James McLaughlin

From

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

To

"James McLaughlin"

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Good morning James, I hope you are well? I'm following up on my email from the other day to ask if we can please meet to discuss the issues I've previously raised. I'm no longer seeking answers to previous questions, they can't change the past, I'm seeking solutions, a way for both parties to move forwards. There was a communication breakdown, I am trying to repair the damage and communicate effectively. I am a disabled tenant of Sandwell Council, I have been living in a caravan, in the fields of Cornwall for over 14 months waiting for repairs that were meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, and am very HAPPY down here. I am thriving, I'm facing challenging circumstances with my usual joie de vivre, but problem solving challenges like not being able to receive mail is exhausting. I want to terminate my tenancy in Sandwell, access the bungalow to retrieve my property and sell it to pay for this caravan, then find a safe place to park this caravan in Cornwall. I'll be able to afford a dog and will chug off into the distance with a happy little wave, able to update my address and finally contact people to tackle my other issues with a firm budget and secure housing. Sandwell MBC will be able to house a family or individual in a lovely little bungalow and many people will be happier. Delays carrying out the repairs are causing unnecessary stress and concern. Is it possible for us to begin there, with that issue, and try to find a way to move forwards please? The day to day impact of not being able to receive mail is significant, I attended court for a speeding ticket last month because the original ticket had not reached me before it progressed to court. The magistrates were very lenient but the court clerks/computers/whatever ignored requests to email me the payment instructions for the first installment, payable in November, but they have mailed it to the bungalow and I am late paying it. I'm now trying to problem solve this too. I need access to my mail, if you can't help me to resolve the tenancy/repairs conundrum, could you please refer me to whomever you feel would be more appropriate to help me find a solution? If Sandwell MBC and I can address this major issue, I'm sure we can find solutions to the others. Best wishes, Marie From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 26 November 2024 8:27 PM To: James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Fw: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Hello James, I hope you are well. I've been trying to raise my concerns about the actions of Tipton ASB Team with staff of SMBC for some time. I first raised concerns in 2016 because I felt the team were making it incredibly challenging to submit evidence of antisocial behaviour by my neighbour Carl Clift. When Carl's antisocial behaviour escalated in frequency and intensity the team continued to ignore it, I feel this was to my detriment. I have consistently and persistently been raising these concerns ever since, but no one at Sandwell MBC has reviewed the evidence I've been trying to provide. Could you please take a look at this Timeline of events, which contains a small sample of the incidents and correspondence, then let me know if you'd be willing to discuss my concerns, so we can try to find a way to move forwards? I'm told it may not be necessary to bring the timeline to present day and would appreciate some respite from looking at this documentation. Best wishes, Marie From: Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Sent: Thursday, November 7, 2024 4:47:13 PM To: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team <EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

From

James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>

To

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>, Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk>

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Good morning Marie, Thank you for your email. First of all, an apology to you. Sukhjinder indicated to you that when you made contact that I was looking into the background of the issues that you had raised. As you have stated in your email, I have multiple areas of responsibility and have limited time in my diary so this has taken longer that I would have hoped. That said, I am sorry that I have not been in touch before now to make arrangements to meet with you to listen to your concerns. Notwithstanding what you have detailed in your email below, I am happy to meet with you and will ask a colleague to make arrangements today if you wish to have that discussion. From the review of the timeline that you provided I cannot see any instances of problems arising for you since 2021, but I would like to understand if there are other issues since that time that you wish to raise. The issues that you have described as set out in full on your website and this has been helpful in giving me some insight into the concerns you have and the experiences you have referred to. It would be helpful from my perspective to meet with you to hear a bit more about that first hand. I appreciate that you may not want to take forward the offer to meet, but I’ll leave that with you and hope to hear back from you. Thanks, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 6:41 AM To: Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk>; James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. An update I am suing SMBC for a fall I had on 5th December in one of their properties and the SMBC solicitor originally came back stating I had not informed SMBC that I needed a wheelchair at that point. Correspondence proved not only were SMBC informed that I needed a wheelchair but also that this was because my neighbour damaged my spine and SMBC only made him write me a letter of apology. SMBC solicitors are settling that claim on a no prejudice basis. Yesterday I saw the medici legal solicitor and he is referring me for an assessment with a neuropsychiatrist because he thinks I have a brain injury as well as trauma. I have years of correspondence showing I've been describing my communication issues and begging for help but SMBC staff have consistently ignored my human rights to a safe home and staff as senior as the deputy exec just ignore these emails. I was normal when I moved into my first SMBC property in 2010 and tried to buy the property in 2017ish but living there being harassed non stop by Carl Clift broke me mentally and his five assaults left me physically disabled. The discrimination I experienced throughout that tenancy by Tipton asb team was appalling so when I moved out of Tipton my mental and physical disabilities were well documented. I moved to an SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow in November 2020 but it is still unsafe for wheelchair users and I can't live there having falls every week because my landlord won't fit a ramp being poisoned and starved by carers provided by SMBC because the kitchen is too unsafe for me to cook in independently not because I'm not capable of cooking for myself. I agreed to terminate the tenancy but a payment from SMBC to help cover the camp site fees was not received as agreed and I was not able to travel up on 1st January as planned. I am a disabled SMBC tenant who is living in a caravan because her wheelchair accessible bungalow is unsafe 4 years after I moved to it, my support worker describes SMBC as the worst local authority she has ever dealt with as she's been trying to get legally required adaptations for two years without success and has also experienced SMBC staff ignoring required time frames etc. I could go cripple Carl, write him a letter of apology explaining I really didn't want to hurt him, I'm a pacifist who believes violence doesn't solve problems however I believe the treatment I experienced at the hands of SMBC staff was wrong and it feels like the only way to highlight this is to do unto others as they have done to me. So if I cripple him I can sit back and watch as HE asks for his flat to be adapted for a wheelchair so he doesn't have to move out of his home. If he asks for carers to feed him 3x daily I can explain no he only gets 2x meals per day, if he asks for a wheelchair accessible bungalow I can point out SMBC don't provide safe homes for their disabled tenants and then he gets angry about how he's being treated and sends an angry email to the staff responsible I'll expect SMBC to threaten him with eviction for a breach of tenancy rather than address the problem. As I lose this caravan at the end of the month and will be sleeping in my car I really have nothing left to lose. The above legal action can't happen soon enough to help me avoid homelessness because I can't access universal credit or resolve SMBC issues when even the assistant chief exec. I can't access the help I need to access the help I need! It's ridiculous and I'm out of patience. A jail cell would be a lot easier and comfier than a caravan so that's the timeframe for someone to contact me to discuss the above and seek meaningful resolutions, I'm unwilling to live like this any more. I'll write the letter of apology to Carl so I can leave it with him after I take revenge, I will limit my attack to ensure his injuries match the injuries he inflicted on me. Broken toe, concussion and a spinal cord injury. I'll use them iron bars he swung at my head, I assume Carl is still allowed to hoard rubbish and dangerous items in the communal areas and I'll find the iron bars on the front garden where he kept them. I'm not in crisis, I'm following SMBC logic which implies that it's fine for people to cripple each other, this doesn't require police or court intervention but simply a letter of apology to make ten years of abuse go away. And James I'm going to send you a personal letter before court. As the highest level member of staff to ignore me when I worked really hard to express the problems calmly and clearly, I feel that you are setting a poor example for your staff and if that content was received from any other tenant you would have responded to it. I tire of this poor treatment and remind you that as my landlord SMBC has a duty of care to me, universal credit paid rent for an uninhabitable property leaving me without the financial support I need and I am facing sleeping in my car because of the problems with SMBC. I met west Midlands fire service at the property on Saturday and explained to them I need to return to it at the end of the month, SMBC have had over 15 months to make the kitchen SAFE by moving the cooker away from the door which was meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, enough is enough. Either Carl faces legal consequences for the harm he did me and that process begins immediately or I do to him what he did to me (nothing more nothing less) and watch SMBC reaction pointing out any differences in the SMBC approach to him afterwards. Sincerely Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 9:56:56 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for getting in touch. This is just a brief message to let you know that a service area has been allocated to investigate this and they have your contact details and should be in touch with you directly. Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Monday, December 9, 2024 12:55 PM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Sukhjinder Thank you for your prompt response to my enquiry below. Regrettably James has not followed up and my circumstances have changes in the interim, my entire Team was made redundant at the end of last month. As a direct result of my inability to communicate effectively with your colleagues my day to day life is impacted in the following ways: I am currently unable to access financial support from Universal Credit for housing costs because my permanent address remains 8 Boldmere Court, B43 5PH until someone from Sandwell MBC either repairs the property so it is safe for me to return to it to sell my possessions and terminate the tenancy or cancels the job and allow me to return to empty the property of my possessions and terminate the tenancy. Work was scheduled to take 6 to 8 weeks in September 2023 but no date for the work to commence has been provided and a Stage 2 complaint submitted by an advocate is now 4 months overdue its final response from Lisa Ellis (who has been trying to get answers but is equally unable to.) I am unable to receive mail on campsites which were meant to be a temporary solution for the 6 to 8 weeks the repairs were meant to take, this causes additional challenges for example I had to attend Bodmin Court last month to address a speeding ticket that had already progressed to court action before I was aware of it. The fine paperwork was sent to the bungalow so I am trying to address this as I am now being prosecuted for failing to make the first payment towards the fine because I lack the information I need to do so. Because I'm unable to update my permanent address I am also unable to access many services locally, book online delivery unless a pick up location is offered, receive my medication much is mail delivery and many other simple functions always having to find a work around. I am being threatened with court action by SMBC to collect Care Charges that were unfairly assessed and requests for support to complete the assessments with accurate information were and still are being ignored, these could have been addressed back in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 if appropriate support to submit the required paperwork had been provided as requested, recent attempts to work with this department have been ignored. My MH diagnosis is currently being reassessed query Neurodivergency or Trauma but whether my MH issue was caused by my experiences in Tipton (Trauma) and trying to communicate with SMBC staff about the issues or Neurodivergency or the diagnosed Personality Disorder, the lack of appropriate support for my inability to communicate effectively with SMBC has been well documented, as have my hundreds of pleas for help to multiple SMBC departments and staff. I am treated either as a capable person who has shown great fortitude in challenging circumstances and received praise and admiration for my courage or by someone who is whining about nothing the difference in the 2 responses to me are as challenging to process as they are to account for. I would therefore appreciate it if you could please follow up with some urgency as the ongoing uncertainty in my Housing and Finances is incredibly stressful and as I have mentioned a few times this situation was only meant to last for 6 to 8 weeks. Many thanks, Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: 07 November 2024 4:47 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team < EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

From

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

To

"James McLaughlin"

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Hi James, Thank you for your response I understand the limitations on your time and appreciate your acknowledgement of my email I removed the bungalow from the timeline because I was advised that it complicated the discrimination issue but I have everything collated and would welcome time to meet and discuss my concerns in full so you can look into the matter. I can travel up to meet at the council house in Oldbury or any other SMBC building any time to suit you after Tuesday 28th January, but I need a couple of days notice so I can rest the day before I drive up. I'm facing sleeping in my car from Feb 1st as the caravan and campsite are both unaffordable at present so this has been very stressful and my MH has been fragile trying to resolve significant challenges to day to day life hence my delayed response. I accept it will take some time after our meeting for you to look into my concerns and gather the information you'll need to respond and so request we meet as soon as you are able to to begin the process. I have delayed making a decision on terminating the tenancy because I've been advised this is not in my best interest and so I'm waiting for MH assessments to determine both what my diagnosis is and what support is appropriate. Only once I have appropriate support can any long term decisions be made. Many thanks, Marie Brien From: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk> Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 8:14:10 AM To: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for your email. First of all, an apology to you. Sukhjinder indicated to you that when you made contact that I was looking into the background of the issues that you had raised. As you have stated in your email, I have multiple areas of responsibility and have limited time in my diary so this has taken longer that I would have hoped. That said, I am sorry that I have not been in touch before now to make arrangements to meet with you to listen to your concerns. Notwithstanding what you have detailed in your email below, I am happy to meet with you and will ask a colleague to make arrangements today if you wish to have that discussion. From the review of the timeline that you provided I cannot see any instances of problems arising for you since 2021, but I would like to understand if there are other issues since that time that you wish to raise. The issues that you have described as set out in full on your website and this has been helpful in giving me some insight into the concerns you have and the experiences you have referred to. It would be helpful from my perspective to meet with you to hear a bit more about that first hand. I appreciate that you may not want to take forward the offer to meet, but I’ll leave that with you and hope to hear back from you. Thanks, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 6:41 AM To: Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk>; James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. An update I am suing SMBC for a fall I had on 5th December in one of their properties and the SMBC solicitor originally came back stating I had not informed SMBC that I needed a wheelchair at that point. Correspondence proved not only were SMBC informed that I needed a wheelchair but also that this was because my neighbour damaged my spine and SMBC only made him write me a letter of apology. SMBC solicitors are settling that claim on a no prejudice basis. Yesterday I saw the medici legal solicitor and he is referring me for an assessment with a neuropsychiatrist because he thinks I have a brain injury as well as trauma. I have years of correspondence showing I've been describing my communication issues and begging for help but SMBC staff have consistently ignored my human rights to a safe home and staff as senior as the deputy exec just ignore these emails. I was normal when I moved into my first SMBC property in 2010 and tried to buy the property in 2017ish but living there being harassed non stop by Carl Clift broke me mentally and his five assaults left me physically disabled. The discrimination I experienced throughout that tenancy by Tipton asb team was appalling so when I moved out of Tipton my mental and physical disabilities were well documented. I moved to an SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow in November 2020 but it is still unsafe for wheelchair users and I can't live there having falls every week because my landlord won't fit a ramp being poisoned and starved by carers provided by SMBC because the kitchen is too unsafe for me to cook in independently not because I'm not capable of cooking for myself. I agreed to terminate the tenancy but a payment from SMBC to help cover the camp site fees was not received as agreed and I was not able to travel up on 1st January as planned. I am a disabled SMBC tenant who is living in a caravan because her wheelchair accessible bungalow is unsafe 4 years after I moved to it, my support worker describes SMBC as the worst local authority she has ever dealt with as she's been trying to get legally required adaptations for two years without success and has also experienced SMBC staff ignoring required time frames etc. I could go cripple Carl, write him a letter of apology explaining I really didn't want to hurt him, I'm a pacifist who believes violence doesn't solve problems however I believe the treatment I experienced at the hands of SMBC staff was wrong and it feels like the only way to highlight this is to do unto others as they have done to me. So if I cripple him I can sit back and watch as HE asks for his flat to be adapted for a wheelchair so he doesn't have to move out of his home. If he asks for carers to feed him 3x daily I can explain no he only gets 2x meals per day, if he asks for a wheelchair accessible bungalow I can point out SMBC don't provide safe homes for their disabled tenants and then he gets angry about how he's being treated and sends an angry email to the staff responsible I'll expect SMBC to threaten him with eviction for a breach of tenancy rather than address the problem. As I lose this caravan at the end of the month and will be sleeping in my car I really have nothing left to lose. The above legal action can't happen soon enough to help me avoid homelessness because I can't access universal credit or resolve SMBC issues when even the assistant chief exec. I can't access the help I need to access the help I need! It's ridiculous and I'm out of patience. A jail cell would be a lot easier and comfier than a caravan so that's the timeframe for someone to contact me to discuss the above and seek meaningful resolutions, I'm unwilling to live like this any more. I'll write the letter of apology to Carl so I can leave it with him after I take revenge, I will limit my attack to ensure his injuries match the injuries he inflicted on me. Broken toe, concussion and a spinal cord injury. I'll use them iron bars he swung at my head, I assume Carl is still allowed to hoard rubbish and dangerous items in the communal areas and I'll find the iron bars on the front garden where he kept them. I'm not in crisis, I'm following SMBC logic which implies that it's fine for people to cripple each other, this doesn't require police or court intervention but simply a letter of apology to make ten years of abuse go away. And James I'm going to send you a personal letter before court. As the highest level member of staff to ignore me when I worked really hard to express the problems calmly and clearly, I feel that you are setting a poor example for your staff and if that content was received from any other tenant you would have responded to it. I tire of this poor treatment and remind you that as my landlord SMBC has a duty of care to me, universal credit paid rent for an uninhabitable property leaving me without the financial support I need and I am facing sleeping in my car because of the problems with SMBC. I met west Midlands fire service at the property on Saturday and explained to them I need to return to it at the end of the month, SMBC have had over 15 months to make the kitchen SAFE by moving the cooker away from the door which was meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, enough is enough. Either Carl faces legal consequences for the harm he did me and that process begins immediately or I do to him what he did to me (nothing more nothing less) and watch SMBC reaction pointing out any differences in the SMBC approach to him afterwards. Sincerely Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 9:56:56 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for getting in touch. This is just a brief message to let you know that a service area has been allocated to investigate this and they have your contact details and should be in touch with you directly. Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Monday, December 9, 2024 12:55 PM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Sukhjinder Thank you for your prompt response to my enquiry below. Regrettably James has not followed up and my circumstances have changes in the interim, my entire Team was made redundant at the end of last month. As a direct result of my inability to communicate effectively with your colleagues my day to day life is impacted in the following ways: I am currently unable to access financial support from Universal Credit for housing costs because my permanent address remains 8 Boldmere Court, B43 5PH until someone from Sandwell MBC either repairs the property so it is safe for me to return to it to sell my possessions and terminate the tenancy or cancels the job and allow me to return to empty the property of my possessions and terminate the tenancy. Work was scheduled to take 6 to 8 weeks in September 2023 but no date for the work to commence has been provided and a Stage 2 complaint submitted by an advocate is now 4 months overdue its final response from Lisa Ellis (who has been trying to get answers but is equally unable to.) I am unable to receive mail on campsites which were meant to be a temporary solution for the 6 to 8 weeks the repairs were meant to take, this causes additional challenges for example I had to attend Bodmin Court last month to address a speeding ticket that had already progressed to court action before I was aware of it. The fine paperwork was sent to the bungalow so I am trying to address this as I am now being prosecuted for failing to make the first payment towards the fine because I lack the information I need to do so. Because I'm unable to update my permanent address I am also unable to access many services locally, book online delivery unless a pick up location is offered, receive my medication much is mail delivery and many other simple functions always having to find a work around. I am being threatened with court action by SMBC to collect Care Charges that were unfairly assessed and requests for support to complete the assessments with accurate information were and still are being ignored, these could have been addressed back in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 if appropriate support to submit the required paperwork had been provided as requested, recent attempts to work with this department have been ignored. My MH diagnosis is currently being reassessed query Neurodivergency or Trauma but whether my MH issue was caused by my experiences in Tipton (Trauma) and trying to communicate with SMBC staff about the issues or Neurodivergency or the diagnosed Personality Disorder, the lack of appropriate support for my inability to communicate effectively with SMBC has been well documented, as have my hundreds of pleas for help to multiple SMBC departments and staff. I am treated either as a capable person who has shown great fortitude in challenging circumstances and received praise and admiration for my courage or by someone who is whining about nothing the difference in the 2 responses to me are as challenging to process as they are to account for. I would therefore appreciate it if you could please follow up with some urgency as the ongoing uncertainty in my Housing and Finances is incredibly stressful and as I have mentioned a few times this situation was only meant to last for 6 to 8 weeks. Many thanks, Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: 07 November 2024 4:47 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team < EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

From

James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>

To

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>, Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk>

