Whilst all eyes are on the reshuffling of the cabinet, there's some red faces in the Labour camp too, especially with a focus on housing.
A Labour councillor, whose role was to roll out a regional clamp down on rogue landlords, has found herself having to answer some very serious questions after it was leaked that she had failed to declare that her husband owned a rental property in the ward.
Councillor Laila Butt, Barking and Dagenham Council's cabinet member responsible for enforcement and community safety. In accordance with her position, she is required to list any property that she or her partner own on a register of interests. She failed to list a property owned by her husband, Shahid Hussain Butt. The property is also not licensed in accordance with the council's own licensing regulations, breaching council requirements.
Following the breach of protocol, Cllr Butt is under investigation by the council, and there are calls from within the council to suspend her from the party and sack her as a Councillor in the Abbey Ward.
We take very seriously the allegation that has been made about Cllr Butt, which we were made aware of on April 20. We immediately referred the matter to the council’s monitoring officer and asked for an investigation to be carried out. Cllr Butt is in complete agreement with this and is cooperating in full. It is right that an independent process is followed. For this reason, we are not able to add anything further until the investigation has been completed
A Barking and Dagenham Labour group and council spokesman
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