Homes repairs probe

Aug 18 2006 By Neil Elkes

TWO Birmingham housing department officials have been suspended amid claims they hired contractors without authorisation.

An investigation is now under way after it emerged the middle-ranking officers, a man and a woman, may have handed out contracts for work to do with the Three Estates in Kings Norton.

Birmingham's Cabinet member for Housing Coun John Lines said: "Two people have been suspended from the housing department. There is now an investigation into some contract anomalies."

Housing department chiefs only uncovered the apparent anomalies after a string of housing repair contractors rang the Council House demanding payment.

The council paymasters had no records of the contracts or work done and at first refused to pay up.

But the contractors' persistence led to an investigation and the suspension of the two officers.

A council source said the value of contracts under the spotlight could run into hundreds of thousands of pounds by the time the investigation is concluded.

The work related to the three estates of Hawkesley, Primrose and Pool Farm, in Kings Norton.

The estates are currently halfway through a £54 million ten-year regeneration project under the Govern-ment's New Deal for Communities scheme.