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Hi Marie, Thanks for your email and for coming back to me. I am sorry to read of your current circumstances and appreciate the difficulty that this will be causing you. I can offer you a meeting at 3pm on Thursday 6 February for a couple of hours. Please let me know if this date and time works for you. The meeting would be in person at Sandwell Council House in Oldbury. I look forward to hearing from you. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 25 January 2025 08:09 To: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi James, Thank you for your response I understand the limitations on your time and appreciate your acknowledgement of my email I removed the bungalow from the timeline because I was advised that it complicated the discrimination issue but I have everything collated and would welcome time to meet and discuss my concerns in full so you can look into the matter. I can travel up to meet at the council house in Oldbury or any other SMBC building any time to suit you after Tuesday 28th January, but I need a couple of days notice so I can rest the day before I drive up. I'm facing sleeping in my car from Feb 1st as the caravan and campsite are both unaffordable at present so this has been very stressful and my MH has been fragile trying to resolve significant challenges to day to day life hence my delayed response. I accept it will take some time after our meeting for you to look into my concerns and gather the information you'll need to respond and so request we meet as soon as you are able to to begin the process. I have delayed making a decision on terminating the tenancy because I've been advised this is not in my best interest and so I'm waiting for MH assessments to determine both what my diagnosis is and what support is appropriate. Only once I have appropriate support can any long term decisions be made. Many thanks, Marie Brien From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 8:14:10 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for your email. First of all, an apology to you. Sukhjinder indicated to you that when you made contact that I was looking into the background of the issues that you had raised. As you have stated in your email, I have multiple areas of responsibility and have limited time in my diary so this has taken longer that I would have hoped. That said, I am sorry that I have not been in touch before now to make arrangements to meet with you to listen to your concerns. Notwithstanding what you have detailed in your email below, I am happy to meet with you and will ask a colleague to make arrangements today if you wish to have that discussion. From the review of the timeline that you provided I cannot see any instances of problems arising for you since 2021, but I would like to understand if there are other issues since that time that you wish to raise. The issues that you have described as set out in full on your website and this has been helpful in giving me some insight into the concerns you have and the experiences you have referred to. It would be helpful from my perspective to meet with you to hear a bit more about that first hand. I appreciate that you may not want to take forward the offer to meet, but I’ll leave that with you and hope to hear back from you. Thanks, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 6:41 AM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. An update I am suing SMBC for a fall I had on 5th December in one of their properties and the SMBC solicitor originally came back stating I had not informed SMBC that I needed a wheelchair at that point. Correspondence proved not only were SMBC informed that I needed a wheelchair but also that this was because my neighbour damaged my spine and SMBC only made him write me a letter of apology. SMBC solicitors are settling that claim on a no prejudice basis. Yesterday I saw the medici legal solicitor and he is referring me for an assessment with a neuropsychiatrist because he thinks I have a brain injury as well as trauma. I have years of correspondence showing I've been describing my communication issues and begging for help but SMBC staff have consistently ignored my human rights to a safe home and staff as senior as the deputy exec just ignore these emails. I was normal when I moved into my first SMBC property in 2010 and tried to buy the property in 2017ish but living there being harassed non stop by Carl Clift broke me mentally and his five assaults left me physically disabled. The discrimination I experienced throughout that tenancy by Tipton asb team was appalling so when I moved out of Tipton my mental and physical disabilities were well documented. I moved to an SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow in November 2020 but it is still unsafe for wheelchair users and I can't live there having falls every week because my landlord won't fit a ramp being poisoned and starved by carers provided by SMBC because the kitchen is too unsafe for me to cook in independently not because I'm not capable of cooking for myself. I agreed to terminate the tenancy but a payment from SMBC to help cover the camp site fees was not received as agreed and I was not able to travel up on 1st January as planned. I am a disabled SMBC tenant who is living in a caravan because her wheelchair accessible bungalow is unsafe 4 years after I moved to it, my support worker describes SMBC as the worst local authority she has ever dealt with as she's been trying to get legally required adaptations for two years without success and has also experienced SMBC staff ignoring required time frames etc. I could go cripple Carl, write him a letter of apology explaining I really didn't want to hurt him, I'm a pacifist who believes violence doesn't solve problems however I believe the treatment I experienced at the hands of SMBC staff was wrong and it feels like the only way to highlight this is to do unto others as they have done to me. So if I cripple him I can sit back and watch as HE asks for his flat to be adapted for a wheelchair so he doesn't have to move out of his home. If he asks for carers to feed him 3x daily I can explain no he only gets 2x meals per day, if he asks for a wheelchair accessible bungalow I can point out SMBC don't provide safe homes for their disabled tenants and then he gets angry about how he's being treated and sends an angry email to the staff responsible I'll expect SMBC to threaten him with eviction for a breach of tenancy rather than address the problem. As I lose this caravan at the end of the month and will be sleeping in my car I really have nothing left to lose. The above legal action can't happen soon enough to help me avoid homelessness because I can't access universal credit or resolve SMBC issues when even the assistant chief exec. I can't access the help I need to access the help I need! It's ridiculous and I'm out of patience. A jail cell would be a lot easier and comfier than a caravan so that's the timeframe for someone to contact me to discuss the above and seek meaningful resolutions, I'm unwilling to live like this any more. I'll write the letter of apology to Carl so I can leave it with him after I take revenge, I will limit my attack to ensure his injuries match the injuries he inflicted on me. Broken toe, concussion and a spinal cord injury. I'll use them iron bars he swung at my head, I assume Carl is still allowed to hoard rubbish and dangerous items in the communal areas and I'll find the iron bars on the front garden where he kept them. I'm not in crisis, I'm following SMBC logic which implies that it's fine for people to cripple each other, this doesn't require police or court intervention but simply a letter of apology to make ten years of abuse go away. And James I'm going to send you a personal letter before court. As the highest level member of staff to ignore me when I worked really hard to express the problems calmly and clearly, I feel that you are setting a poor example for your staff and if that content was received from any other tenant you would have responded to it. I tire of this poor treatment and remind you that as my landlord SMBC has a duty of care to me, universal credit paid rent for an uninhabitable property leaving me without the financial support I need and I am facing sleeping in my car because of the problems with SMBC. I met west Midlands fire service at the property on Saturday and explained to them I need to return to it at the end of the month, SMBC have had over 15 months to make the kitchen SAFE by moving the cooker away from the door which was meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, enough is enough. Either Carl faces legal consequences for the harm he did me and that process begins immediately or I do to him what he did to me (nothing more nothing less) and watch SMBC reaction pointing out any differences in the SMBC approach to him afterwards. Sincerely Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 9:56:56 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for getting in touch. This is just a brief message to let you know that a service area has been allocated to investigate this and they have your contact details and should be in touch with you directly. Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Monday, December 9, 2024 12:55 PM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Sukhjinder Thank you for your prompt response to my enquiry below. Regrettably James has not followed up and my circumstances have changes in the interim, my entire Team was made redundant at the end of last month. As a direct result of my inability to communicate effectively with your colleagues my day to day life is impacted in the following ways: I am currently unable to access financial support from Universal Credit for housing costs because my permanent address remains 8 Boldmere Court, B43 5PH until someone from Sandwell MBC either repairs the property so it is safe for me to return to it to sell my possessions and terminate the tenancy or cancels the job and allow me to return to empty the property of my possessions and terminate the tenancy. Work was scheduled to take 6 to 8 weeks in September 2023 but no date for the work to commence has been provided and a Stage 2 complaint submitted by an advocate is now 4 months overdue its final response from Lisa Ellis (who has been trying to get answers but is equally unable to.) I am unable to receive mail on campsites which were meant to be a temporary solution for the 6 to 8 weeks the repairs were meant to take, this causes additional challenges for example I had to attend Bodmin Court last month to address a speeding ticket that had already progressed to court action before I was aware of it. The fine paperwork was sent to the bungalow so I am trying to address this as I am now being prosecuted for failing to make the first payment towards the fine because I lack the information I need to do so. Because I'm unable to update my permanent address I am also unable to access many services locally, book online delivery unless a pick up location is offered, receive my medication much is mail delivery and many other simple functions always having to find a work around. I am being threatened with court action by SMBC to collect Care Charges that were unfairly assessed and requests for support to complete the assessments with accurate information were and still are being ignored, these could have been addressed back in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 if appropriate support to submit the required paperwork had been provided as requested, recent attempts to work with this department have been ignored. My MH diagnosis is currently being reassessed query Neurodivergency or Trauma but whether my MH issue was caused by my experiences in Tipton (Trauma) and trying to communicate with SMBC staff about the issues or Neurodivergency or the diagnosed Personality Disorder, the lack of appropriate support for my inability to communicate effectively with SMBC has been well documented, as have my hundreds of pleas for help to multiple SMBC departments and staff. I am treated either as a capable person who has shown great fortitude in challenging circumstances and received praise and admiration for my courage or by someone who is whining about nothing the difference in the 2 responses to me are as challenging to process as they are to account for. I would therefore appreciate it if you could please follow up with some urgency as the ongoing uncertainty in my Housing and Finances is incredibly stressful and as I have mentioned a few times this situation was only meant to last for 6 to 8 weeks. Many thanks, Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: 07 November 2024 4:47 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team < EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

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Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

To

"James McLaughlin"

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Good morning James, Thank you for your empathy, Thursday 6th February at the council house is appreciated. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk> Sent: Monday, January 27, 2025 10:00:09 AM To: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Hi Marie, Thanks for your email and for coming back to me. I am sorry to read of your current circumstances and appreciate the difficulty that this will be causing you. I can offer you a meeting at 3pm on Thursday 6 February for a couple of hours. Please let me know if this date and time works for you. The meeting would be in person at Sandwell Council House in Oldbury. I look forward to hearing from you. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 25 January 2025 08:09 To: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi James, Thank you for your response I understand the limitations on your time and appreciate your acknowledgement of my email I removed the bungalow from the timeline because I was advised that it complicated the discrimination issue but I have everything collated and would welcome time to meet and discuss my concerns in full so you can look into the matter. I can travel up to meet at the council house in Oldbury or any other SMBC building any time to suit you after Tuesday 28th January, but I need a couple of days notice so I can rest the day before I drive up. I'm facing sleeping in my car from Feb 1st as the caravan and campsite are both unaffordable at present so this has been very stressful and my MH has been fragile trying to resolve significant challenges to day to day life hence my delayed response. I accept it will take some time after our meeting for you to look into my concerns and gather the information you'll need to respond and so request we meet as soon as you are able to to begin the process. I have delayed making a decision on terminating the tenancy because I've been advised this is not in my best interest and so I'm waiting for MH assessments to determine both what my diagnosis is and what support is appropriate. Only once I have appropriate support can any long term decisions be made. Many thanks, Marie Brien From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 8:14:10 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for your email. First of all, an apology to you. Sukhjinder indicated to you that when you made contact that I was looking into the background of the issues that you had raised. As you have stated in your email, I have multiple areas of responsibility and have limited time in my diary so this has taken longer that I would have hoped. That said, I am sorry that I have not been in touch before now to make arrangements to meet with you to listen to your concerns. Notwithstanding what you have detailed in your email below, I am happy to meet with you and will ask a colleague to make arrangements today if you wish to have that discussion. From the review of the timeline that you provided I cannot see any instances of problems arising for you since 2021, but I would like to understand if there are other issues since that time that you wish to raise. The issues that you have described as set out in full on your website and this has been helpful in giving me some insight into the concerns you have and the experiences you have referred to. It would be helpful from my perspective to meet with you to hear a bit more about that first hand. I appreciate that you may not want to take forward the offer to meet, but I’ll leave that with you and hope to hear back from you. Thanks, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 6:41 AM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. An update I am suing SMBC for a fall I had on 5th December in one of their properties and the SMBC solicitor originally came back stating I had not informed SMBC that I needed a wheelchair at that point. Correspondence proved not only were SMBC informed that I needed a wheelchair but also that this was because my neighbour damaged my spine and SMBC only made him write me a letter of apology. SMBC solicitors are settling that claim on a no prejudice basis. Yesterday I saw the medici legal solicitor and he is referring me for an assessment with a neuropsychiatrist because he thinks I have a brain injury as well as trauma. I have years of correspondence showing I've been describing my communication issues and begging for help but SMBC staff have consistently ignored my human rights to a safe home and staff as senior as the deputy exec just ignore these emails. I was normal when I moved into my first SMBC property in 2010 and tried to buy the property in 2017ish but living there being harassed non stop by Carl Clift broke me mentally and his five assaults left me physically disabled. The discrimination I experienced throughout that tenancy by Tipton asb team was appalling so when I moved out of Tipton my mental and physical disabilities were well documented. I moved to an SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow in November 2020 but it is still unsafe for wheelchair users and I can't live there having falls every week because my landlord won't fit a ramp being poisoned and starved by carers provided by SMBC because the kitchen is too unsafe for me to cook in independently not because I'm not capable of cooking for myself. I agreed to terminate the tenancy but a payment from SMBC to help cover the camp site fees was not received as agreed and I was not able to travel up on 1st January as planned. I am a disabled SMBC tenant who is living in a caravan because her wheelchair accessible bungalow is unsafe 4 years after I moved to it, my support worker describes SMBC as the worst local authority she has ever dealt with as she's been trying to get legally required adaptations for two years without success and has also experienced SMBC staff ignoring required time frames etc. I could go cripple Carl, write him a letter of apology explaining I really didn't want to hurt him, I'm a pacifist who believes violence doesn't solve problems however I believe the treatment I experienced at the hands of SMBC staff was wrong and it feels like the only way to highlight this is to do unto others as they have done to me. So if I cripple him I can sit back and watch as HE asks for his flat to be adapted for a wheelchair so he doesn't have to move out of his home. If he asks for carers to feed him 3x daily I can explain no he only gets 2x meals per day, if he asks for a wheelchair accessible bungalow I can point out SMBC don't provide safe homes for their disabled tenants and then he gets angry about how he's being treated and sends an angry email to the staff responsible I'll expect SMBC to threaten him with eviction for a breach of tenancy rather than address the problem. As I lose this caravan at the end of the month and will be sleeping in my car I really have nothing left to lose. The above legal action can't happen soon enough to help me avoid homelessness because I can't access universal credit or resolve SMBC issues when even the assistant chief exec. I can't access the help I need to access the help I need! It's ridiculous and I'm out of patience. A jail cell would be a lot easier and comfier than a caravan so that's the timeframe for someone to contact me to discuss the above and seek meaningful resolutions, I'm unwilling to live like this any more. I'll write the letter of apology to Carl so I can leave it with him after I take revenge, I will limit my attack to ensure his injuries match the injuries he inflicted on me. Broken toe, concussion and a spinal cord injury. I'll use them iron bars he swung at my head, I assume Carl is still allowed to hoard rubbish and dangerous items in the communal areas and I'll find the iron bars on the front garden where he kept them. I'm not in crisis, I'm following SMBC logic which implies that it's fine for people to cripple each other, this doesn't require police or court intervention but simply a letter of apology to make ten years of abuse go away. And James I'm going to send you a personal letter before court. As the highest level member of staff to ignore me when I worked really hard to express the problems calmly and clearly, I feel that you are setting a poor example for your staff and if that content was received from any other tenant you would have responded to it. I tire of this poor treatment and remind you that as my landlord SMBC has a duty of care to me, universal credit paid rent for an uninhabitable property leaving me without the financial support I need and I am facing sleeping in my car because of the problems with SMBC. I met west Midlands fire service at the property on Saturday and explained to them I need to return to it at the end of the month, SMBC have had over 15 months to make the kitchen SAFE by moving the cooker away from the door which was meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, enough is enough. Either Carl faces legal consequences for the harm he did me and that process begins immediately or I do to him what he did to me (nothing more nothing less) and watch SMBC reaction pointing out any differences in the SMBC approach to him afterwards. Sincerely Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 9:56:56 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for getting in touch. This is just a brief message to let you know that a service area has been allocated to investigate this and they have your contact details and should be in touch with you directly. Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Monday, December 9, 2024 12:55 PM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Sukhjinder Thank you for your prompt response to my enquiry below. Regrettably James has not followed up and my circumstances have changes in the interim, my entire Team was made redundant at the end of last month. As a direct result of my inability to communicate effectively with your colleagues my day to day life is impacted in the following ways: I am currently unable to access financial support from Universal Credit for housing costs because my permanent address remains 8 Boldmere Court, B43 5PH until someone from Sandwell MBC either repairs the property so it is safe for me to return to it to sell my possessions and terminate the tenancy or cancels the job and allow me to return to empty the property of my possessions and terminate the tenancy. Work was scheduled to take 6 to 8 weeks in September 2023 but no date for the work to commence has been provided and a Stage 2 complaint submitted by an advocate is now 4 months overdue its final response from Lisa Ellis (who has been trying to get answers but is equally unable to.) I am unable to receive mail on campsites which were meant to be a temporary solution for the 6 to 8 weeks the repairs were meant to take, this causes additional challenges for example I had to attend Bodmin Court last month to address a speeding ticket that had already progressed to court action before I was aware of it. The fine paperwork was sent to the bungalow so I am trying to address this as I am now being prosecuted for failing to make the first payment towards the fine because I lack the information I need to do so. Because I'm unable to update my permanent address I am also unable to access many services locally, book online delivery unless a pick up location is offered, receive my medication much is mail delivery and many other simple functions always having to find a work around. I am being threatened with court action by SMBC to collect Care Charges that were unfairly assessed and requests for support to complete the assessments with accurate information were and still are being ignored, these could have been addressed back in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 if appropriate support to submit the required paperwork had been provided as requested, recent attempts to work with this department have been ignored. My MH diagnosis is currently being reassessed query Neurodivergency or Trauma but whether my MH issue was caused by my experiences in Tipton (Trauma) and trying to communicate with SMBC staff about the issues or Neurodivergency or the diagnosed Personality Disorder, the lack of appropriate support for my inability to communicate effectively with SMBC has been well documented, as have my hundreds of pleas for help to multiple SMBC departments and staff. I am treated either as a capable person who has shown great fortitude in challenging circumstances and received praise and admiration for my courage or by someone who is whining about nothing the difference in the 2 responses to me are as challenging to process as they are to account for. I would therefore appreciate it if you could please follow up with some urgency as the ongoing uncertainty in my Housing and Finances is incredibly stressful and as I have mentioned a few times this situation was only meant to last for 6 to 8 weeks. Many thanks, Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: 07 November 2024 4:47 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team < EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

From

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

To

"James McLaughlin"

