Prologue to Shed and Corruption

12-October-2022*

In the covering email to a former neighbour, I implied that some of my neighbours were unreliable witnesses and gave some evidence, some of which may be disputed, though I can vouch for the fact the Haigs did tell their solicitors that a party wall agreement was in place when it was not. None of what follows is hearsay, hence all the cross-references.

We had two and a half months to work out that UK Docks claim that their shed was ‘legal’ to mean approved was a nonsense and Haig’s repetition of it to the committee of the TGA on 25th November 2013 was no different from the fraudulent misrepresentation made to the Gazette by a UK Docks representative two and a half months before.

Someone in South Tyneside Council or the Gazette must of come to the same point of view within 24 hours because the reference to legal meaning approved had been dropped and incidentally the frame upon which the engineer was standing had a height of 55ft when it was erected. The permitted height at that point was 46ft not the 36ft as reported in spite of what South Tyneside Council tells you. The variation from the planned height was and still is about 9ft or more accurately 8ft 8ins or 2.656m as explained in Shed and Corruption, Part 1.

I realised why Mr Haig brought the meeting to such an abrupt end less than two weeks later when he was rewarded by the South Tyneside Council by allowing, ST/0749/13/FUL, first seen on the 31st July 2013 to be overwritten by ST/0749/13/HFUL on the 5th December. There is no longer any record for application ST/0749/13/FUL on the planning portal.

Mr Haig had instructed the builders to revert to the original plan with a wall extending for another few meters as shown in the drawing below from ST/0749/13/HFUL, the fence having been replaced by a wall. The drawing above no longer exists as part of the Council’s Archive as it was removed when ST/0749/13/FUL was removed from the planning portal as was partly explained in Shed and Corruption – Part 2.

Figure 1: Drawing 000 from ST/0966/12/FUL

I say rewarded because it also meant that he did not have to rebuild the partition wall between 70 and 71 Greens Place, either to put the fence atop of it as per ST/0966/12/FUL, or ensure the integrity of the foundations of the old partition wall.

He was able to do this because the Planning Manager, Mr G Atkinson, with the help of the Planning Officer, Ms C Matten, firstly removed an application for a retrospective look at the development of 71 Greens with one that did not. The the architect/agent, Dr J Martin, then produced one to match what had been built rather than what had been permitted in 2012 and the Planning Officer put ‘a retrospective look’ back in.

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Figure 1: Drawing 000 from ST/0749/13/HFUL

The lack of a retrospective look at the development, only got Ms Matten off with the hook for paying little regard to SPD9 but it was later put back in, to get the building inspector Mr M Telford off the hook as well. He was of course was famous for his selective blind eye to the goings not only for 71 Greens Place and other developments on his patch, but also for the structure that appeared on UK Docks slipway in September 2013.

Her wilful disregard of the guidance given in SPD9 had obliged South Tyneside Council to mislead the Ombudsman into believing she had followed them when it was very obvious that she had done nothing of the sort. The final lines of the Ombudsman’s findings, 8-Nov-13 included:-
“The Council took account of the issues privacy outlook, and over dominance and overshadowing. I cannot comment on the reasons for the officer’s view, and I cannot say it is at fault because their views differs from yours.
“The information you have provided has not changed my provisional views.

Not only had the Council misled the Ombudsman about ST/0966/12/FUL, Mr and Mrs Haig had ignored my concerns about the party wall between 70 and 71, please see the copy of the letter to them from Wardhadaway, 15th February 2013. Not only did they not halt work, they told their solicitors that a party wall agreement was in place. After a second letter from Wardhadaway, I thought that a party wall agreement would be put into place but no, Mr Haig instructed his builders to build (the) continuation of the party wall with a six to eight inch gap on his side of the boundary line as shown in the second drawing by way of avoiding the implications of party wall act.

One only has to walk down lane at the back to see that he had not followed it at all and a Senior Enforcement officer colluded with the scam when he as good as accused us of making allegations about the rebuild of 71 Greens Place (alleged building works + alleged breach).

Instead of gathering evidence Mr Eggington did nothing but the architect Mr J Martin obligingly redrew the side elevations to save Mr Egginton having to go to the bother of slapping an enforcement order on Mr Haig. What is most disturbing about this drawing of 17th September 2013 was that Mr Martin said it referred to ST/0749/13/FUL but someone had taken the decision not to review the Haig’s development at 71 retrospectively and it may not have been Mr Egginton. Ms Matten was still referring to ST/0749/13/FUL as late as the 12th November 2013 but she had dropped the word retrospective from the description. When /HFUL replaced /FUL in December it was said to be retrospective again.

How and why the fraud was perpertrated is described in more detail in:-
Removing the Requirement for Enforcement.