{"id":158386,"date":"2024-10-21T18:17:50","date_gmt":"2024-10-21T18:17:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/10\/21\/serious-fraud-office-probe-112m-unite-union-hotel\/"},"modified":"2024-10-21T18:17:50","modified_gmt":"2024-10-21T18:17:50","slug":"serious-fraud-office-probe-112m-unite-union-hotel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/10\/21\/serious-fraud-office-probe-112m-unite-union-hotel\/","title":{"rendered":"Serious Fraud Office probe \u00a3112m Unite union hotel"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Serious<\/div>


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The Serious Fraud Office is investigating the construction of a hotel and conference centre owned by one of the UK\u2019s biggest trade unions, the BBC can reveal.<\/p>\n

Unite the Union spent a total of \u00a3112m of its members\u2019 money on the project in Birmingham.<\/p>\n

The building has since been valued at just \u00a329m, suggesting \u00a383m has been wasted.<\/p>\n

A KC-led inquiry commissioned by Unite\u2019s general secretary Sharon Graham also identified a missing \u00a314m which has been described as a \u201cmystery\u201d and does not feature in the project\u2019s final accounts.<\/p>\n

Unite has told the BBC the case is \u201cnow with the Serious Fraud Office\u201d and Ms Graham, who took over as Unite general secretary in 2021, would \u201cleave no stone unturned in finding out if there was any financial wrongdoing\u201d.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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An SFO spokesperson said: \u201cIn line with long established practice to avoid prejudice to law enforcement activity, we can neither confirm nor deny any investigation into this matter.”<\/p>\n

The Birmingham project was intended to be an investment for Unite as well as saving the union money with hotel and conference costs.<\/p>\n

Construction was completed in 2020 and development includes a four star 195 bedroom hotel, a 1,000 person capacity conference centre, as well as Unite\u2019s regional offices.<\/p>\n

Employment tribunal documents reveal the union believes its ruling executive council had been misled as to the true value of the project.<\/p>\n

In 2022 South Wales Police searched the union\u2019s London headquarters as part of a separate bribery, money-laundering and fraud investigation.<\/p>\n

The force has told the BBC that the investigation is ongoing.<\/p>\n

A Unite spokesperson said: \u201cIt is important to note that Sharon Graham has had to endure repeated attacks by those with much to lose since she launched these inquiries, from both inside and outside the union. <\/p>\n

“These have been sickening and horrendous but she has remained determined to get to the truth.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are also pursuing legal claims to recover money lost to the union and the general secretary has put safeguards in place to ensure that such things can never happen again.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Serious Fraud Office is investigating the construction of a hotel and conference centre owned by one of the UK\u2019s biggest trade unions, the BBC can reveal. Unite the Union spent a total of \u00a3112m of its members\u2019 money on the project in Birmingham. The building has since been valued at just \u00a329m, suggesting \u00a383m […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":158387,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/1024\/branded_news\/b439\/live\/8a065440-8fc3-11ef-8e6d-e3e64e16c628.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[603],"tags":[123827,6229,4382,1951,322,6953,57305],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158386"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158386"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158386\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":158388,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158386\/revisions\/158388"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/158387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}