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Good morning James and Sukhjinder, Thank you for your time yesterday. SMBC and WMP this is the OneDrive folder I have been compiling the documents in, Brief Examples contains the documents on the website which I believe are the most pertinent such as the email to Jennifer asking her to intervene with the gate before Carl damaged my spine, the state 2 complaint response that states Carl's letter of apology was appropriate for crippling me etc The wmp oasis report shows the police logs for the more serious incidents, in chasing up notes on those prior to 2012. I recently tried to reach out to departments to try to resolve issues but one of the first responses I received was from Beverly about the care charges, given the volume of emails between us over the last 5 years with me requesting support to submit my budget for a fair assessment based on my income and expenditure, and Bev repeatedly using figures from 2018/2019 because I failed to access support to provide up to date figures. If you have any questions or need a particular document I have referenced please let me know, I can create a sub folder for them or attach them to an email. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk> Sent: Wednesday, January 29, 2025 1:16:03 PM To: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Thanks Marie. If you come to the One Stop Shop reception and inform them that you are here to meet with me, one of my colleagues will come to greet you and bring you to our meeting room. I look forward to meeting you in person then. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 29 January 2025 10:23 To: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James, Thank you for your empathy, Thursday 6th February at the council house is appreciated. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Monday, January 27, 2025 10:00:09 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Hi Marie, Thanks for your email and for coming back to me. I am sorry to read of your current circumstances and appreciate the difficulty that this will be causing you. I can offer you a meeting at 3pm on Thursday 6 February for a couple of hours. Please let me know if this date and time works for you. The meeting would be in person at Sandwell Council House in Oldbury. I look forward to hearing from you. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 25 January 2025 08:09 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi James, Thank you for your response I understand the limitations on your time and appreciate your acknowledgement of my email I removed the bungalow from the timeline because I was advised that it complicated the discrimination issue but I have everything collated and would welcome time to meet and discuss my concerns in full so you can look into the matter. I can travel up to meet at the council house in Oldbury or any other SMBC building any time to suit you after Tuesday 28th January, but I need a couple of days notice so I can rest the day before I drive up. I'm facing sleeping in my car from Feb 1st as the caravan and campsite are both unaffordable at present so this has been very stressful and my MH has been fragile trying to resolve significant challenges to day to day life hence my delayed response. I accept it will take some time after our meeting for you to look into my concerns and gather the information you'll need to respond and so request we meet as soon as you are able to to begin the process. I have delayed making a decision on terminating the tenancy because I've been advised this is not in my best interest and so I'm waiting for MH assessments to determine both what my diagnosis is and what support is appropriate. Only once I have appropriate support can any long term decisions be made. Many thanks, Marie Brien From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 8:14:10 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for your email. First of all, an apology to you. Sukhjinder indicated to you that when you made contact that I was looking into the background of the issues that you had raised. As you have stated in your email, I have multiple areas of responsibility and have limited time in my diary so this has taken longer that I would have hoped. That said, I am sorry that I have not been in touch before now to make arrangements to meet with you to listen to your concerns. Notwithstanding what you have detailed in your email below, I am happy to meet with you and will ask a colleague to make arrangements today if you wish to have that discussion. From the review of the timeline that you provided I cannot see any instances of problems arising for you since 2021, but I would like to understand if there are other issues since that time that you wish to raise. The issues that you have described as set out in full on your website and this has been helpful in giving me some insight into the concerns you have and the experiences you have referred to. It would be helpful from my perspective to meet with you to hear a bit more about that first hand. I appreciate that you may not want to take forward the offer to meet, but I’ll leave that with you and hope to hear back from you. Thanks, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 6:41 AM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. An update I am suing SMBC for a fall I had on 5th December in one of their properties and the SMBC solicitor originally came back stating I had not informed SMBC that I needed a wheelchair at that point. Correspondence proved not only were SMBC informed that I needed a wheelchair but also that this was because my neighbour damaged my spine and SMBC only made him write me a letter of apology. SMBC solicitors are settling that claim on a no prejudice basis. Yesterday I saw the medici legal solicitor and he is referring me for an assessment with a neuropsychiatrist because he thinks I have a brain injury as well as trauma. I have years of correspondence showing I've been describing my communication issues and begging for help but SMBC staff have consistently ignored my human rights to a safe home and staff as senior as the deputy exec just ignore these emails. I was normal when I moved into my first SMBC property in 2010 and tried to buy the property in 2017ish but living there being harassed non stop by Carl Clift broke me mentally and his five assaults left me physically disabled. The discrimination I experienced throughout that tenancy by Tipton asb team was appalling so when I moved out of Tipton my mental and physical disabilities were well documented. I moved to an SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow in November 2020 but it is still unsafe for wheelchair users and I can't live there having falls every week because my landlord won't fit a ramp being poisoned and starved by carers provided by SMBC because the kitchen is too unsafe for me to cook in independently not because I'm not capable of cooking for myself. I agreed to terminate the tenancy but a payment from SMBC to help cover the camp site fees was not received as agreed and I was not able to travel up on 1st January as planned. I am a disabled SMBC tenant who is living in a caravan because her wheelchair accessible bungalow is unsafe 4 years after I moved to it, my support worker describes SMBC as the worst local authority she has ever dealt with as she's been trying to get legally required adaptations for two years without success and has also experienced SMBC staff ignoring required time frames etc. I could go cripple Carl, write him a letter of apology explaining I really didn't want to hurt him, I'm a pacifist who believes violence doesn't solve problems however I believe the treatment I experienced at the hands of SMBC staff was wrong and it feels like the only way to highlight this is to do unto others as they have done to me. So if I cripple him I can sit back and watch as HE asks for his flat to be adapted for a wheelchair so he doesn't have to move out of his home. If he asks for carers to feed him 3x daily I can explain no he only gets 2x meals per day, if he asks for a wheelchair accessible bungalow I can point out SMBC don't provide safe homes for their disabled tenants and then he gets angry about how he's being treated and sends an angry email to the staff responsible I'll expect SMBC to threaten him with eviction for a breach of tenancy rather than address the problem. As I lose this caravan at the end of the month and will be sleeping in my car I really have nothing left to lose. The above legal action can't happen soon enough to help me avoid homelessness because I can't access universal credit or resolve SMBC issues when even the assistant chief exec. I can't access the help I need to access the help I need! It's ridiculous and I'm out of patience. A jail cell would be a lot easier and comfier than a caravan so that's the timeframe for someone to contact me to discuss the above and seek meaningful resolutions, I'm unwilling to live like this any more. I'll write the letter of apology to Carl so I can leave it with him after I take revenge, I will limit my attack to ensure his injuries match the injuries he inflicted on me. Broken toe, concussion and a spinal cord injury. I'll use them iron bars he swung at my head, I assume Carl is still allowed to hoard rubbish and dangerous items in the communal areas and I'll find the iron bars on the front garden where he kept them. I'm not in crisis, I'm following SMBC logic which implies that it's fine for people to cripple each other, this doesn't require police or court intervention but simply a letter of apology to make ten years of abuse go away. And James I'm going to send you a personal letter before court. As the highest level member of staff to ignore me when I worked really hard to express the problems calmly and clearly, I feel that you are setting a poor example for your staff and if that content was received from any other tenant you would have responded to it. I tire of this poor treatment and remind you that as my landlord SMBC has a duty of care to me, universal credit paid rent for an uninhabitable property leaving me without the financial support I need and I am facing sleeping in my car because of the problems with SMBC. I met west Midlands fire service at the property on Saturday and explained to them I need to return to it at the end of the month, SMBC have had over 15 months to make the kitchen SAFE by moving the cooker away from the door which was meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, enough is enough. Either Carl faces legal consequences for the harm he did me and that process begins immediately or I do to him what he did to me (nothing more nothing less) and watch SMBC reaction pointing out any differences in the SMBC approach to him afterwards. Sincerely Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 9:56:56 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for getting in touch. This is just a brief message to let you know that a service area has been allocated to investigate this and they have your contact details and should be in touch with you directly. Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Monday, December 9, 2024 12:55 PM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Sukhjinder Thank you for your prompt response to my enquiry below. Regrettably James has not followed up and my circumstances have changes in the interim, my entire Team was made redundant at the end of last month. As a direct result of my inability to communicate effectively with your colleagues my day to day life is impacted in the following ways: I am currently unable to access financial support from Universal Credit for housing costs because my permanent address remains 8 Boldmere Court, B43 5PH until someone from Sandwell MBC either repairs the property so it is safe for me to return to it to sell my possessions and terminate the tenancy or cancels the job and allow me to return to empty the property of my possessions and terminate the tenancy. Work was scheduled to take 6 to 8 weeks in September 2023 but no date for the work to commence has been provided and a Stage 2 complaint submitted by an advocate is now 4 months overdue its final response from Lisa Ellis (who has been trying to get answers but is equally unable to.) I am unable to receive mail on campsites which were meant to be a temporary solution for the 6 to 8 weeks the repairs were meant to take, this causes additional challenges for example I had to attend Bodmin Court last month to address a speeding ticket that had already progressed to court action before I was aware of it. The fine paperwork was sent to the bungalow so I am trying to address this as I am now being prosecuted for failing to make the first payment towards the fine because I lack the information I need to do so. Because I'm unable to update my permanent address I am also unable to access many services locally, book online delivery unless a pick up location is offered, receive my medication much is mail delivery and many other simple functions always having to find a work around. I am being threatened with court action by SMBC to collect Care Charges that were unfairly assessed and requests for support to complete the assessments with accurate information were and still are being ignored, these could have been addressed back in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 if appropriate support to submit the required paperwork had been provided as requested, recent attempts to work with this department have been ignored. My MH diagnosis is currently being reassessed query Neurodivergency or Trauma but whether my MH issue was caused by my experiences in Tipton (Trauma) and trying to communicate with SMBC staff about the issues or Neurodivergency or the diagnosed Personality Disorder, the lack of appropriate support for my inability to communicate effectively with SMBC has been well documented, as have my hundreds of pleas for help to multiple SMBC departments and staff. I am treated either as a capable person who has shown great fortitude in challenging circumstances and received praise and admiration for my courage or by someone who is whining about nothing the difference in the 2 responses to me are as challenging to process as they are to account for. I would therefore appreciate it if you could please follow up with some urgency as the ongoing uncertainty in my Housing and Finances is incredibly stressful and as I have mentioned a few times this situation was only meant to last for 6 to 8 weeks. Many thanks, Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: 07 November 2024 4:47 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team < EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

From

James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>

To

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>, Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk>

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Good morning Marie, Thank you for coming in to meet with me and Sukhjinder last week. Apologies for the delay in following up with an email as promised. Having listened carefully to the experiences that you shared with us, I have agreed to speak with colleagues in Housing and Adult Social Care to see what we can do to unblock the housing issue that prevents you from moving to a new property in Cornwall. This may take a little time to get through, but I will come back to you by the end of next week with an update on progress in any event. What struck me when listening to you articulating your experiences was that no one had apologised to you for the experiences that you have had and I recognised that I needed to apologise to you for that on behalf of the Council. There is a lot of information to review and we will do that. In the meantime, if you need any further information from us or have any questions then please do come back to us. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 07 February 2025 06:59 To: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James and Sukhjinder, Thank you for your time yesterday. SMBC and WMP this is the OneDrive folder I have been compiling the documents in, Brief Examples contains the documents on the website which I believe are the most pertinent such as the email to Jennifer asking her to intervene with the gate before Carl damaged my spine, the state 2 complaint response that states Carl's letter of apology was appropriate for crippling me etc The wmp oasis report shows the police logs for the more serious incidents, in chasing up notes on those prior to 2012. I recently tried to reach out to departments to try to resolve issues but one of the first responses I received was from Beverly about the care charges, given the volume of emails between us over the last 5 years with me requesting support to submit my budget for a fair assessment based on my income and expenditure, and Bev repeatedly using figures from 2018/2019 because I failed to access support to provide up to date figures. If you have any questions or need a particular document I have referenced please let me know, I can create a sub folder for them or attach them to an email. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Wednesday, January 29, 2025 1:16:03 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Thanks Marie. If you come to the One Stop Shop reception and inform them that you are here to meet with me, one of my colleagues will come to greet you and bring you to our meeting room. I look forward to meeting you in person then. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 29 January 2025 10:23 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James, Thank you for your empathy, Thursday 6th February at the council house is appreciated. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Monday, January 27, 2025 10:00:09 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Hi Marie, Thanks for your email and for coming back to me. I am sorry to read of your current circumstances and appreciate the difficulty that this will be causing you. I can offer you a meeting at 3pm on Thursday 6 February for a couple of hours. Please let me know if this date and time works for you. The meeting would be in person at Sandwell Council House in Oldbury. I look forward to hearing from you. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 25 January 2025 08:09 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi James, Thank you for your response I understand the limitations on your time and appreciate your acknowledgement of my email I removed the bungalow from the timeline because I was advised that it complicated the discrimination issue but I have everything collated and would welcome time to meet and discuss my concerns in full so you can look into the matter. I can travel up to meet at the council house in Oldbury or any other SMBC building any time to suit you after Tuesday 28th January, but I need a couple of days notice so I can rest the day before I drive up. I'm facing sleeping in my car from Feb 1st as the caravan and campsite are both unaffordable at present so this has been very stressful and my MH has been fragile trying to resolve significant challenges to day to day life hence my delayed response. I accept it will take some time after our meeting for you to look into my concerns and gather the information you'll need to respond and so request we meet as soon as you are able to to begin the process. I have delayed making a decision on terminating the tenancy because I've been advised this is not in my best interest and so I'm waiting for MH assessments to determine both what my diagnosis is and what support is appropriate. Only once I have appropriate support can any long term decisions be made. Many thanks, Marie Brien From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 8:14:10 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for your email. First of all, an apology to you. Sukhjinder indicated to you that when you made contact that I was looking into the background of the issues that you had raised. As you have stated in your email, I have multiple areas of responsibility and have limited time in my diary so this has taken longer that I would have hoped. That said, I am sorry that I have not been in touch before now to make arrangements to meet with you to listen to your concerns. Notwithstanding what you have detailed in your email below, I am happy to meet with you and will ask a colleague to make arrangements today if you wish to have that discussion. From the review of the timeline that you provided I cannot see any instances of problems arising for you since 2021, but I would like to understand if there are other issues since that time that you wish to raise. The issues that you have described as set out in full on your website and this has been helpful in giving me some insight into the concerns you have and the experiences you have referred to. It would be helpful from my perspective to meet with you to hear a bit more about that first hand. I appreciate that you may not want to take forward the offer to meet, but I’ll leave that with you and hope to hear back from you. Thanks, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 6:41 AM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. An update I am suing SMBC for a fall I had on 5th December in one of their properties and the SMBC solicitor originally came back stating I had not informed SMBC that I needed a wheelchair at that point. Correspondence proved not only were SMBC informed that I needed a wheelchair but also that this was because my neighbour damaged my spine and SMBC only made him write me a letter of apology. SMBC solicitors are settling that claim on a no prejudice basis. Yesterday I saw the medici legal solicitor and he is referring me for an assessment with a neuropsychiatrist because he thinks I have a brain injury as well as trauma. I have years of correspondence showing I've been describing my communication issues and begging for help but SMBC staff have consistently ignored my human rights to a safe home and staff as senior as the deputy exec just ignore these emails. I was normal when I moved into my first SMBC property in 2010 and tried to buy the property in 2017ish but living there being harassed non stop by Carl Clift broke me mentally and his five assaults left me physically disabled. The discrimination I experienced throughout that tenancy by Tipton asb team was appalling so when I moved out of Tipton my mental and physical disabilities were well documented. I moved to an SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow in November 2020 but it is still unsafe for wheelchair users and I can't live there having falls every week because my landlord won't fit a ramp being poisoned and starved by carers provided by SMBC because the kitchen is too unsafe for me to cook in independently not because I'm not capable of cooking for myself. I agreed to terminate the tenancy but a payment from SMBC to help cover the camp site fees was not received as agreed and I was not able to travel up on 1st January as planned. I am a disabled SMBC tenant who is living in a caravan because her wheelchair accessible bungalow is unsafe 4 years after I moved to it, my support worker describes SMBC as the worst local authority she has ever dealt with as she's been trying to get legally required adaptations for two years without success and has also experienced SMBC staff ignoring required time frames etc. I could go cripple Carl, write him a letter of apology explaining I really didn't want to hurt him, I'm a pacifist who believes violence doesn't solve problems however I believe the treatment I experienced at the hands of SMBC staff was wrong and it feels like the only way to highlight this is to do unto others as they have done to me. So if I cripple him I can sit back and watch as HE asks for his flat to be adapted for a wheelchair so he doesn't have to move out of his home. If he asks for carers to feed him 3x daily I can explain no he only gets 2x meals per day, if he asks for a wheelchair accessible bungalow I can point out SMBC don't provide safe homes for their disabled tenants and then he gets angry about how he's being treated and sends an angry email to the staff responsible I'll expect SMBC to threaten him with eviction for a breach of tenancy rather than address the problem. As I lose this caravan at the end of the month and will be sleeping in my car I really have nothing left to lose. The above legal action can't happen soon enough to help me avoid homelessness because I can't access universal credit or resolve SMBC issues when even the assistant chief exec. I can't access the help I need to access the help I need! It's ridiculous and I'm out of patience. A jail cell would be a lot easier and comfier than a caravan so that's the timeframe for someone to contact me to discuss the above and seek meaningful resolutions, I'm unwilling to live like this any more. I'll write the letter of apology to Carl so I can leave it with him after I take revenge, I will limit my attack to ensure his injuries match the injuries he inflicted on me. Broken toe, concussion and a spinal cord injury. I'll use them iron bars he swung at my head, I assume Carl is still allowed to hoard rubbish and dangerous items in the communal areas and I'll find the iron bars on the front garden where he kept them. I'm not in crisis, I'm following SMBC logic which implies that it's fine for people to cripple each other, this doesn't require police or court intervention but simply a letter of apology to make ten years of abuse go away. And James I'm going to send you a personal letter before court. As the highest level member of staff to ignore me when I worked really hard to express the problems calmly and clearly, I feel that you are setting a poor example for your staff and if that content was received from any other tenant you would have responded to it. I tire of this poor treatment and remind you that as my landlord SMBC has a duty of care to me, universal credit paid rent for an uninhabitable property leaving me without the financial support I need and I am facing sleeping in my car because of the problems with SMBC. I met west Midlands fire service at the property on Saturday and explained to them I need to return to it at the end of the month, SMBC have had over 15 months to make the kitchen SAFE by moving the cooker away from the door which was meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, enough is enough. Either Carl faces legal consequences for the harm he did me and that process begins immediately or I do to him what he did to me (nothing more nothing less) and watch SMBC reaction pointing out any differences in the SMBC approach to him afterwards. Sincerely Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 9:56:56 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for getting in touch. This is just a brief message to let you know that a service area has been allocated to investigate this and they have your contact details and should be in touch with you directly. Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Monday, December 9, 2024 12:55 PM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Sukhjinder Thank you for your prompt response to my enquiry below. Regrettably James has not followed up and my circumstances have changes in the interim, my entire Team was made redundant at the end of last month. As a direct result of my inability to communicate effectively with your colleagues my day to day life is impacted in the following ways: I am currently unable to access financial support from Universal Credit for housing costs because my permanent address remains 8 Boldmere Court, B43 5PH until someone from Sandwell MBC either repairs the property so it is safe for me to return to it to sell my possessions and terminate the tenancy or cancels the job and allow me to return to empty the property of my possessions and terminate the tenancy. Work was scheduled to take 6 to 8 weeks in September 2023 but no date for the work to commence has been provided and a Stage 2 complaint submitted by an advocate is now 4 months overdue its final response from Lisa Ellis (who has been trying to get answers but is equally unable to.) I am unable to receive mail on campsites which were meant to be a temporary solution for the 6 to 8 weeks the repairs were meant to take, this causes additional challenges for example I had to attend Bodmin Court last month to address a speeding ticket that had already progressed to court action before I was aware of it. The fine paperwork was sent to the bungalow so I am trying to address this as I am now being prosecuted for failing to make the first payment towards the fine because I lack the information I need to do so. Because I'm unable to update my permanent address I am also unable to access many services locally, book online delivery unless a pick up location is offered, receive my medication much is mail delivery and many other simple functions always having to find a work around. I am being threatened with court action by SMBC to collect Care Charges that were unfairly assessed and requests for support to complete the assessments with accurate information were and still are being ignored, these could have been addressed back in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 if appropriate support to submit the required paperwork had been provided as requested, recent attempts to work with this department have been ignored. My MH diagnosis is currently being reassessed query Neurodivergency or Trauma but whether my MH issue was caused by my experiences in Tipton (Trauma) and trying to communicate with SMBC staff about the issues or Neurodivergency or the diagnosed Personality Disorder, the lack of appropriate support for my inability to communicate effectively with SMBC has been well documented, as have my hundreds of pleas for help to multiple SMBC departments and staff. I am treated either as a capable person who has shown great fortitude in challenging circumstances and received praise and admiration for my courage or by someone who is whining about nothing the difference in the 2 responses to me are as challenging to process as they are to account for. I would therefore appreciate it if you could please follow up with some urgency as the ongoing uncertainty in my Housing and Finances is incredibly stressful and as I have mentioned a few times this situation was only meant to last for 6 to 8 weeks. Many thanks, Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: 07 November 2024 4:47 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team < EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

From

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

To

"Alex Spencer"

CC

"James McLaughlin"

