Page 14 - STATEMENT OF CASE re-OCR s22_1

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tain additional funding requirements related to the refurbishment project and (b) to secure the payment of those funding requirements by other leaseholders at Mitre House.
(comment/reply) Correspondence of the period will disprove these allegations. 12. Lack of Competence
It is apparent from the correspondence that MHML and Mr Brown-Constable have proved wholly incom- petent in managing the refurbishment project as well as the budget. At no time was this more apparent than in the course of September 2014. In a flurry of some 20 e-mails to the leaseholders over as many days Mr Brown-Constable moved from a statement to the effect that no additional funding would be re- quired from the leaseholders, to a request for additional funds of £2,000 (both for additional service charge and for one off reserves), to a statement that certain approved and funded works were to be cancelled.
In the course of the refurbishment project leaseholders were advised, at 10.30 pm on a Friday night, of the urgent necessity to replace their water tank, but unsupported by any sort of rational explanation, or third party inspection report, or by alternative quotations. This compounded a similar unscheduled "emergency" on 10 August 2014 when leaseholders had been advised that: "due to some emergency electric works following our recent electrical report, electricians will be attending Mitre House for a week and whilst various other electrical works are carried out as a further economy measure". This had "only become apparent on Friday 8th [August] and best to get out of the way before major works commence on Ist September." These electrics were "not included in the A&R Lawrence quote".
In his e-mail of 21 September 2014 Mr Brown-Constable went on to say that four items which had specifically been approved under Section 20, and which were within the planned and budgeted works (including a specialist terrazzo floor renovation regarded by some of the leaseholders as essential) would be cancelled because of a shortage of money: "this affair is for too time consuming on Manage- ment to re-arrange" .... On the MHML website under the heading "Quotes and Costs" Mr Brown-Consta- ble subsequently informed tenants that "due to the nonpayment by some lessees of the previously agreed £2,000 to properly fund the A.R.Lawrence quote, certain works have been cancelled, namely the Terrazzo specialist floor attention, now only one colour internal communal areas and no attention to main front door and furniture".
While it is true that some of the leaseholders had temporarily withheld payment, the fact is that they did all pay the £2,000. Attention to the Terrazzo specialist floor was an item which a majority of the lessees had voted for and which was part of the agreed specification. Nevertheless MHML cancelled this a nd other work, but appears to have kept the money paid by the leaseholders to have the work done.
Not only did the lessees actually pay the £2,000 requested by Mr Brown-Constable for the reserve, but they also paid in addition for the water tank replacement, and for the communal TV installation. Which begs the question what has happened to these funds which were paid to MHML on a false premise (ie on the assumption that all the scheduled work would be done) and which have not been refunded?
Following this last e-mail from Mr Brown-Constable of 21 September 2014, Mr Diego Fortunati wrote to Mr Brown-Constable an e-mail dated 22 September 2014 asking (inter alia) who was actually carrying out the internal and external works? Why had Mr Brown-Constable unilaterally changed the scope of works originally approved, imposing works none of the lessees had agreed (the replacement TV aerial) or which had specifically been excluded (the lift), but now asking for additional funds? Why was he dis- posing of their reserve funds as if those were his own money?
As Mr Fortunati correctly stated, Section 20 is there to protect lessees and it cannot be circumvented by changing works and contractors at leisure. Mr Brown-Constable had no authority, he said, to dispose of the leaseholders' reserve fund for works outside the scope of the section 20 Notice, unless there are ur- gent contingencies.