the authority should cut ties with Mears.
During the three- and- a- half hour long meeting, Progressive Change party councillor David Crichton said: “What we’re saying is that we have had a long-term relationship with an organisation that has just been proven to be manipulating data that affects the decision-making of the council.
“Yet the report [suggests with] some tweaks and changes that it’s going to be okay to continue down the road of any engagement with Mears. I find that incredible.”
Progressive Change councillor Cameron Mcmanus said his party would continue to push for answers on the scandal.
He said: “The investigation audit report confirmed serious wrongdoing by Mears by way of seeming data manipulation.
“We remain hugely concerned over many issues and plan to continue our critical role of scrutiny in this matter on behalf of the people of North Lanarkshire, who deserve clear answers as to how this has been allowed to happen.”