BCC

—

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I have been refused temporary accommodation by Sandwell consistently, if you had spoken with Elizabeth Deegan she could have confirmed this. Her organisation offered me a safe home whilst SMBC adapted a property for me but SMBC refused permission for me to live outside the borough and pay rent which was why I had to stay at manifoldia Grange. The reasons for the fire are well documented and the email I forwarded to you can also be verified independently. The asb team at my local authority allowed a white neighbour to break my bones repeatedly, threaten to kill me and destroy anything I added to the communal spaces, all without consequence and when this racist neighbour damaged my spine (still without consequence) I had to move to a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by the same local authority. They refused to make the property safe and it is not wheelchair accessible, I experienced 3 or 4 falls every week for 3.5 years before the NHS intervened and installed grab rails in my bathroom and by the doors to reduce preventable falls in July 2013. I was forced to shower in the presence of carers for my own safety because my local authority wouldn't install a £5 grab rail. The kitchen was unsafe so I had to eat meals prepared by carers who kept giving me food poisoning so severe I was hospitalised multiple times even after West Midlands fire service intervened in November 2022 my local authority refused to make the property safer or remedy the kitchen which was a fire hazard. I was charged for these carers even though I am capable of caring for myself independently and cooking independently as long as I don't try to move heavy items, the care plans didn't include help I need due to my disability so I had to pay for that out of pocket and was unable to access my local community leaving me isolated at home and at risk of a fall if I ventured into the garden I couldn't even go outside alone to get the sunshine on my face without risking a concussion. When SMBC became responsible for my care and began commissioning care agencies I was 105kg size 20/22 having put on weight since my sci by the time the experience broke me and I arrived in Cornwall I was 61.5kg size 6, if I had remained in Sandwell they would have starved me to death or I would have committed suicide. my mental health was so impaired I had spent 40 hours in a and e waiting for a crisis bed when doctors explained they felt my mental health was fine and my home was the problem because it was unsafe for me, they wanted to send me to a long stay NHS bed to wait for my local authority to adapt the bungalow (something SMBC have been REFUSING to do until this email from James McLaughlin following our meeting last week.) That was why I went home and torched the kitchen, in that emotional state destroying the kitchen wall the only way to Stop the carers who were making me ill by serving improperly prepared meals, stressing me out destroying property in their haste and interrupting my work meetings because they came outside of the agreed times. Stop the care charges which were leaving me without means to buy food despite working full time. Try to force the local authority to make the kitchen safer as per the fire service instructions. I only need a wheelchair because my neighbour was enabled to abuse my by the asb team that should have protected me, I was prosecuted for sending angry emails to the team who had enabled him to repeatedly assault me and then cripple me and I am being prosecuted for the arson fire. I accept responsibility and the consequences of my actions but if my local authority had provided a SAFE home at any point during the last 15 years I would not be mentally and physically disabled living in a caravan and if they had offered to house me on safe accommodation I would indeed now be safe. I am including Elizabeth and James in this response hoping they can help me appeal this decision, I accept responsibility for seeing the fire and when I attend court I will accept whatever consequence is deemed appropriate, but I have not been offered safe accommodation by SMBC both people included can confirm this, and world like to know the name of the person who claims this please in addition to appealing your decision based on this inaccurate information. I also have vast documentation that supports the above should you wish to meet in person to discuss this and request copies of anything you need. Sincerely, Marie Brown From: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk> Sent: Tuesday, February 11, 2025 9:11:34 AM To: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for coming in to meet with me and Sukhjinder last week. Apologies for the delay in following up with an email as promised. Having listened carefully to the experiences that you shared with us, I have agreed to speak with colleagues in Housing and Adult Social Care to see what we can do to unblock the housing issue that prevents you from moving to a new property in Cornwall. This may take a little time to get through, but I will come back to you by the end of next week with an update on progress in any event. What struck me when listening to you articulating your experiences was that no one had apologised to you for the experiences that you have had and I recognised that I needed to apologise to you for that on behalf of the Council. There is a lot of information to review and we will do that. In the meantime, if you need any further information from us or have any questions then please do come back to us. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 07 February 2025 06:59 To: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James and Sukhjinder, Thank you for your time yesterday. SMBC and WMP this is the OneDrive folder I have been compiling the documents in, Brief Examples contains the documents on the website which I believe are the most pertinent such as the email to Jennifer asking her to intervene with the gate before Carl damaged my spine, the state 2 complaint response that states Carl's letter of apology was appropriate for crippling me etc The wmp oasis report shows the police logs for the more serious incidents, in chasing up notes on those prior to 2012. I recently tried to reach out to departments to try to resolve issues but one of the first responses I received was from Beverly about the care charges, given the volume of emails between us over the last 5 years with me requesting support to submit my budget for a fair assessment based on my income and expenditure, and Bev repeatedly using figures from 2018/2019 because I failed to access support to provide up to date figures. If you have any questions or need a particular document I have referenced please let me know, I can create a sub folder for them or attach them to an email. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Wednesday, January 29, 2025 1:16:03 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Thanks Marie. If you come to the One Stop Shop reception and inform them that you are here to meet with me, one of my colleagues will come to greet you and bring you to our meeting room. I look forward to meeting you in person then. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 29 January 2025 10:23 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James, Thank you for your empathy, Thursday 6th February at the council house is appreciated. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Monday, January 27, 2025 10:00:09 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Hi Marie, Thanks for your email and for coming back to me. I am sorry to read of your current circumstances and appreciate the difficulty that this will be causing you. I can offer you a meeting at 3pm on Thursday 6 February for a couple of hours. Please let me know if this date and time works for you. The meeting would be in person at Sandwell Council House in Oldbury. I look forward to hearing from you. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 25 January 2025 08:09 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi James, Thank you for your response I understand the limitations on your time and appreciate your acknowledgement of my email I removed the bungalow from the timeline because I was advised that it complicated the discrimination issue but I have everything collated and would welcome time to meet and discuss my concerns in full so you can look into the matter. I can travel up to meet at the council house in Oldbury or any other SMBC building any time to suit you after Tuesday 28th January, but I need a couple of days notice so I can rest the day before I drive up. I'm facing sleeping in my car from Feb 1st as the caravan and campsite are both unaffordable at present so this has been very stressful and my MH has been fragile trying to resolve significant challenges to day to day life hence my delayed response. I accept it will take some time after our meeting for you to look into my concerns and gather the information you'll need to respond and so request we meet as soon as you are able to to begin the process. I have delayed making a decision on terminating the tenancy because I've been advised this is not in my best interest and so I'm waiting for MH assessments to determine both what my diagnosis is and what support is appropriate. Only once I have appropriate support can any long term decisions be made. Many thanks, Marie Brien From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 8:14:10 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for your email. First of all, an apology to you. Sukhjinder indicated to you that when you made contact that I was looking into the background of the issues that you had raised. As you have stated in your email, I have multiple areas of responsibility and have limited time in my diary so this has taken longer that I would have hoped. That said, I am sorry that I have not been in touch before now to make arrangements to meet with you to listen to your concerns. Notwithstanding what you have detailed in your email below, I am happy to meet with you and will ask a colleague to make arrangements today if you wish to have that discussion. From the review of the timeline that you provided I cannot see any instances of problems arising for you since 2021, but I would like to understand if there are other issues since that time that you wish to raise. The issues that you have described as set out in full on your website and this has been helpful in giving me some insight into the concerns you have and the experiences you have referred to. It would be helpful from my perspective to meet with you to hear a bit more about that first hand. I appreciate that you may not want to take forward the offer to meet, but I’ll leave that with you and hope to hear back from you. Thanks, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 6:41 AM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. An update I am suing SMBC for a fall I had on 5th December in one of their properties and the SMBC solicitor originally came back stating I had not informed SMBC that I needed a wheelchair at that point. Correspondence proved not only were SMBC informed that I needed a wheelchair but also that this was because my neighbour damaged my spine and SMBC only made him write me a letter of apology. SMBC solicitors are settling that claim on a no prejudice basis. Yesterday I saw the medici legal solicitor and he is referring me for an assessment with a neuropsychiatrist because he thinks I have a brain injury as well as trauma. I have years of correspondence showing I've been describing my communication issues and begging for help but SMBC staff have consistently ignored my human rights to a safe home and staff as senior as the deputy exec just ignore these emails. I was normal when I moved into my first SMBC property in 2010 and tried to buy the property in 2017ish but living there being harassed non stop by Carl Clift broke me mentally and his five assaults left me physically disabled. The discrimination I experienced throughout that tenancy by Tipton asb team was appalling so when I moved out of Tipton my mental and physical disabilities were well documented. I moved to an SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow in November 2020 but it is still unsafe for wheelchair users and I can't live there having falls every week because my landlord won't fit a ramp being poisoned and starved by carers provided by SMBC because the kitchen is too unsafe for me to cook in independently not because I'm not capable of cooking for myself. I agreed to terminate the tenancy but a payment from SMBC to help cover the camp site fees was not received as agreed and I was not able to travel up on 1st January as planned. I am a disabled SMBC tenant who is living in a caravan because her wheelchair accessible bungalow is unsafe 4 years after I moved to it, my support worker describes SMBC as the worst local authority she has ever dealt with as she's been trying to get legally required adaptations for two years without success and has also experienced SMBC staff ignoring required time frames etc. I could go cripple Carl, write him a letter of apology explaining I really didn't want to hurt him, I'm a pacifist who believes violence doesn't solve problems however I believe the treatment I experienced at the hands of SMBC staff was wrong and it feels like the only way to highlight this is to do unto others as they have done to me. So if I cripple him I can sit back and watch as HE asks for his flat to be adapted for a wheelchair so he doesn't have to move out of his home. If he asks for carers to feed him 3x daily I can explain no he only gets 2x meals per day, if he asks for a wheelchair accessible bungalow I can point out SMBC don't provide safe homes for their disabled tenants and then he gets angry about how he's being treated and sends an angry email to the staff responsible I'll expect SMBC to threaten him with eviction for a breach of tenancy rather than address the problem. As I lose this caravan at the end of the month and will be sleeping in my car I really have nothing left to lose. The above legal action can't happen soon enough to help me avoid homelessness because I can't access universal credit or resolve SMBC issues when even the assistant chief exec. I can't access the help I need to access the help I need! It's ridiculous and I'm out of patience. A jail cell would be a lot easier and comfier than a caravan so that's the timeframe for someone to contact me to discuss the above and seek meaningful resolutions, I'm unwilling to live like this any more. I'll write the letter of apology to Carl so I can leave it with him after I take revenge, I will limit my attack to ensure his injuries match the injuries he inflicted on me. Broken toe, concussion and a spinal cord injury. I'll use them iron bars he swung at my head, I assume Carl is still allowed to hoard rubbish and dangerous items in the communal areas and I'll find the iron bars on the front garden where he kept them. I'm not in crisis, I'm following SMBC logic which implies that it's fine for people to cripple each other, this doesn't require police or court intervention but simply a letter of apology to make ten years of abuse go away. And James I'm going to send you a personal letter before court. As the highest level member of staff to ignore me when I worked really hard to express the problems calmly and clearly, I feel that you are setting a poor example for your staff and if that content was received from any other tenant you would have responded to it. I tire of this poor treatment and remind you that as my landlord SMBC has a duty of care to me, universal credit paid rent for an uninhabitable property leaving me without the financial support I need and I am facing sleeping in my car because of the problems with SMBC. I met west Midlands fire service at the property on Saturday and explained to them I need to return to it at the end of the month, SMBC have had over 15 months to make the kitchen SAFE by moving the cooker away from the door which was meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, enough is enough. Either Carl faces legal consequences for the harm he did me and that process begins immediately or I do to him what he did to me (nothing more nothing less) and watch SMBC reaction pointing out any differences in the SMBC approach to him afterwards. Sincerely Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 9:56:56 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for getting in touch. This is just a brief message to let you know that a service area has been allocated to investigate this and they have your contact details and should be in touch with you directly. Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Monday, December 9, 2024 12:55 PM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Sukhjinder Thank you for your prompt response to my enquiry below. Regrettably James has not followed up and my circumstances have changes in the interim, my entire Team was made redundant at the end of last month. As a direct result of my inability to communicate effectively with your colleagues my day to day life is impacted in the following ways: I am currently unable to access financial support from Universal Credit for housing costs because my permanent address remains 8 Boldmere Court, B43 5PH until someone from Sandwell MBC either repairs the property so it is safe for me to return to it to sell my possessions and terminate the tenancy or cancels the job and allow me to return to empty the property of my possessions and terminate the tenancy. Work was scheduled to take 6 to 8 weeks in September 2023 but no date for the work to commence has been provided and a Stage 2 complaint submitted by an advocate is now 4 months overdue its final response from Lisa Ellis (who has been trying to get answers but is equally unable to.) I am unable to receive mail on campsites which were meant to be a temporary solution for the 6 to 8 weeks the repairs were meant to take, this causes additional challenges for example I had to attend Bodmin Court last month to address a speeding ticket that had already progressed to court action before I was aware of it. The fine paperwork was sent to the bungalow so I am trying to address this as I am now being prosecuted for failing to make the first payment towards the fine because I lack the information I need to do so. Because I'm unable to update my permanent address I am also unable to access many services locally, book online delivery unless a pick up location is offered, receive my medication much is mail delivery and many other simple functions always having to find a work around. I am being threatened with court action by SMBC to collect Care Charges that were unfairly assessed and requests for support to complete the assessments with accurate information were and still are being ignored, these could have been addressed back in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 if appropriate support to submit the required paperwork had been provided as requested, recent attempts to work with this department have been ignored. My MH diagnosis is currently being reassessed query Neurodivergency or Trauma but whether my MH issue was caused by my experiences in Tipton (Trauma) and trying to communicate with SMBC staff about the issues or Neurodivergency or the diagnosed Personality Disorder, the lack of appropriate support for my inability to communicate effectively with SMBC has been well documented, as have my hundreds of pleas for help to multiple SMBC departments and staff. I am treated either as a capable person who has shown great fortitude in challenging circumstances and received praise and admiration for my courage or by someone who is whining about nothing the difference in the 2 responses to me are as challenging to process as they are to account for. I would therefore appreciate it if you could please follow up with some urgency as the ongoing uncertainty in my Housing and Finances is incredibly stressful and as I have mentioned a few times this situation was only meant to last for 6 to 8 weeks. Many thanks, Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: 07 November 2024 4:47 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team < EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

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Hello James, Thank you for following up. I have now been charged with arson and am seeking a criminal defense solicitor to prepare for the case in early march. Cornwall council have refused my homeless application stating I have twice been offered safe accommodation by SMBC but I am not aware of these offers, I've copied in Elizabeth in case this is something she is aware of. I am mindful I may be going to prison in March but will need somewhere safe before then, if there is anything any of you are able to do, say or send to Alex that could help I would very much appreciate it, I'm mindful how insane I sound when I relate my experiences and have learned it's better when it comes from a third party. Warm wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk> Sent: Tuesday, February 11, 2025 9:11:34 AM To: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for coming in to meet with me and Sukhjinder last week. Apologies for the delay in following up with an email as promised. Having listened carefully to the experiences that you shared with us, I have agreed to speak with colleagues in Housing and Adult Social Care to see what we can do to unblock the housing issue that prevents you from moving to a new property in Cornwall. This may take a little time to get through, but I will come back to you by the end of next week with an update on progress in any event. What struck me when listening to you articulating your experiences was that no one had apologised to you for the experiences that you have had and I recognised that I needed to apologise to you for that on behalf of the Council. There is a lot of information to review and we will do that. In the meantime, if you need any further information from us or have any questions then please do come back to us. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 07 February 2025 06:59 To: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James and Sukhjinder, Thank you for your time yesterday. SMBC and WMP this is the OneDrive folder I have been compiling the documents in, Brief Examples contains the documents on the website which I believe are the most pertinent such as the email to Jennifer asking her to intervene with the gate before Carl damaged my spine, the state 2 complaint response that states Carl's letter of apology was appropriate for crippling me etc The wmp oasis report shows the police logs for the more serious incidents, in chasing up notes on those prior to 2012. I recently tried to reach out to departments to try to resolve issues but one of the first responses I received was from Beverly about the care charges, given the volume of emails between us over the last 5 years with me requesting support to submit my budget for a fair assessment based on my income and expenditure, and Bev repeatedly using figures from 2018/2019 because I failed to access support to provide up to date figures. If you have any questions or need a particular document I have referenced please let me know, I can create a sub folder for them or attach them to an email. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Wednesday, January 29, 2025 1:16:03 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Thanks Marie. If you come to the One Stop Shop reception and inform them that you are here to meet with me, one of my colleagues will come to greet you and bring you to our meeting room. I look forward to meeting you in person then. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 29 January 2025 10:23 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James, Thank you for your empathy, Thursday 6th February at the council house is appreciated. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Monday, January 27, 2025 10:00:09 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Hi Marie, Thanks for your email and for coming back to me. I am sorry to read of your current circumstances and appreciate the difficulty that this will be causing you. I can offer you a meeting at 3pm on Thursday 6 February for a couple of hours. Please let me know if this date and time works for you. The meeting would be in person at Sandwell Council House in Oldbury. I look forward to hearing from you. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 25 January 2025 08:09 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi James, Thank you for your response I understand the limitations on your time and appreciate your acknowledgement of my email I removed the bungalow from the timeline because I was advised that it complicated the discrimination issue but I have everything collated and would welcome time to meet and discuss my concerns in full so you can look into the matter. I can travel up to meet at the council house in Oldbury or any other SMBC building any time to suit you after Tuesday 28th January, but I need a couple of days notice so I can rest the day before I drive up. I'm facing sleeping in my car from Feb 1st as the caravan and campsite are both unaffordable at present so this has been very stressful and my MH has been fragile trying to resolve significant challenges to day to day life hence my delayed response. I accept it will take some time after our meeting for you to look into my concerns and gather the information you'll need to respond and so request we meet as soon as you are able to to begin the process. I have delayed making a decision on terminating the tenancy because I've been advised this is not in my best interest and so I'm waiting for MH assessments to determine both what my diagnosis is and what support is appropriate. Only once I have appropriate support can any long term decisions be made. Many thanks, Marie Brien From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 8:14:10 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for your email. First of all, an apology to you. Sukhjinder indicated to you that when you made contact that I was looking into the background of the issues that you had raised. As you have stated in your email, I have multiple areas of responsibility and have limited time in my diary so this has taken longer that I would have hoped. That said, I am sorry that I have not been in touch before now to make arrangements to meet with you to listen to your concerns. Notwithstanding what you have detailed in your email below, I am happy to meet with you and will ask a colleague to make arrangements today if you wish to have that discussion. From the review of the timeline that you provided I cannot see any instances of problems arising for you since 2021, but I would like to understand if there are other issues since that time that you wish to raise. The issues that you have described as set out in full on your website and this has been helpful in giving me some insight into the concerns you have and the experiences you have referred to. It would be helpful from my perspective to meet with you to hear a bit more about that first hand. I appreciate that you may not want to take forward the offer to meet, but I’ll leave that with you and hope to hear back from you. Thanks, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 6:41 AM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. An update I am suing SMBC for a fall I had on 5th December in one of their properties and the SMBC solicitor originally came back stating I had not informed SMBC that I needed a wheelchair at that point. Correspondence proved not only were SMBC informed that I needed a wheelchair but also that this was because my neighbour damaged my spine and SMBC only made him write me a letter of apology. SMBC solicitors are settling that claim on a no prejudice basis. Yesterday I saw the medici legal solicitor and he is referring me for an assessment with a neuropsychiatrist because he thinks I have a brain injury as well as trauma. I have years of correspondence showing I've been describing my communication issues and begging for help but SMBC staff have consistently ignored my human rights to a safe home and staff as senior as the deputy exec just ignore these emails. I was normal when I moved into my first SMBC property in 2010 and tried to buy the property in 2017ish but living there being harassed non stop by Carl Clift broke me mentally and his five assaults left me physically disabled. The discrimination I experienced throughout that tenancy by Tipton asb team was appalling so when I moved out of Tipton my mental and physical disabilities were well documented. I moved to an SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow in November 2020 but it is still unsafe for wheelchair users and I can't live there having falls every week because my landlord won't fit a ramp being poisoned and starved by carers provided by SMBC because the kitchen is too unsafe for me to cook in independently not because I'm not capable of cooking for myself. I agreed to terminate the tenancy but a payment from SMBC to help cover the camp site fees was not received as agreed and I was not able to travel up on 1st January as planned. I am a disabled SMBC tenant who is living in a caravan because her wheelchair accessible bungalow is unsafe 4 years after I moved to it, my support worker describes SMBC as the worst local authority she has ever dealt with as she's been trying to get legally required adaptations for two years without success and has also experienced SMBC staff ignoring required time frames etc. I could go cripple Carl, write him a letter of apology explaining I really didn't want to hurt him, I'm a pacifist who believes violence doesn't solve problems however I believe the treatment I experienced at the hands of SMBC staff was wrong and it feels like the only way to highlight this is to do unto others as they have done to me. So if I cripple him I can sit back and watch as HE asks for his flat to be adapted for a wheelchair so he doesn't have to move out of his home. If he asks for carers to feed him 3x daily I can explain no he only gets 2x meals per day, if he asks for a wheelchair accessible bungalow I can point out SMBC don't provide safe homes for their disabled tenants and then he gets angry about how he's being treated and sends an angry email to the staff responsible I'll expect SMBC to threaten him with eviction for a breach of tenancy rather than address the problem. As I lose this caravan at the end of the month and will be sleeping in my car I really have nothing left to lose. The above legal action can't happen soon enough to help me avoid homelessness because I can't access universal credit or resolve SMBC issues when even the assistant chief exec. I can't access the help I need to access the help I need! It's ridiculous and I'm out of patience. A jail cell would be a lot easier and comfier than a caravan so that's the timeframe for someone to contact me to discuss the above and seek meaningful resolutions, I'm unwilling to live like this any more. I'll write the letter of apology to Carl so I can leave it with him after I take revenge, I will limit my attack to ensure his injuries match the injuries he inflicted on me. Broken toe, concussion and a spinal cord injury. I'll use them iron bars he swung at my head, I assume Carl is still allowed to hoard rubbish and dangerous items in the communal areas and I'll find the iron bars on the front garden where he kept them. I'm not in crisis, I'm following SMBC logic which implies that it's fine for people to cripple each other, this doesn't require police or court intervention but simply a letter of apology to make ten years of abuse go away. And James I'm going to send you a personal letter before court. As the highest level member of staff to ignore me when I worked really hard to express the problems calmly and clearly, I feel that you are setting a poor example for your staff and if that content was received from any other tenant you would have responded to it. I tire of this poor treatment and remind you that as my landlord SMBC has a duty of care to me, universal credit paid rent for an uninhabitable property leaving me without the financial support I need and I am facing sleeping in my car because of the problems with SMBC. I met west Midlands fire service at the property on Saturday and explained to them I need to return to it at the end of the month, SMBC have had over 15 months to make the kitchen SAFE by moving the cooker away from the door which was meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, enough is enough. Either Carl faces legal consequences for the harm he did me and that process begins immediately or I do to him what he did to me (nothing more nothing less) and watch SMBC reaction pointing out any differences in the SMBC approach to him afterwards. Sincerely Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 9:56:56 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for getting in touch. This is just a brief message to let you know that a service area has been allocated to investigate this and they have your contact details and should be in touch with you directly. Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Monday, December 9, 2024 12:55 PM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Sukhjinder Thank you for your prompt response to my enquiry below. Regrettably James has not followed up and my circumstances have changes in the interim, my entire Team was made redundant at the end of last month. As a direct result of my inability to communicate effectively with your colleagues my day to day life is impacted in the following ways: I am currently unable to access financial support from Universal Credit for housing costs because my permanent address remains 8 Boldmere Court, B43 5PH until someone from Sandwell MBC either repairs the property so it is safe for me to return to it to sell my possessions and terminate the tenancy or cancels the job and allow me to return to empty the property of my possessions and terminate the tenancy. Work was scheduled to take 6 to 8 weeks in September 2023 but no date for the work to commence has been provided and a Stage 2 complaint submitted by an advocate is now 4 months overdue its final response from Lisa Ellis (who has been trying to get answers but is equally unable to.) I am unable to receive mail on campsites which were meant to be a temporary solution for the 6 to 8 weeks the repairs were meant to take, this causes additional challenges for example I had to attend Bodmin Court last month to address a speeding ticket that had already progressed to court action before I was aware of it. The fine paperwork was sent to the bungalow so I am trying to address this as I am now being prosecuted for failing to make the first payment towards the fine because I lack the information I need to do so. Because I'm unable to update my permanent address I am also unable to access many services locally, book online delivery unless a pick up location is offered, receive my medication much is mail delivery and many other simple functions always having to find a work around. I am being threatened with court action by SMBC to collect Care Charges that were unfairly assessed and requests for support to complete the assessments with accurate information were and still are being ignored, these could have been addressed back in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 if appropriate support to submit the required paperwork had been provided as requested, recent attempts to work with this department have been ignored. My MH diagnosis is currently being reassessed query Neurodivergency or Trauma but whether my MH issue was caused by my experiences in Tipton (Trauma) and trying to communicate with SMBC staff about the issues or Neurodivergency or the diagnosed Personality Disorder, the lack of appropriate support for my inability to communicate effectively with SMBC has been well documented, as have my hundreds of pleas for help to multiple SMBC departments and staff. I am treated either as a capable person who has shown great fortitude in challenging circumstances and received praise and admiration for my courage or by someone who is whining about nothing the difference in the 2 responses to me are as challenging to process as they are to account for. I would therefore appreciate it if you could please follow up with some urgency as the ongoing uncertainty in my Housing and Finances is incredibly stressful and as I have mentioned a few times this situation was only meant to last for 6 to 8 weeks. Many thanks, Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: 07 November 2024 4:47 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team < EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

