THURROCK Council has made good on its threat to take legal action against 23 councils across the country as it seeks to recover up to £54 million lost in its catastrophic investments in solar energy, which left it with debts or more than a billion pounds.

News of Thurrock Council's intentions broke last week, prompting condemnation of it from many other local authorities. One council leader described Thurrock's move as scanaalous and that it 'beggars belief'. News sites acros the country quoted the angry and beligerant rersponse from councils, who say they would strongly contest Thurrock's action. A number of councils in Wales were among those to express anger and pledged a 'vigourous defence.

Nevertheless, today (Friday, 15 November), Labour-run Thurrock announced it has filed a claim against councils that are members of the Association for Public Service Excellence (APSE), after a 'standstill' agreement was not reached between Thurrock and the other councils.

A statement from Thurrock Council said: "The council will be moving immediately to secure an order to stay those proceedings to minimise costs for all involved and to allow the council to focus on other recovery options."

Thurrock Nub News understands that Thurrock Council, itself a member of APSE, has selected 23 councils, almost at random, as sample test cases, in the belief that it it wins, the responsibility for payment of the £54 million is is seeking to recover would actually be spread among all APSA member councils, of which there are more than 230.

Thurrock's statement continues: "The council's claim relates to the valuation by APSE of investments made by Thurrock with an individual called Liam Kavanagh and companies associated with him operating under the name Rockfire Energy.

"The council's case is that valuations of solar assets undertaken on a commercial basis by APSE and which APSE allowed the council to rely upon, were negligent and overvalued those assets.

"As a consequence of relying on those valuations the council did not have adequate security for the value of the investments made with Liam Kavanagh and companies within the Rockfire group between 2017 and 2020.

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"It is the council's case that this has led to significant financial losses to Thurrock with negative impact on taxpayers and service users.

"While the council's primary focus is on recovering money from Mr Kavanagh (and his associated companies) who sought to line his own pockets from the public purse, we also have a duty to pursue those whose actions led to the poor investments."

Cllr John Kent, Leader of Thurrock Council, said: "Since we raised our legal concerns about the valuations with APSE in September 2023, we have explained that the council has no option but to pursue the millions of pounds of public money that was lost through poor investments. APSE provided inaccurate valuations that gave the council misplaced confidence in its investments, and so they must take responsibility for that, otherwise why would anyone seek such advice in the first place?

'We know what a challenging time this is for all councils, and we never wanted to pursue individual councils, but unfortunately APSE didn't have adequate insurance or protection in place, meaning that its member councils are liable for consequences of decisions taken by APSE.

"We will immediately be applying to the courts to pause the action while we pursue Kavanagh, but we had no choice but to file the claim by the deadline, or risk never having the opportunity to recover Thurrock's money."

Key figures in the solar storm that led to today's legal action. From left: Ex CEO Lyn Carpenter, former council leader Rob Gledhill, Liam Kavanagh and former chief finance officer Sean Clark.

Thurrock Council built up debts of about £1.3bn after a series of failed investments largely in solar farms when its fiance director, Sean Clark, was given carte blanche to invest in anything he felt fit".

The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities intervened at the council in September 2022.

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A 'best value report' was commissioned and compiled by Essex County Council, which also supplied senior management to supervise the running of Thurrock Council.

The report was a damning indictment of Thurrock's failures - though it failed to drill down and allocate individual blame or offer up accountability for the loses. In its wake calls, so far unheeded by government, have been made for a full indepenent inquire to name and shame those who were responsible. No one has been prosecuted despite the widespread beleif there was wilful disobedience of the rules and possibly criminality.

Tony McArdle OBE, the lead author of the report, said: "Although serious mistakes have been made by individuals, the challenges facing the council stem from a series of self-sustaining, systemic weaknesses which have allowed for repeated failure."

He said failures were "enabled by dereliction in political and managerial leadership, inadequate governance arrangements and serious weaknesses in internal control."