Donnygate scandal ends in jail terms

Donnygate scandal ends in jail terms | Society | The Guardian:

"Donnygate scandal ends in jail terms

'Rotten' bribes network exposed in court hearing"

The worst local government corruption case since the Poulson scandal of the 1970s ended yesterday with hefty jail terms for a senior Labour councillor and the property developer who bribed him.

The four-year sentence for Peter Birks, former chairman of planning in Doncaster finished the virtual elimination of the old, miner-dominated Labour party in the South Yorkshire town, which has already seen two former council leaders and two former mayors among 21 councillors convicted of fraud.

Most were found guilty of fiddling expenses, often for small sums but damned by a series of judges as part of a wholesale culture of corruption which engulfed the mid-90s administration. But yesterday's verdicts unravelled the much more far-reaching, "rotten network" created by Doncaster developer Alan Hughes, 63, who was given five years.

I can't see that there is anything illegal. If you make up a legal system on planning which stops people using their own assets as they see fit, then its creating the ideal blag. Councils will ask for bribes in the form of section 106 agreements.

All that has happened here is a bit of private enterprise to oil the wheels so to speak.

If its good for the government (s106) its good for the councilors

Lord Blagger