From

Elizabeth Deegan <Elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk>

To

James McLaughlin <james_mclaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>, "alan_lunt@sandwell.gov.uk" <alan_lunt@sandwell.gov.uk>

CC

Marie Brown <mariebrownuk@outlook.com>, Sukhjinder Sahota <sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk>

BCC

—

Named attachments

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Apologies, I placed a typo in Alan’s email address – please see below email, I look forward to hearing from you. Kind regards, Elizabeth Deegan (She/Her) Housing Advisor Aspire – supporting people with spinal cord injuries Please donate to Aspire: https://www.aspire.org.uk/donate M 07918 673 896 W www.aspire.org.uk Aspire, Aspire Leisure Centre, Wood Lane, Stanmore, Middlesex HA7 4AP Association for Spinal Injury Research, Rehabilitation and Reintegration. Registered Company no. 3744357. Registered Charity no. 1075317. Scottish Registered Charity no. SC037482. This e-mail (and any attachments) is confidential. If you have received it in error, please delete it from your system, do not use, copy or disclose the information in any way nor act in reliance on it and notify Aspire immediately. Thank you. From: Elizabeth Deegan Sent: 12 February 2025 14:55 To: James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk; alan.lunt@sandwell.gov.uk Cc: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>; Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk Subject: Temporary accommodation required - RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Importance: High Good afternoon James and Alan, Following on from Marie’s email below. Cornwall have reached the decision that Marie is not homeless based on her tenancy in Sandwell (and information provided by Sandwell staff members). We will be appealing this decision however this will take some time and does not help with Marie’s housing situation in the meantime. There is no guarantee that the appeal will also be awarded in Marie’s favour. As Marie has explained, she needs somewhere to stay and has now informed me that she will be homeless as of Monday 17 th February 2025 . Marie does not have any money to pay for accommodation passed this point and due to the ongoing issues with the tenancy she is unable to claim Housing costs via benefits and is surviving on basic benefits. Cornwall will not provide accommodation for Marie and have stated in their investigations as part of the homelessness application; ‘Sandwell Borough Council have accepted their duty to provide temporary accommodation to you while they source services to repair the damage to your kitchen’. The last time temporary accommodation was requested to help Marie via the West Bromwich Housing team was on Monday 5 th August 2024 when Marie was really in need. A response was provided on 9 th August 2024, stating the below email, and nothing has been heard about this since the below email (please see attached PDF): ‘Hi Elizabeth I have been making enquiries about suitable temporary accommodation and we do not have anything at the moment, Marie has been put on the waiting list for wheelchair accessible accommodation and when something becomes available, we will contact her (and you). Kind regards Janet’ As you can imagine I am at a bit of a loss as to what to advise Marie as no other LA’s will help Marie with housing due to her tenancy, Sandwell Council are stating that they are accepting duty to rehouse Marie however no accommodation is available for her via Sandwell Council and the works still have not been completed on her property so this inhabitable for her to return to. I appreciate James that you do not oversee Housing, and you had requested until the end of next week to respond to Marie, however this is a significant issue which needs urgently addressing. Marie will be sleeping in her car from Monday as she will have nowhere else to go and I am very concerned about how this will impact her spinal cord injury, her overall health and mental wellbeing. Marie is a vulnerable adult who has had multiple issues with Sandwell Council, as discussed in the meeting last week. Sandwell has a duty of care towards Marie and have also stated this to Cornwall Council. I am concerned the impression that Sandwell Council have given to Cornwall Council is not a true representation or what has happened/is currently happening. Lisa Ellis kindly responded to the Stage 2 complaint and was liaising with Marie and I, however this was leading towards Marie relinquishing her tenancy which would make Marie intentionally homeless, and I strongly advised Marie not to do this. This situation has now been going on for 18 months where she has not been able to live in her property. Marie needs temporary accommodation from Monday; due to seriousness of the situation and how we have tried to liaise with workers of various management level before and no resolutions have been I feel that it is only appropriate that a director has oversight of this case moving forwards. Please can temporary accommodation be arranged from Monday that is suitable and safe for Marie to occupy with her wheelchair, and please can you advise of a named contact of who I and Marie can liaise with regarding this request. Kind regards, Elizabeth Deegan (She/Her) Housing Advisor Aspire – supporting people with spinal cord injuries Please donate to Aspire: https://www.aspire.org.uk/donate M 07918 673 896 W www.aspire.org.uk Aspire, Aspire Leisure Centre, Wood Lane, Stanmore, Middlesex HA7 4AP Association for Spinal Injury Research, Rehabilitation and Reintegration. Registered Company no. 3744357. Registered Charity no. 1075317. Scottish Registered Charity no. SC037482. This e-mail (and any attachments) is confidential. If you have received it in error, please delete it from your system, do not use, copy or disclose the information in any way nor act in reliance on it and notify Aspire immediately. Thank you. From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 11 February 2025 14:57 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk >; Elizabeth Deegan < Elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Hello James, Thank you for following up. I have now been charged with arson and am seeking a criminal defense solicitor to prepare for the case in early march. Cornwall council have refused my homeless application stating I have twice been offered safe accommodation by SMBC but I am not aware of these offers, I've copied in Elizabeth in case this is something she is aware of. I am mindful I may be going to prison in March but will need somewhere safe before then, if there is anything any of you are able to do, say or send to Alex that could help I would very much appreciate it, I'm mindful how insane I sound when I relate my experiences and have learned it's better when it comes from a third party. Warm wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, February 11, 2025 9:11:34 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for coming in to meet with me and Sukhjinder last week. Apologies for the delay in following up with an email as promised. Having listened carefully to the experiences that you shared with us, I have agreed to speak with colleagues in Housing and Adult Social Care to see what we can do to unblock the housing issue that prevents you from moving to a new property in Cornwall. This may take a little time to get through, but I will come back to you by the end of next week with an update on progress in any event. What struck me when listening to you articulating your experiences was that no one had apologised to you for the experiences that you have had and I recognised that I needed to apologise to you for that on behalf of the Council. There is a lot of information to review and we will do that. In the meantime, if you need any further information from us or have any questions then please do come back to us. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 07 February 2025 06:59 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James and Sukhjinder, Thank you for your time yesterday. SMBC and WMP this is the OneDrive folder I have been compiling the documents in, Brief Examples contains the documents on the website which I believe are the most pertinent such as the email to Jennifer asking her to intervene with the gate before Carl damaged my spine, the state 2 complaint response that states Carl's letter of apology was appropriate for crippling me etc The wmp oasis report shows the police logs for the more serious incidents, in chasing up notes on those prior to 2012. I recently tried to reach out to departments to try to resolve issues but one of the first responses I received was from Beverly about the care charges, given the volume of emails between us over the last 5 years with me requesting support to submit my budget for a fair assessment based on my income and expenditure, and Bev repeatedly using figures from 2018/2019 because I failed to access support to provide up to date figures. If you have any questions or need a particular document I have referenced please let me know, I can create a sub folder for them or attach them to an email. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Wednesday, January 29, 2025 1:16:03 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Thanks Marie. If you come to the One Stop Shop reception and inform them that you are here to meet with me, one of my colleagues will come to greet you and bring you to our meeting room. I look forward to meeting you in person then. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 29 January 2025 10:23 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James, Thank you for your empathy, Thursday 6th February at the council house is appreciated. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Monday, January 27, 2025 10:00:09 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Hi Marie, Thanks for your email and for coming back to me. I am sorry to read of your current circumstances and appreciate the difficulty that this will be causing you. I can offer you a meeting at 3pm on Thursday 6 February for a couple of hours. Please let me know if this date and time works for you. The meeting would be in person at Sandwell Council House in Oldbury. I look forward to hearing from you. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 25 January 2025 08:09 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi James, Thank you for your response I understand the limitations on your time and appreciate your acknowledgement of my email I removed the bungalow from the timeline because I was advised that it complicated the discrimination issue but I have everything collated and would welcome time to meet and discuss my concerns in full so you can look into the matter. I can travel up to meet at the council house in Oldbury or any other SMBC building any time to suit you after Tuesday 28th January, but I need a couple of days notice so I can rest the day before I drive up. I'm facing sleeping in my car from Feb 1st as the caravan and campsite are both unaffordable at present so this has been very stressful and my MH has been fragile trying to resolve significant challenges to day to day life hence my delayed response. I accept it will take some time after our meeting for you to look into my concerns and gather the information you'll need to respond and so request we meet as soon as you are able to to begin the process. I have delayed making a decision on terminating the tenancy because I've been advised this is not in my best interest and so I'm waiting for MH assessments to determine both what my diagnosis is and what support is appropriate. Only once I have appropriate support can any long term decisions be made. Many thanks, Marie Brien From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 8:14:10 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for your email. First of all, an apology to you. Sukhjinder indicated to you that when you made contact that I was looking into the background of the issues that you had raised. As you have stated in your email, I have multiple areas of responsibility and have limited time in my diary so this has taken longer that I would have hoped. That said, I am sorry that I have not been in touch before now to make arrangements to meet with you to listen to your concerns. Notwithstanding what you have detailed in your email below, I am happy to meet with you and will ask a colleague to make arrangements today if you wish to have that discussion. From the review of the timeline that you provided I cannot see any instances of problems arising for you since 2021, but I would like to understand if there are other issues since that time that you wish to raise. The issues that you have described as set out in full on your website and this has been helpful in giving me some insight into the concerns you have and the experiences you have referred to. It would be helpful from my perspective to meet with you to hear a bit more about that first hand. I appreciate that you may not want to take forward the offer to meet, but I’ll leave that with you and hope to hear back from you. Thanks, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 6:41 AM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. An update I am suing SMBC for a fall I had on 5th December in one of their properties and the SMBC solicitor originally came back stating I had not informed SMBC that I needed a wheelchair at that point. Correspondence proved not only were SMBC informed that I needed a wheelchair but also that this was because my neighbour damaged my spine and SMBC only made him write me a letter of apology. SMBC solicitors are settling that claim on a no prejudice basis. Yesterday I saw the medici legal solicitor and he is referring me for an assessment with a neuropsychiatrist because he thinks I have a brain injury as well as trauma. I have years of correspondence showing I've been describing my communication issues and begging for help but SMBC staff have consistently ignored my human rights to a safe home and staff as senior as the deputy exec just ignore these emails. I was normal when I moved into my first SMBC property in 2010 and tried to buy the property in 2017ish but living there being harassed non stop by Carl Clift broke me mentally and his five assaults left me physically disabled. The discrimination I experienced throughout that tenancy by Tipton asb team was appalling so when I moved out of Tipton my mental and physical disabilities were well documented. I moved to an SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow in November 2020 but it is still unsafe for wheelchair users and I can't live there having falls every week because my landlord won't fit a ramp being poisoned and starved by carers provided by SMBC because the kitchen is too unsafe for me to cook in independently not because I'm not capable of cooking for myself. I agreed to terminate the tenancy but a payment from SMBC to help cover the camp site fees was not received as agreed and I was not able to travel up on 1st January as planned. I am a disabled SMBC tenant who is living in a caravan because her wheelchair accessible bungalow is unsafe 4 years after I moved to it, my support worker describes SMBC as the worst local authority she has ever dealt with as she's been trying to get legally required adaptations for two years without success and has also experienced SMBC staff ignoring required time frames etc. I could go cripple Carl, write him a letter of apology explaining I really didn't want to hurt him, I'm a pacifist who believes violence doesn't solve problems however I believe the treatment I experienced at the hands of SMBC staff was wrong and it feels like the only way to highlight this is to do unto others as they have done to me. So if I cripple him I can sit back and watch as HE asks for his flat to be adapted for a wheelchair so he doesn't have to move out of his home. If he asks for carers to feed him 3x daily I can explain no he only gets 2x meals per day, if he asks for a wheelchair accessible bungalow I can point out SMBC don't provide safe homes for their disabled tenants and then he gets angry about how he's being treated and sends an angry email to the staff responsible I'll expect SMBC to threaten him with eviction for a breach of tenancy rather than address the problem. As I lose this caravan at the end of the month and will be sleeping in my car I really have nothing left to lose. The above legal action can't happen soon enough to help me avoid homelessness because I can't access universal credit or resolve SMBC issues when even the assistant chief exec. I can't access the help I need to access the help I need! It's ridiculous and I'm out of patience. A jail cell would be a lot easier and comfier than a caravan so that's the timeframe for someone to contact me to discuss the above and seek meaningful resolutions, I'm unwilling to live like this any more. I'll write the letter of apology to Carl so I can leave it with him after I take revenge, I will limit my attack to ensure his injuries match the injuries he inflicted on me. Broken toe, concussion and a spinal cord injury. I'll use them iron bars he swung at my head, I assume Carl is still allowed to hoard rubbish and dangerous items in the communal areas and I'll find the iron bars on the front garden where he kept them. I'm not in crisis, I'm following SMBC logic which implies that it's fine for people to cripple each other, this doesn't require police or court intervention but simply a letter of apology to make ten years of abuse go away. And James I'm going to send you a personal letter before court. As the highest level member of staff to ignore me when I worked really hard to express the problems calmly and clearly, I feel that you are setting a poor example for your staff and if that content was received from any other tenant you would have responded to it. I tire of this poor treatment and remind you that as my landlord SMBC has a duty of care to me, universal credit paid rent for an uninhabitable property leaving me without the financial support I need and I am facing sleeping in my car because of the problems with SMBC. I met west Midlands fire service at the property on Saturday and explained to them I need to return to it at the end of the month, SMBC have had over 15 months to make the kitchen SAFE by moving the cooker away from the door which was meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, enough is enough. Either Carl faces legal consequences for the harm he did me and that process begins immediately or I do to him what he did to me (nothing more nothing less) and watch SMBC reaction pointing out any differences in the SMBC approach to him afterwards. Sincerely Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 9:56:56 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for getting in touch. This is just a brief message to let you know that a service area has been allocated to investigate this and they have your contact details and should be in touch with you directly. Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Monday, December 9, 2024 12:55 PM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Sukhjinder Thank you for your prompt response to my enquiry below. Regrettably James has not followed up and my circumstances have changes in the interim, my entire Team was made redundant at the end of last month. As a direct result of my inability to communicate effectively with your colleagues my day to day life is impacted in the following ways: I am currently unable to access financial support from Universal Credit for housing costs because my permanent address remains 8 Boldmere Court, B43 5PH until someone from Sandwell MBC either repairs the property so it is safe for me to return to it to sell my possessions and terminate the tenancy or cancels the job and allow me to return to empty the property of my possessions and terminate the tenancy. Work was scheduled to take 6 to 8 weeks in September 2023 but no date for the work to commence has been provided and a Stage 2 complaint submitted by an advocate is now 4 months overdue its final response from Lisa Ellis (who has been trying to get answers but is equally unable to.) I am unable to receive mail on campsites which were meant to be a temporary solution for the 6 to 8 weeks the repairs were meant to take, this causes additional challenges for example I had to attend Bodmin Court last month to address a speeding ticket that had already progressed to court action before I was aware of it. The fine paperwork was sent to the bungalow so I am trying to address this as I am now being prosecuted for failing to make the first payment towards the fine because I lack the information I need to do so. Because I'm unable to update my permanent address I am also unable to access many services locally, book online delivery unless a pick up location is offered, receive my medication much is mail delivery and many other simple functions always having to find a work around. I am being threatened with court action by SMBC to collect Care Charges that were unfairly assessed and requests for support to complete the assessments with accurate information were and still are being ignored, these could have been addressed back in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 if appropriate support to submit the required paperwork had been provided as requested, recent attempts to work with this department have been ignored. My MH diagnosis is currently being reassessed query Neurodivergency or Trauma but whether my MH issue was caused by my experiences in Tipton (Trauma) and trying to communicate with SMBC staff about the issues or Neurodivergency or the diagnosed Personality Disorder, the lack of appropriate support for my inability to communicate effectively with SMBC has been well documented, as have my hundreds of pleas for help to multiple SMBC departments and staff. I am treated either as a capable person who has shown great fortitude in challenging circumstances and received praise and admiration for my courage or by someone who is whining about nothing the difference in the 2 responses to me are as challenging to process as they are to account for. I would therefore appreciate it if you could please follow up with some urgency as the ongoing uncertainty in my Housing and Finances is incredibly stressful and as I have mentioned a few times this situation was only meant to last for 6 to 8 weeks. Many thanks, Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: 07 November 2024 4:47 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team < EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

From

James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>

To

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

CC

Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk>

BCC

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Hi Marie, Thank you for your email and for sharing your experiences. Whilst it is good that you have been given some accommodation following our discussion last month I appreciate the issues that you have described in the email below are challenging and distressing for you. That said, it is good to see that you have had support from Lisa and Janet in housing, as well as Tracey in adult social care – thank you for that feedback. Having heard your first-hand account of your experiences, you can be sure that I will be raising your concerns with the relevant officers today so that these can be addressed. Whilst I can’t guarantee that anything will happen immediately, I hope that we can communicate quickly what we will do in response to the issues you have raised. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 21 March 2025 15:35 To: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk> Cc: Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Wheelchair accessibility and reasonable adjustments at Manifoldia Grange Importance: High CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good afternoon James, I hope you are well, I would like to follow up to thank you for removing barriers, Janet and Lisa arranged for me to move to Manifoldia Grange on 17th February, I'm grateful I did not have to sleep in my car as I feared I might have to, thank you. I have a few concerns about my safety while I reside at Manifoldia Grange again: 1. The doors at Manifoldia Grange are wide enough to accommodate a wheelchair, but they are also very heavy and do not have any adaptation to enable a wheelchair user to open them independently. Staff from Manifoldia Grange arranged for West Midlands Fire Service 18th February to prepare a PEEP and I was instructed to remain in the flat and await fire service evacuation in an emergency/fire drill. When the fire alarms went off repeatedly between 2am and 4am one morning no-one came to help me escape through the doors. I am scared I might be forgotten again if this happens in future and my triride has torn a hole in the vinyl flooring trying to drag my wheelchair over the door threshold which is also a trip hazard when I try to walk. 2. The kitchen is not wheelchair accessible, Janet and Lisa kindly sourced a dining table and place mats for me to use my pressure cooker and portable hob from my wheelchair which helped enormously, but accessing items in the fridge from my wheelchair caused a few minor injuries so west Midlands fire service staff moved the fridge to the lounge to reduce preventable falls. I'm finding it challenging to safely prepare drinks and meals or wash up without over balancing, stumbling or toppling forwards out of my wheelchair and would appreciate it if we could find a way to address the challenges to completing these essential tasks more safely during my stay here please? -Last time I was placed at Manifoldia Grange I was charged amounts I could not afford for carers to cook for me twice per day and I had to order take away for evening meals, I was also charged for carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety which are not Solutions I am open to this time, I am open to anything else. (I remain very much open to paying my care charges when my income and expenses have been reassessed but remain unable to access appropriate support to complete a financial reassessment) 3. The bathroom doesn't have any grab rails or a built in shower chair and was unsafe for me to use until Janet and Lisa went to the bungalow to collect my toilet frame and shower chair. Unfortunately I can't fit my wheelchair in the bathroom with my shower chair because the bathroom is not large enough to accommodate both, so I have to leave my wheelchair in the hall outside which has caused 2 falls. One was in the dark and I simply tripped over the black chair in the dark hallway despite both hands being pressed against the walls the other was trying to get to the wheelchair because the door opens outwards and shoved the chair further away as my body weight pushed it. I have reduced my fluid intake as much as I dare and taken other measures to reduce the frequency of the risk I'll fall but it persists despite my efforts. I am open to any solution that allows me to use the loo safely without being supervised in any way because this would again compromise my dignity. My mental health is being impacted because I do not feel very safe here, and being in the mirror image of Flat 3 Manifoldia Grange, where I was supervised in the shower and experienced so many falls is triggering flashbacks that are very distressing to me. I am receiving appropriate mental health support for the above via the NHS and I have been assigned a SMBC social worker named Tracey who already looked into alternative housing options and has referred me to welfare rights for help to mitigate UC sanctions and apply for housing costs etc I am very grateful for this help and if I could just complete the tasks/functions described above without risking another preventable injury to my spine during my stay here I would very much appreciate it. Warm wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, February 11, 2025 9:11:34 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for coming in to meet with me and Sukhjinder last week. Apologies for the delay in following up with an email as promised. Having listened carefully to the experiences that you shared with us, I have agreed to speak with colleagues in Housing and Adult Social Care to see what we can do to unblock the housing issue that prevents you from moving to a new property in Cornwall. This may take a little time to get through, but I will come back to you by the end of next week with an update on progress in any event. What struck me when listening to you articulating your experiences was that no one had apologised to you for the experiences that you have had and I recognised that I needed to apologise to you for that on behalf of the Council. There is a lot of information to review and we will do that. In the meantime, if you need any further information from us or have any questions then please do come back to us. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 07 February 2025 06:59 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James and Sukhjinder, Thank you for your time yesterday. SMBC and WMP this is the OneDrive folder I have been compiling the documents in, Brief Examples contains the documents on the website which I believe are the most pertinent such as the email to Jennifer asking her to intervene with the gate before Carl damaged my spine, the state 2 complaint response that states Carl's letter of apology was appropriate for crippling me etc The wmp oasis report shows the police logs for the more serious incidents, in chasing up notes on those prior to 2012. I recently tried to reach out to departments to try to resolve issues but one of the first responses I received was from Beverly about the care charges, given the volume of emails between us over the last 5 years with me requesting support to submit my budget for a fair assessment based on my income and expenditure, and Bev repeatedly using figures from 2018/2019 because I failed to access support to provide up to date figures. If you have any questions or need a particular document I have referenced please let me know, I can create a sub folder for them or attach them to an email. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Wednesday, January 29, 2025 1:16:03 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Thanks Marie. If you come to the One Stop Shop reception and inform them that you are here to meet with me, one of my colleagues will come to greet you and bring you to our meeting room. I look forward to meeting you in person then. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 29 January 2025 10:23 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James, Thank you for your empathy, Thursday 6th February at the council house is appreciated. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Monday, January 27, 2025 10:00:09 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Hi Marie, Thanks for your email and for coming back to me. I am sorry to read of your current circumstances and appreciate the difficulty that this will be causing you. I can offer you a meeting at 3pm on Thursday 6 February for a couple of hours. Please let me know if this date and time works for you. The meeting would be in person at Sandwell Council House in Oldbury. I look forward to hearing from you. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 25 January 2025 08:09 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi James, Thank you for your response I understand the limitations on your time and appreciate your acknowledgement of my email I removed the bungalow from the timeline because I was advised that it complicated the discrimination issue but I have everything collated and would welcome time to meet and discuss my concerns in full so you can look into the matter. I can travel up to meet at the council house in Oldbury or any other SMBC building any time to suit you after Tuesday 28th January, but I need a couple of days notice so I can rest the day before I drive up. I'm facing sleeping in my car from Feb 1st as the caravan and campsite are both unaffordable at present so this has been very stressful and my MH has been fragile trying to resolve significant challenges to day to day life hence my delayed response. I accept it will take some time after our meeting for you to look into my concerns and gather the information you'll need to respond and so request we meet as soon as you are able to to begin the process. I have delayed making a decision on terminating the tenancy because I've been advised this is not in my best interest and so I'm waiting for MH assessments to determine both what my diagnosis is and what support is appropriate. Only once I have appropriate support can any long term decisions be made. Many thanks, Marie Brien From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 8:14:10 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for your email. First of all, an apology to you. Sukhjinder indicated to you that when you made contact that I was looking into the background of the issues that you had raised. As you have stated in your email, I have multiple areas of responsibility and have limited time in my diary so this has taken longer that I would have hoped. That said, I am sorry that I have not been in touch before now to make arrangements to meet with you to listen to your concerns. Notwithstanding what you have detailed in your email below, I am happy to meet with you and will ask a colleague to make arrangements today if you wish to have that discussion. From the review of the timeline that you provided I cannot see any instances of problems arising for you since 2021, but I would like to understand if there are other issues since that time that you wish to raise. The issues that you have described as set out in full on your website and this has been helpful in giving me some insight into the concerns you have and the experiences you have referred to. It would be helpful from my perspective to meet with you to hear a bit more about that first hand. I appreciate that you may not want to take forward the offer to meet, but I’ll leave that with you and hope to hear back from you. Thanks, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 6:41 AM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. An update I am suing SMBC for a fall I had on 5th December in one of their properties and the SMBC solicitor originally came back stating I had not informed SMBC that I needed a wheelchair at that point. Correspondence proved not only were SMBC informed that I needed a wheelchair but also that this was because my neighbour damaged my spine and SMBC only made him write me a letter of apology. SMBC solicitors are settling that claim on a no prejudice basis. Yesterday I saw the medici legal solicitor and he is referring me for an assessment with a neuropsychiatrist because he thinks I have a brain injury as well as trauma. I have years of correspondence showing I've been describing my communication issues and begging for help but SMBC staff have consistently ignored my human rights to a safe home and staff as senior as the deputy exec just ignore these emails. I was normal when I moved into my first SMBC property in 2010 and tried to buy the property in 2017ish but living there being harassed non stop by Carl Clift broke me mentally and his five assaults left me physically disabled. The discrimination I experienced throughout that tenancy by Tipton asb team was appalling so when I moved out of Tipton my mental and physical disabilities were well documented. I moved to an SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow in November 2020 but it is still unsafe for wheelchair users and I can't live there having falls every week because my landlord won't fit a ramp being poisoned and starved by carers provided by SMBC because the kitchen is too unsafe for me to cook in independently not because I'm not capable of cooking for myself. I agreed to terminate the tenancy but a payment from SMBC to help cover the camp site fees was not received as agreed and I was not able to travel up on 1st January as planned. I am a disabled SMBC tenant who is living in a caravan because her wheelchair accessible bungalow is unsafe 4 years after I moved to it, my support worker describes SMBC as the worst local authority she has ever dealt with as she's been trying to get legally required adaptations for two years without success and has also experienced SMBC staff ignoring required time frames etc. I could go cripple Carl, write him a letter of apology explaining I really didn't want to hurt him, I'm a pacifist who believes violence doesn't solve problems however I believe the treatment I experienced at the hands of SMBC staff was wrong and it feels like the only way to highlight this is to do unto others as they have done to me. So if I cripple him I can sit back and watch as HE asks for his flat to be adapted for a wheelchair so he doesn't have to move out of his home. If he asks for carers to feed him 3x daily I can explain no he only gets 2x meals per day, if he asks for a wheelchair accessible bungalow I can point out SMBC don't provide safe homes for their disabled tenants and then he gets angry about how he's being treated and sends an angry email to the staff responsible I'll expect SMBC to threaten him with eviction for a breach of tenancy rather than address the problem. As I lose this caravan at the end of the month and will be sleeping in my car I really have nothing left to lose. The above legal action can't happen soon enough to help me avoid homelessness because I can't access universal credit or resolve SMBC issues when even the assistant chief exec. I can't access the help I need to access the help I need! It's ridiculous and I'm out of patience. A jail cell would be a lot easier and comfier than a caravan so that's the timeframe for someone to contact me to discuss the above and seek meaningful resolutions, I'm unwilling to live like this any more. I'll write the letter of apology to Carl so I can leave it with him after I take revenge, I will limit my attack to ensure his injuries match the injuries he inflicted on me. Broken toe, concussion and a spinal cord injury. I'll use them iron bars he swung at my head, I assume Carl is still allowed to hoard rubbish and dangerous items in the communal areas and I'll find the iron bars on the front garden where he kept them. I'm not in crisis, I'm following SMBC logic which implies that it's fine for people to cripple each other, this doesn't require police or court intervention but simply a letter of apology to make ten years of abuse go away. And James I'm going to send you a personal letter before court. As the highest level member of staff to ignore me when I worked really hard to express the problems calmly and clearly, I feel that you are setting a poor example for your staff and if that content was received from any other tenant you would have responded to it. I tire of this poor treatment and remind you that as my landlord SMBC has a duty of care to me, universal credit paid rent for an uninhabitable property leaving me without the financial support I need and I am facing sleeping in my car because of the problems with SMBC. I met west Midlands fire service at the property on Saturday and explained to them I need to return to it at the end of the month, SMBC have had over 15 months to make the kitchen SAFE by moving the cooker away from the door which was meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, enough is enough. Either Carl faces legal consequences for the harm he did me and that process begins immediately or I do to him what he did to me (nothing more nothing less) and watch SMBC reaction pointing out any differences in the SMBC approach to him afterwards. Sincerely Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 9:56:56 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for getting in touch. This is just a brief message to let you know that a service area has been allocated to investigate this and they have your contact details and should be in touch with you directly. Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Monday, December 9, 2024 12:55 PM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Sukhjinder Thank you for your prompt response to my enquiry below. Regrettably James has not followed up and my circumstances have changes in the interim, my entire Team was made redundant at the end of last month. As a direct result of my inability to communicate effectively with your colleagues my day to day life is impacted in the following ways: I am currently unable to access financial support from Universal Credit for housing costs because my permanent address remains 8 Boldmere Court, B43 5PH until someone from Sandwell MBC either repairs the property so it is safe for me to return to it to sell my possessions and terminate the tenancy or cancels the job and allow me to return to empty the property of my possessions and terminate the tenancy. Work was scheduled to take 6 to 8 weeks in September 2023 but no date for the work to commence has been provided and a Stage 2 complaint submitted by an advocate is now 4 months overdue its final response from Lisa Ellis (who has been trying to get answers but is equally unable to.) I am unable to receive mail on campsites which were meant to be a temporary solution for the 6 to 8 weeks the repairs were meant to take, this causes additional challenges for example I had to attend Bodmin Court last month to address a speeding ticket that had already progressed to court action before I was aware of it. The fine paperwork was sent to the bungalow so I am trying to address this as I am now being prosecuted for failing to make the first payment towards the fine because I lack the information I need to do so. Because I'm unable to update my permanent address I am also unable to access many services locally, book online delivery unless a pick up location is offered, receive my medication much is mail delivery and many other simple functions always having to find a work around. I am being threatened with court action by SMBC to collect Care Charges that were unfairly assessed and requests for support to complete the assessments with accurate information were and still are being ignored, these could have been addressed back in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 if appropriate support to submit the required paperwork had been provided as requested, recent attempts to work with this department have been ignored. My MH diagnosis is currently being reassessed query Neurodivergency or Trauma but whether my MH issue was caused by my experiences in Tipton (Trauma) and trying to communicate with SMBC staff about the issues or Neurodivergency or the diagnosed Personality Disorder, the lack of appropriate support for my inability to communicate effectively with SMBC has been well documented, as have my hundreds of pleas for help to multiple SMBC departments and staff. I am treated either as a capable person who has shown great fortitude in challenging circumstances and received praise and admiration for my courage or by someone who is whining about nothing the difference in the 2 responses to me are as challenging to process as they are to account for. I would therefore appreciate it if you could please follow up with some urgency as the ongoing uncertainty in my Housing and Finances is incredibly stressful and as I have mentioned a few times this situation was only meant to last for 6 to 8 weeks. Many thanks, Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: 07 November 2024 4:47 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team < EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

From

Shokat Lal <Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk>

To

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

CC

Elizabeth Deegan <elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk>, James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>, Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk>

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Hi Marie, I understand that colleagues have been in touch with you and are working their way through the issues raised and I will ask the question around why you were put into the property without the right reasonable adjustments made. Can I ask that you work with James on this and you have also contacted me through Linkedin earlier asking a question, the right place to do that is through my official email address which is this. Thanks Shokat From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 25 March 2025 06:30 To: Shokat Lal <Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk> Cc: Elizabeth Deegan <elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk>; James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: Responding to Linkedin message CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Shokat, Thanks for reaching out, James is aware of the original issues, he apologised to me, said he needed time to look into things and would respond, and the outcome I asked James for was a SAFE home. Then James sent me BACK to Manifoldia Grange where more safeguarding issues have been raised and ignored. Elizabeth and I are still waiting for the response to everything Elizabeth, James, Sukhjinder and I discussed on February 6th 2025, James please send that today as a reasonable time has now passed. Shokat, could you please explain to me (because I'm a bit thick and can't communicate effectively with SMBC staff) why, a disabled 49 year old tenant of Sandwell Council spent the last few weeks in a flat with standard kitchen units and no grab rails, and is being sent back to a bungalow with steps in the back garden, when Elizabeth Deegan has been asking Sandwell Council to install wheelchair adaptations in one of their wheelchair accessible bungalows for a few years now? I look forward to hearing from you soon. Marie From: Shokat Lal < Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Monday, March 24, 2025 8:50:59 PM To: MarieBrownUK@outlook.com < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: Responding to Linkedin message Hi Marie, I am just following up on the message you left on Linkedin on Sunday. I understand that there are some issues which you have raised and a number of officers need to look intoi, I have been told that they are looking into those and will be coming back to you but I would be happy for you to let me know the exact issues that need resolving? Thank you Shokat Shokat Lal Chief Executive Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council Sandwell Council House Freeth Street Oldbury B69 3DE Office: 07721 687878 www.sandwell.gov.uk

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Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

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"James McLaughlin"

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Hi James This response is now very overdue, can you please explain the delay? Marie From: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk> Sent: Tuesday, February 11, 2025 9:11:34 AM To: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for coming in to meet with me and Sukhjinder last week. Apologies for the delay in following up with an email as promised. Having listened carefully to the experiences that you shared with us, I have agreed to speak with colleagues in Housing and Adult Social Care to see what we can do to unblock the housing issue that prevents you from moving to a new property in Cornwall. This may take a little time to get through, but I will come back to you by the end of next week with an update on progress in any event. What struck me when listening to you articulating your experiences was that no one had apologised to you for the experiences that you have had and I recognised that I needed to apologise to you for that on behalf of the Council. There is a lot of information to review and we will do that. In the meantime, if you need any further information from us or have any questions then please do come back to us. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 07 February 2025 06:59 To: James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James and Sukhjinder, Thank you for your time yesterday. SMBC and WMP this is the OneDrive folder I have been compiling the documents in, Brief Examples contains the documents on the website which I believe are the most pertinent such as the email to Jennifer asking her to intervene with the gate before Carl damaged my spine, the state 2 complaint response that states Carl's letter of apology was appropriate for crippling me etc The wmp oasis report shows the police logs for the more serious incidents, in chasing up notes on those prior to 2012. I recently tried to reach out to departments to try to resolve issues but one of the first responses I received was from Beverly about the care charges, given the volume of emails between us over the last 5 years with me requesting support to submit my budget for a fair assessment based on my income and expenditure, and Bev repeatedly using figures from 2018/2019 because I failed to access support to provide up to date figures. If you have any questions or need a particular document I have referenced please let me know, I can create a sub folder for them or attach them to an email. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Wednesday, January 29, 2025 1:16:03 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Thanks Marie. If you come to the One Stop Shop reception and inform them that you are here to meet with me, one of my colleagues will come to greet you and bring you to our meeting room. I look forward to meeting you in person then. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 29 January 2025 10:23 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good morning James, Thank you for your empathy, Thursday 6th February at the council house is appreciated. Best wishes, Marie From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Monday, January 27, 2025 10:00:09 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Hi Marie, Thanks for your email and for coming back to me. I am sorry to read of your current circumstances and appreciate the difficulty that this will be causing you. I can offer you a meeting at 3pm on Thursday 6 February for a couple of hours. Please let me know if this date and time works for you. The meeting would be in person at Sandwell Council House in Oldbury. I look forward to hearing from you. Best wishes, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 25 January 2025 08:09 To: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi James, Thank you for your response I understand the limitations on your time and appreciate your acknowledgement of my email I removed the bungalow from the timeline because I was advised that it complicated the discrimination issue but I have everything collated and would welcome time to meet and discuss my concerns in full so you can look into the matter. I can travel up to meet at the council house in Oldbury or any other SMBC building any time to suit you after Tuesday 28th January, but I need a couple of days notice so I can rest the day before I drive up. I'm facing sleeping in my car from Feb 1st as the caravan and campsite are both unaffordable at present so this has been very stressful and my MH has been fragile trying to resolve significant challenges to day to day life hence my delayed response. I accept it will take some time after our meeting for you to look into my concerns and gather the information you'll need to respond and so request we meet as soon as you are able to to begin the process. I have delayed making a decision on terminating the tenancy because I've been advised this is not in my best interest and so I'm waiting for MH assessments to determine both what my diagnosis is and what support is appropriate. Only once I have appropriate support can any long term decisions be made. Many thanks, Marie Brien From: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 8:14:10 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for your email. First of all, an apology to you. Sukhjinder indicated to you that when you made contact that I was looking into the background of the issues that you had raised. As you have stated in your email, I have multiple areas of responsibility and have limited time in my diary so this has taken longer that I would have hoped. That said, I am sorry that I have not been in touch before now to make arrangements to meet with you to listen to your concerns. Notwithstanding what you have detailed in your email below, I am happy to meet with you and will ask a colleague to make arrangements today if you wish to have that discussion. From the review of the timeline that you provided I cannot see any instances of problems arising for you since 2021, but I would like to understand if there are other issues since that time that you wish to raise. The issues that you have described as set out in full on your website and this has been helpful in giving me some insight into the concerns you have and the experiences you have referred to. It would be helpful from my perspective to meet with you to hear a bit more about that first hand. I appreciate that you may not want to take forward the offer to meet, but I’ll leave that with you and hope to hear back from you. Thanks, James James McLaughlin Assistant Chief Executive ( 07823 664562 * James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk : www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Thursday, January 16, 2025 6:41 AM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. An update I am suing SMBC for a fall I had on 5th December in one of their properties and the SMBC solicitor originally came back stating I had not informed SMBC that I needed a wheelchair at that point. Correspondence proved not only were SMBC informed that I needed a wheelchair but also that this was because my neighbour damaged my spine and SMBC only made him write me a letter of apology. SMBC solicitors are settling that claim on a no prejudice basis. Yesterday I saw the medici legal solicitor and he is referring me for an assessment with a neuropsychiatrist because he thinks I have a brain injury as well as trauma. I have years of correspondence showing I've been describing my communication issues and begging for help but SMBC staff have consistently ignored my human rights to a safe home and staff as senior as the deputy exec just ignore these emails. I was normal when I moved into my first SMBC property in 2010 and tried to buy the property in 2017ish but living there being harassed non stop by Carl Clift broke me mentally and his five assaults left me physically disabled. The discrimination I experienced throughout that tenancy by Tipton asb team was appalling so when I moved out of Tipton my mental and physical disabilities were well documented. I moved to an SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow in November 2020 but it is still unsafe for wheelchair users and I can't live there having falls every week because my landlord won't fit a ramp being poisoned and starved by carers provided by SMBC because the kitchen is too unsafe for me to cook in independently not because I'm not capable of cooking for myself. I agreed to terminate the tenancy but a payment from SMBC to help cover the camp site fees was not received as agreed and I was not able to travel up on 1st January as planned. I am a disabled SMBC tenant who is living in a caravan because her wheelchair accessible bungalow is unsafe 4 years after I moved to it, my support worker describes SMBC as the worst local authority she has ever dealt with as she's been trying to get legally required adaptations for two years without success and has also experienced SMBC staff ignoring required time frames etc. I could go cripple Carl, write him a letter of apology explaining I really didn't want to hurt him, I'm a pacifist who believes violence doesn't solve problems however I believe the treatment I experienced at the hands of SMBC staff was wrong and it feels like the only way to highlight this is to do unto others as they have done to me. So if I cripple him I can sit back and watch as HE asks for his flat to be adapted for a wheelchair so he doesn't have to move out of his home. If he asks for carers to feed him 3x daily I can explain no he only gets 2x meals per day, if he asks for a wheelchair accessible bungalow I can point out SMBC don't provide safe homes for their disabled tenants and then he gets angry about how he's being treated and sends an angry email to the staff responsible I'll expect SMBC to threaten him with eviction for a breach of tenancy rather than address the problem. As I lose this caravan at the end of the month and will be sleeping in my car I really have nothing left to lose. The above legal action can't happen soon enough to help me avoid homelessness because I can't access universal credit or resolve SMBC issues when even the assistant chief exec. I can't access the help I need to access the help I need! It's ridiculous and I'm out of patience. A jail cell would be a lot easier and comfier than a caravan so that's the timeframe for someone to contact me to discuss the above and seek meaningful resolutions, I'm unwilling to live like this any more. I'll write the letter of apology to Carl so I can leave it with him after I take revenge, I will limit my attack to ensure his injuries match the injuries he inflicted on me. Broken toe, concussion and a spinal cord injury. I'll use them iron bars he swung at my head, I assume Carl is still allowed to hoard rubbish and dangerous items in the communal areas and I'll find the iron bars on the front garden where he kept them. I'm not in crisis, I'm following SMBC logic which implies that it's fine for people to cripple each other, this doesn't require police or court intervention but simply a letter of apology to make ten years of abuse go away. And James I'm going to send you a personal letter before court. As the highest level member of staff to ignore me when I worked really hard to express the problems calmly and clearly, I feel that you are setting a poor example for your staff and if that content was received from any other tenant you would have responded to it. I tire of this poor treatment and remind you that as my landlord SMBC has a duty of care to me, universal credit paid rent for an uninhabitable property leaving me without the financial support I need and I am facing sleeping in my car because of the problems with SMBC. I met west Midlands fire service at the property on Saturday and explained to them I need to return to it at the end of the month, SMBC have had over 15 months to make the kitchen SAFE by moving the cooker away from the door which was meant to take 6 to 8 weeks, enough is enough. Either Carl faces legal consequences for the harm he did me and that process begins immediately or I do to him what he did to me (nothing more nothing less) and watch SMBC reaction pointing out any differences in the SMBC approach to him afterwards. Sincerely Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, January 14, 2025 9:56:56 AM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Good morning Marie, Thank you for getting in touch. This is just a brief message to let you know that a service area has been allocated to investigate this and they have your contact details and should be in touch with you directly. Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Monday, December 9, 2024 12:55 PM To: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Sukhjinder Thank you for your prompt response to my enquiry below. Regrettably James has not followed up and my circumstances have changes in the interim, my entire Team was made redundant at the end of last month. As a direct result of my inability to communicate effectively with your colleagues my day to day life is impacted in the following ways: I am currently unable to access financial support from Universal Credit for housing costs because my permanent address remains 8 Boldmere Court, B43 5PH until someone from Sandwell MBC either repairs the property so it is safe for me to return to it to sell my possessions and terminate the tenancy or cancels the job and allow me to return to empty the property of my possessions and terminate the tenancy. Work was scheduled to take 6 to 8 weeks in September 2023 but no date for the work to commence has been provided and a Stage 2 complaint submitted by an advocate is now 4 months overdue its final response from Lisa Ellis (who has been trying to get answers but is equally unable to.) I am unable to receive mail on campsites which were meant to be a temporary solution for the 6 to 8 weeks the repairs were meant to take, this causes additional challenges for example I had to attend Bodmin Court last month to address a speeding ticket that had already progressed to court action before I was aware of it. The fine paperwork was sent to the bungalow so I am trying to address this as I am now being prosecuted for failing to make the first payment towards the fine because I lack the information I need to do so. Because I'm unable to update my permanent address I am also unable to access many services locally, book online delivery unless a pick up location is offered, receive my medication much is mail delivery and many other simple functions always having to find a work around. I am being threatened with court action by SMBC to collect Care Charges that were unfairly assessed and requests for support to complete the assessments with accurate information were and still are being ignored, these could have been addressed back in 2019, 2020, 2022 and 2023 if appropriate support to submit the required paperwork had been provided as requested, recent attempts to work with this department have been ignored. My MH diagnosis is currently being reassessed query Neurodivergency or Trauma but whether my MH issue was caused by my experiences in Tipton (Trauma) and trying to communicate with SMBC staff about the issues or Neurodivergency or the diagnosed Personality Disorder, the lack of appropriate support for my inability to communicate effectively with SMBC has been well documented, as have my hundreds of pleas for help to multiple SMBC departments and staff. I am treated either as a capable person who has shown great fortitude in challenging circumstances and received praise and admiration for my courage or by someone who is whining about nothing the difference in the 2 responses to me are as challenging to process as they are to account for. I would therefore appreciate it if you could please follow up with some urgency as the ongoing uncertainty in my Housing and Finances is incredibly stressful and as I have mentioned a few times this situation was only meant to last for 6 to 8 weeks. Many thanks, Marie Brown From: Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: 07 November 2024 4:47 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: RE: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result Dear Marie, Thank you for reaching out to the Sandwell EDI Team. We are really sorry to hear about your experiences and how they have impacted upon you. This matter has now been escalated to our Assistant Chief Executive, James McLaughlin, who will contact you in due course. I have also included James’s email address below for reference, James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk Kind regards, Sukhjinder Singh Sahota Equality, Diversity & Inclusion Team Leader Please note that responses outside of regular working hours are not required or expected. E: sukhjinder_sahota@sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: Wednesday, November 6, 2024 12:08 AM To: EDI Team < EDI_Team@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: My experience in Sandwell as a woman of colour and questions as a result CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Team, I'm a mixed race disabled lesbian who works on the DE&I Team at Michael Page recruitment agency, and I have several concerns about equality in Sandwell for people of colour. Prior to moving to Sandwell I had lived in the USA between 1999 and 2004 while I studied Special Education with a focus on Neurodivergency because my brother is autistic. I have lived in homes and communities as diverse as million dollar houses in Ann Arbor and Grosse Pointe, to tiny rural villages in South Derbyshire, after growing up in local authority owned homes my family rented in Tamworth and Birmingham and in each community I adapted and made friends from all religions, ages and backgrounds, learning about different cultures and ways of life. I had the misfortune to live in Tipton in an SMBC flat for ten years during which my neighbour Carl Clift repeatedly racially harassed me when I tried to access the communal gardens. I tried to work with SMBC staff for several years to help Carl understand the communal gardens were for the use of everyone, but after 3 years of thefts, criminal damage, harassment and abuse I was being hospitalised for respite from Carl because my MH was impacted by the relentlessness of the abuse. A complaint of Harassment was upheld by SMBC and Carl left me alone for a year though he continued to harass my visitors. Between 2014 and 2017 Tipton ASB Team members repeatedly ignored evidence of Carls escalating abuse and although all of my neighbours (all white skinned) were allowed to store items such as benches, tubs and coal (for example) throughout the communal areas, several members of Tipton ASB Team repeatedly refused me permission to use the communal spaces in the same way my neighbours were able to and threatened me with eviction if I did not remove the item I was attempting to add (such as a hanging basket bracket I tried to put NEXT TO AN EXISTING BRACKET which my neighbour had a basket hanging from etc.) By now I had been diagnosed with a personality disorder because I was having so many MH crises and episodes (I was in my mid 30's and had never experienced MH issues like that, just a little depression after major life events like deaths. I challenged this difference in approach multiple times in writing, to which SMBC staff would reply that they would deal with the neighbours separately, but photos and videos demonstrate that no action was taken and these items remained in place through 2010 to 2020, independent sources such as Google maps also demonstrate this. I made a formal complaint about Carls behaviour and handed Nik Woodridge a 60gig memory stick containing documents, emails, photos, videos, CCTV footage, audio recordings etc which he had in his possession for six months before returning it stating he had not been able to review the evidence due to a missing codec. The codec was on the memory stick and this does not explain why he could not review any of the other evidence so I submitted a complaint. Niks colleague investigated the matter but did not collect the memory stick to review the evidence, instead he reviewed notes made by Nik and Niks Team and made his decision based on that. I have since asked multiple people across all departments at SMBC to review the actions of this team. By 2017 my MH was destroyed and when Carl harassed my then 3 and 5 year old nephews I finally lost it and retaliated against him. This was the first time I had retaliated and it took 7 years before I cracked. Days later Carl threatened to kill me yet still Nik and the ASB Team refused to take action despite being aware that Carl had assaulted me four times by then in addition to the other incidents. Niks efforts to protect Carl included forcing everyone in the block to sign a Good Neighbour Agreement (threatening me with eviction if I refused to sign it) and then using that Good Neighbour Agreement to instruct West Midlands Police not to question Carl stating I had agreed to this. Carl went on to assault me whist installing a gate across the communal gardens, Nik and the Team did not take action against him and last I checked the gate remains in place. The pain in my left hip was diagnosed as a spinal cord injury for which I needed surgery and now require a wheelchair though I am thankfully still able to walk short distances and when I made a formal complaint about this the response stated "You are unhappy that your neighbour Carl Clift faced no consequences for crippling you, but he was made tow wrote you a letter of apology." The impact on my already fragile mental health was astounding. Efforts to highlight the disparity with which SMBC treated Carl and myself have been ignored and my complaints about Tipton ASB Team remain unanswered despite the intervention of numerous Charities and agencies trying to help resolve them and multiple other issues that have arisen as a result of the injuries I received from Carl and the disability they left me with. During a mental health crisis I threatened to do to Carl and the ASB Team members "what Carl did to me" and another time "you reap what you sow" nothing more and nothing less, which I am not excusing, but I hope explains the context of my threat. Carl assaulted me four times, threatened to kill me, and then went on to damage my spine during a 5 th assault and the most severe consequence he faced was to write me a letter of apology. I assaulted 0 people, threatened to kill 0 people, limited my threatened actions to only what had been considered OK when Carl was the aggressor yet I was arrested by West Midlands Police and Sandwell MBC IMMEDIATELY threatened me with eviction. Things got worse in November 2020 when I moved to what was meant to be a wheelchair accessible bungalow owned by Sandwell MBC. Adaptions were delayed and in November 2021 a kitchen was installed which was meant to be wheelchair accessible but was a fire hazard. West Midlands Fire Service condemned it in November 2022 but still SMBC staff refused to remedy the fire risks. I was charged for carers to prepare my meals because I was not allowed to use the kitchen and carers to supervise me in the shower for my safety because the OT refused to allow me grab rails. I eventually lost my mind and set fire to the kitchen to prevent carers from giving me food poisoning and SMBC bankrupting me in care charges because my home was unsafe. In September 2023 I was told I had to find somewhere else to stay for 6 to 8 weeks while work was carried out on the bungalow. 14 months later work has not begun and the professional who has been liaising with SMBC since January 2023 with no more success than me, is chasing a late response to a second or third formal complaint. A timeline I am compiling can be found here but I have many more documents to add, and a gofundme page can be found here. Life in Sandwell as a Black woman discriminationinsandwell.uk Donate to Please help save my first safe home in 14 years, organized by Marie Brown Update 20/10/24 I'm advised I've compiled enough for the criminal defence … Marie Brown needs your support for Please help save my first safe home in 14 years gofund.me As one DE&I professional to another I have questions about Sandwell MBC. Why does SMBC refuse grab rails in the bathroom of a wheelchair accessible bungalow and then force disabled tenants to have carers supervise them in the shower "for their safety?" Why do SMBC then charge disabled tenants for these carers visits when installing grab rails is cheaper, safer and far less degrading/humiliating? Why are white SMBC tenants able to harm black SMBC tenants repeatedly without consequence? Why are white SMBC tenants allowed to install gates across communal gardens and prevent black or mixed race SMBC tenants from accessing them? Why do black SMBC tenants have to pay the same rent as white SMBC tenants when they are not allowed to enjoy or use the communal spaces in the same way as their white or none mixed race neighbours? Why does Sandwell MBC charge physically disabled tenants for carers to cook for them because the kitchen is unsafe, when installing a safe, wheelchair accessible kitchen would enable the physically disabled tenant to be independent? How many requests to SMBC does it take for a black woman to get support to complete a financial reassessment for care charges on average? How does that number compared to the number of requests white tenants have to submit to SMBC for help for a financial reassessment before receiving it? How many years does it take for black or mixed race women in Sandwell to be listened to by SMBC staff when raising legitimate and valid concerns about her safety in her SMBC owned home? Between 2010 and now, how many other black SMBC tenants have been assaulted by white neighbours but not prosecuted? Between 2010 and now, how many death threats by tenants of one race against tenants of another race have been reported to SMBC staff? What happened in each case? I am happy to resubmit these questions as an SAR if necessary, I'm just trying to get an idea on the scale of the issues or whether I was just unfortunate to be in Tipton versus another town. Warm wishes and good luck turning things around over there, Marie

From

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

To

"West Bromwich Local Centre"

CC

"James McLaughlin"

BCC

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["pro-hpkSfGhF.jpeg", "image005.jpg", "image004.jpg", "image003.jpg", "image002.jpg", "image001.jpg"]

I will submit an online report shortly but this morning the toilet frame tipped over because it is not bolted down. It sits to one side of the toilet because the basin pedestal obstructs the frame, this makes it challenging to balance my weight equally on both sides so it tips over like this a few times per week. Every single week since I moved in here in November 2020. A wheelchair accessible basin should not have a pedestal and should be lower than a standard basin, and a wheelchair accessible toilet should have appropriate grab rails to the side. Last week I asked a crisis team member what would happen if someone from SMBC experienced as many preventable injuries as I have. Assuming 2 falls per week (it's often more) and rounding down to be generous to SMBC I estimated 100 falls per year multiplied by the 4 years I've been occupying this bungalow and realised that conservatively this is 400 falls trying to use the toilet of my SMBC owned wheelchair accessible bungalow so I asked what would happen if I injured Mandy Amos that many times. How many head injuries could she survive without damage? They interpreted this as a threat towards Mandy even as I explained it's not a threat it's a question. How many preventable injuries does someone have to suffer before a problem is resolved? Apparently the answer is that for other people it's 0 because I received a letter from SMBC warning me to stay away from Manifoldia Grange because I had threatened staff. I repeat i wasn't threatening anyone. Yet I've had falls on steps, because this place lacks grab rails, trying to close windows, been hospitalised with concussions and spine injuries and still, 5 years and multiple breakdowns later still unable to pee safely in my own SMBC home. It wasn't a threat and it's still not, I'm just curious. Is the plan to wait until I'm too brain damaged through one of these falls to keep pointing out the disparity? What actually would happen if it were SMBC staff experiencing these injuries? How long is it going to take for SMBC to make this property wheelchair accessible and respond to my very reasonable questions about my experiences to date? It would be nice to have a safe home again, my last safe home was 17 Mehdi road SMBC staff have made every bone since then unsafe in one way or another and I'd like to resolve this please, try to ensure this morning's toilet frame topple is the last. Realistically 5 falls per week is would be a low estimate, balancing this toilet frame is a challenge I face up to ten times per day, I'm mostly able to push up evenly but when my spine spasms it's like an electric shock causing the stumbles and falls. 5x52=1040 falls or stumbles when this frame tips over since I moved here and nothing I can do to stabilise it further. A claim for a fall in the garden steps in December 2022 is being settled on a no prejudice basis yet the steps remain a barrier to accessing the garden. How many more preventable falls will I experience in SMBC wheelchair accessible properties and why are people surprised that I'm triggered MH wise by them and trying to resolve the issues that cause them? Marie Brown https://discriminationinsandwell.uk/ #LetReePeeSafely #ShameSMBC @SandwellTenant From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: Friday, May 2, 2025 5:38:45 PM To: WestBromwich Support <WestBromwich_Support@sandwell.gov.uk> Cc: Elizabeth Deegan <elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk>; jadeharris@talbotslaw.co.uk <jadeharris@talbotslaw.co.uk>; James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>; Shokat Lal <shokat_lal@sandwell.gov.uk>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: IL1 Home Visit Hello Claire Apologies but as I have not met my floating support worker or social worker I don't have anyone appropriate to support me at a meeting next week. I also can't access carers because Bev Mountain still hasn't reassessed care charges despite 5 years of written requests for both a fair charging assessment (to separate the charges to mitigate dangerous accommodation versus charges for care related to my disability as per relevant disability legislation) an MDT in March 2023, my arson in September 2023 or requests for this to be addressed since then, even James McLaughlin hasn't been able to motivate Bev to address this so I don't stand a chance🤷🏽. A relevant care charges statement is attached, I'm still waiting for proceedings to begin so that I can submit the relevant correspondence to the court🤨 resolve this however they decide is fair and move forwards with appropriate support in place. I have two neighbours who understand my disability and enable me who are interested in personal assistant roles for the minimal hours I would need each week but I can't access direct payments because of the outstanding debt so some movement to either reassess the charges or begin court proceedings would be appreciated as this affects my fat to day ability to function as I keep explaining. Someone phoned me claiming to be a social worker and offering a free package of care at Manifoldia Grange but she refused to email anything to confirm what was discussed as part of the care needs assessment, the written care plan, her contact details, the cost or provide anything to verify I was talking to a genuine SMBC social worker and the offer was a legitimate one, and I haven't heard from her since then. I would appreciate a face to face meeting with a social worker at my home address as soon as possible please, to discuss appropriate support with day to day activities like laundry, sweeping, mopping and to resolve multiple ongoing social issues and obviously some support to meet with staff from SMBC.🙏🏽 The woman claiming to be my floating support worker has not contacted me to reschedule an appointment to discuss the ongoing issues with inaccessible accommodation, adaptations, care needs, care charges, rent arrears, benefits, rubbish and recycling collection or preventable falls. She has not responded to text messages since the day she came to Manifoldia Grange at 9.30am and refused to notify staff I was in too much pain to get out of bed and crawl around any more and asked for her help. I have requested floating support regularly since Eve Willis was removed right after my sci diagnosis and repeatedly explained that I'm unable to resolve these issues myself. So many years of emails but no resolution, I've admitted defeat and asked for someone appropriate and will keep asking for this for as long as it takes😘 Once I have appropriate support in place I can check availability with the support workers, arrange a meeting with other departments to try to resolve these issues but until my local authority provide the support I need I will not be able to arrange any further meetings or respond to any further emails etc. This affects my mental health too much. I would therefore appreciate it if you could forward this to the relevant departments and the necessary referrals be made to ensure I am allocated named workers to visit me at my home address and help to resolve the social, housing, financial and safety issues that I keep requesting help to resolve. Please notify Elizabeth Deegan when named workers have been allocated as she understands why I need a time out to manage my MH effectively. If you could please WhatsApp me when someone from SMBC confirms appropriate named workers have been allocated Elizabeth I would be very grateful? I can then meet with them face to face, at home, so they can see the challenges and correspondence for themselves then work out solutions, rather than me attempting to describe things over the phone. This would be more effective, face to face is how I've been asking SMBC to communicate for several years, the DE&I team have been made aware of this reasonable adjustment request up to management level so I anticipate things going smoothly. Many thanks, Marie Cc Jade Harris and Elizabeth Deegan so they are aware I have once again made the appropriate requests to address these issues🤷🏽 SMBC leadership so they are aware of the ongoing problems, and to remind James McLaughlin and Sukhjinder that I'm still waiting for their response following our February 6th meeting as promised in James's email of February 11th 2025🤨 https://discriminationinsandwell.uk/ #LetReePeeSafely #ShameSMBC @SandwellTenant From: WestBromwich Support <WestBromwich_Support@sandwell.gov.uk> Sent: Friday, May 2, 2025 1:58:30 PM To: MarieBrownUK@outlook.com <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Subject: IL1 Home Visit Good afternoon, Miss Brown As you are aware Jan is on leave this week, so we are contacting you to check in and confirm if you have availability for a home visit next week , could you let us know your availability for us to arrange the visit. For your information residents can now use their MySandwell account to log many Sandwell Council requests online, including reporting missed collections; fly tipping and pot holes. Residents can also check their council tax balance on MyAccounts and find ‘MyNearest’ on their personalised homepage. For information please go to www.sandwell.gov.uk/mysandwell . Kind regards Claire Maczkowski Housing Service Officer West Bromwich Housing Team T: 0121 368 1166 W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE

From

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

To

"WestBromwich Support"

CC

"James McLaughlin"

BCC

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Named attachments

["image006.jpg", "image005.jpg", "image004.jpg", "image003.jpg", "image002.jpg", "image001.jpg"]

Good morning I had another fall when the toilet frame tipped over and an again requesting the following; Appropriate support worker for paperwork and accessing services Long overdue response to the February 6th meeting from James and Sukhjinder Care needs assessment for help with sweeping, mopping, moving heavy items I am not capable of moving. OT assessment of the accessibility of the property in particular the steps in the back garden and toilet frame as these cause most injuries. Water leak in the kitchen to be repaired so that the water supply can remain connected to the mains. My bins to be emptied weekly as my neighbours are. i have not been able to liaise with all of the necessary utility companies as my first attempt to do so ended up with my being missold a package different to the one requested so I'm still trying to sort out the problem, I need support to call the water and electric companies please to update my address please. Could you also please advise the name of my social worker and their contact details and explain why Emma, my OT has still not been to assess the property or contacted Elizabeth Deegan to discuss appropriate aids and adaptations for it? Many thanks Marie https://discriminationinsandwell.uk/ #LetReePeeSafely #ShameSMBC @SandwellTenant From: WestBromwich Support <WestBromwich_Support@sandwell.gov.uk> Sent: Thursday, May 8, 2025 10:15:41 AM To: Marie Brown <mariebrownuk@outlook.com> Subject: Welfare Visit Hi Marie Hope you are well. Following our quick chat yesterday, I have pencilled you in for a visit tomorrow (Friday 9 th May) around lunchtime if that is ok? Let me know if this isn’t suitable. Thank you Regards For your information residents can now use their MySandwell account to log many Sandwell Council requests online, including reporting missed collections; fly tipping and pot holes. Residents can also check their council tax balance on MyAccounts and find ‘MyNearest’ on their personalised homepage. For information please go to www.sandwell.gov.uk/mysandwell Janet Millett Housing Services Officer West Bromwich Housing Team Sandwell Council…working for you T: 0121 368 1166 W: www.sandwell.gov.uk Sandwell Council House, Freeth Street, Oldbury, B69 3DE

From

Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

To

"Shokat Lal"

CC

"Elizabeth Deegan"

BCC

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Named attachments

["2023 03 06 Final Draft Mins MDT 6.3.23 MB295269 - Minutes approved 18th May 2023.docx", "image001.png"]

Good day Shokat, Please consider this a formal complaint about the conduct of James McLaughlin and Sukhjinder Sahota, who have ignored multiple reasonable adjustment requests made in person and in writing. Following our meeting on February 6th 2025, James emailed me on February 11th 2025 and has failed to follow up on actions promised in that email. I am escalating the matter to you Shokat, because you are James and Sukhjinders manager, I moved to Boldmere Court in 2020 because it was described as wheelchair accessible. I have consistently challenged this description and asked for the property to be adapted for the wheelchair and would like to know why actions agreed almost 2 years ago remain unresolved and both James and Sukhjinder continue to ignore SMBC policy and procedures. I will not list my concerns again, they are well documented already. I look forward to your acknowledgment of my complaint within 5 working days. Sincerely, Marie Brown From: Shokat Lal <Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk> Sent: Tuesday, March 25, 2025 5:18:39 PM To: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Cc: Elizabeth Deegan <elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk>; James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: RE: Responding to Linkedin message Hi Marie, I understand that colleagues have been in touch with you and are working their way through the issues raised and I will ask the question around why you were put into the property without the right reasonable adjustments made. Can I ask that you work with James on this and you have also contacted me through Linkedin earlier asking a question, the right place to do that is through my official email address which is this. Thanks Shokat From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 25 March 2025 06:30 To: Shokat Lal <Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk> Cc: Elizabeth Deegan <elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk>; James McLaughlin <James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk>; Sukhjinder Sahota <Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Re: Responding to Linkedin message CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Shokat, Thanks for reaching out, James is aware of the original issues, he apologised to me, said he needed time to look into things and would respond, and the outcome I asked James for was a SAFE home. Then James sent me BACK to Manifoldia Grange where more safeguarding issues have been raised and ignored. Elizabeth and I are still waiting for the response to everything Elizabeth, James, Sukhjinder and I discussed on February 6th 2025, James please send that today as a reasonable time has now passed. Shokat, could you please explain to me (because I'm a bit thick and can't communicate effectively with SMBC staff) why, a disabled 49 year old tenant of Sandwell Council spent the last few weeks in a flat with standard kitchen units and no grab rails, and is being sent back to a bungalow with steps in the back garden, when Elizabeth Deegan has been asking Sandwell Council to install wheelchair adaptations in one of their wheelchair accessible bungalows for a few years now? I look forward to hearing from you soon. Marie From: Shokat Lal < Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Monday, March 24, 2025 8:50:59 PM To: MarieBrownUK@outlook.com < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: Responding to Linkedin message Hi Marie, I am just following up on the message you left on Linkedin on Sunday. I understand that there are some issues which you have raised and a number of officers need to look intoi, I have been told that they are looking into those and will be coming back to you but I would be happy for you to let me know the exact issues that need resolving? Thank you Shokat Shokat Lal Chief Executive Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council Sandwell Council House Freeth Street Oldbury B69 3DE Office: 07721 687878 www.sandwell.gov.uk

From

Elizabeth Deegan <Elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk>

To

Shokat Lal <Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk>

CC

Marie Brown <mariebrownuk@outlook.com>

BCC

—

Named attachments

["2023 03 06 Final Draft Mins MDT 6.3.23 MB295269 - Minutes approved 18th May 2023.docx", "Aspire FOA - MB.jpeg", "image009.png", "image008.jpg", "image007.png", "image006.jpg", "image005.png", "image004.png", "image003.png", "image002.png"]

Good afternoon Shokat, I hope you are well. By way of introductions my name is Elizabeth, and I am a Housing Advisor for Aspire charity; we offer telephone support to people who have sustained a spinal cord injury. Marie Brown is linked in with our service to receive some additional support regarding her housing situation. Please see attached signed form of authority from Marie. Please can we be advised as to whether Marie’s previous email sent on the 13 th May 2025 (please see below) has been acknowledged as an official complaint, as Marie has not had any further contact regarding this? Please do let me know if this needs to be logged directly with the complaints team if you are not accepting the email as a complaint and I will forward the below onto them. Kind regards, Elizabeth Deegan (She/Her) Housing Advisor Aspire – supporting people with spinal cord injuries Please donate to Aspire: https://www.aspire.org.uk/donate M 07918 673 896 W www.aspire.org.uk Aspire, Aspire Leisure Centre, Wood Lane, Stanmore, Middlesex HA7 4AP Association for Spinal Injury Research, Rehabilitation and Reintegration. Registered Company no. 3744357. Registered Charity no. 1075317. Scottish Registered Charity no. SC037482. This e-mail (and any attachments) is confidential. If you have received it in error, please delete it from your system, do not use, copy or disclose the information in any way nor act in reliance on it and notify Aspire immediately. Thank you. From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 13 May 2025 15:43 To: Shokat Lal <Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk> Cc: Elizabeth Deegan <Elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk> Subject: Formal complaint about James McLaughlin and Good day Shokat, Please consider this a formal complaint about the conduct of James McLaughlin and Sukhjinder Sahota, who have ignored multiple reasonable adjustment requests made in person and in writing. Following our meeting on February 6th 2025, James emailed me on February 11th 2025 and has failed to follow up on actions promised in that email. I am escalating the matter to you Shokat, because you are James and Sukhjinders manager, I moved to Boldmere Court in 2020 because it was described as wheelchair accessible. I have consistently challenged this description and asked for the property to be adapted for the wheelchair and would like to know why actions agreed almost 2 years ago remain unresolved and both James and Sukhjinder continue to ignore SMBC policy and procedures. I will not list my concerns again, they are well documented already. I look forward to your acknowledgment of my complaint within 5 working days. Sincerely, Marie Brown From: Shokat Lal < Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, March 25, 2025 5:18:39 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Cc: Elizabeth Deegan < elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: Responding to Linkedin message Hi Marie, I understand that colleagues have been in touch with you and are working their way through the issues raised and I will ask the question around why you were put into the property without the right reasonable adjustments made. Can I ask that you work with James on this and you have also contacted me through Linkedin earlier asking a question, the right place to do that is through my official email address which is this. Thanks Shokat From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 25 March 2025 06:30 To: Shokat Lal < Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: Elizabeth Deegan < elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: Responding to Linkedin message CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Shokat, Thanks for reaching out, James is aware of the original issues, he apologised to me, said he needed time to look into things and would respond, and the outcome I asked James for was a SAFE home. Then James sent me BACK to Manifoldia Grange where more safeguarding issues have been raised and ignored. Elizabeth and I are still waiting for the response to everything Elizabeth, James, Sukhjinder and I discussed on February 6th 2025, James please send that today as a reasonable time has now passed. Shokat, could you please explain to me (because I'm a bit thick and can't communicate effectively with SMBC staff) why, a disabled 49 year old tenant of Sandwell Council spent the last few weeks in a flat with standard kitchen units and no grab rails, and is being sent back to a bungalow with steps in the back garden, when Elizabeth Deegan has been asking Sandwell Council to install wheelchair adaptations in one of their wheelchair accessible bungalows for a few years now? I look forward to hearing from you soon. Marie From: Shokat Lal < Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Monday, March 24, 2025 8:50:59 PM To: MarieBrownUK@outlook.com < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: Responding to Linkedin message Hi Marie, I am just following up on the message you left on Linkedin on Sunday. I understand that there are some issues which you have raised and a number of officers need to look intoi, I have been told that they are looking into those and will be coming back to you but I would be happy for you to let me know the exact issues that need resolving? Thank you Shokat Shokat Lal Chief Executive Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council Sandwell Council House Freeth Street Oldbury B69 3DE Office: 07721 687878 www.sandwell.gov.uk

From

Shokat Lal <Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk>

To

Elizabeth Deegan <Elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk>

CC

Marie Brown <mariebrownuk@outlook.com>

BCC

—

Named attachments

["image008.png", "image007.jpg", "image006.png", "image005.jpg", "image004.png", "image003.png", "image002.png", "image001.png"]

Hi Elizabeth, I am good thanks and hope you are well. I acknowledge receipt of the email and I am currently taking legal advice as to how this complaint should be considered. Thanks Shokat From: Elizabeth Deegan <Elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk> Sent: 22 May 2025 13:06 To: Shokat Lal <Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk> Cc: Marie Brown <mariebrownuk@outlook.com> Subject: RE: Formal complaint about James McLaughlin and Sukhjinder Sahota CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Good afternoon Shokat, I hope you are well. By way of introductions my name is Elizabeth, and I am a Housing Advisor for Aspire charity; we offer telephone support to people who have sustained a spinal cord injury. Marie Brown is linked in with our service to receive some additional support regarding her housing situation. Please see attached signed form of authority from Marie. Please can we be advised as to whether Marie’s previous email sent on the 13 th May 2025 (please see below) has been acknowledged as an official complaint, as Marie has not had any further contact regarding this? Please do let me know if this needs to be logged directly with the complaints team if you are not accepting the email as a complaint and I will forward the below onto them. Kind regards, Elizabeth Deegan (She/Her) Housing Advisor Aspire – supporting people with spinal cord injuries Please donate to Aspire: https://www.aspire.org.uk/donate M 07918 673 896 W www.aspire.org.uk Aspire, Aspire Leisure Centre, Wood Lane, Stanmore, Middlesex HA7 4AP Association for Spinal Injury Research, Rehabilitation and Reintegration. Registered Company no. 3744357. Registered Charity no. 1075317. Scottish Registered Charity no. SC037482. This e-mail (and any attachments) is confidential. If you have received it in error, please delete it from your system, do not use, copy or disclose the information in any way nor act in reliance on it and notify Aspire immediately. Thank you. From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 13 May 2025 15:43 To: Shokat Lal < Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: Elizabeth Deegan < Elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk > Subject: Formal complaint about James McLaughlin and Good day Shokat, Please consider this a formal complaint about the conduct of James McLaughlin and Sukhjinder Sahota, who have ignored multiple reasonable adjustment requests made in person and in writing. Following our meeting on February 6th 2025, James emailed me on February 11th 2025 and has failed to follow up on actions promised in that email. I am escalating the matter to you Shokat, because you are James and Sukhjinders manager, I moved to Boldmere Court in 2020 because it was described as wheelchair accessible. I have consistently challenged this description and asked for the property to be adapted for the wheelchair and would like to know why actions agreed almost 2 years ago remain unresolved and both James and Sukhjinder continue to ignore SMBC policy and procedures. I will not list my concerns again, they are well documented already. I look forward to your acknowledgment of my complaint within 5 working days. Sincerely, Marie Brown From: Shokat Lal < Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Tuesday, March 25, 2025 5:18:39 PM To: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Cc: Elizabeth Deegan < elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: RE: Responding to Linkedin message Hi Marie, I understand that colleagues have been in touch with you and are working their way through the issues raised and I will ask the question around why you were put into the property without the right reasonable adjustments made. Can I ask that you work with James on this and you have also contacted me through Linkedin earlier asking a question, the right place to do that is through my official email address which is this. Thanks Shokat From: Marie Brown < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Sent: 25 March 2025 06:30 To: Shokat Lal < Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk > Cc: Elizabeth Deegan < elizabeth.deegan@aspire.org.uk >; James McLaughlin < James_McLaughlin@sandwell.gov.uk >; Sukhjinder Sahota < Sukhjinder_Sahota@sandwell.gov.uk > Subject: Re: Responding to Linkedin message CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi Shokat, Thanks for reaching out, James is aware of the original issues, he apologised to me, said he needed time to look into things and would respond, and the outcome I asked James for was a SAFE home. Then James sent me BACK to Manifoldia Grange where more safeguarding issues have been raised and ignored. Elizabeth and I are still waiting for the response to everything Elizabeth, James, Sukhjinder and I discussed on February 6th 2025, James please send that today as a reasonable time has now passed. Shokat, could you please explain to me (because I'm a bit thick and can't communicate effectively with SMBC staff) why, a disabled 49 year old tenant of Sandwell Council spent the last few weeks in a flat with standard kitchen units and no grab rails, and is being sent back to a bungalow with steps in the back garden, when Elizabeth Deegan has been asking Sandwell Council to install wheelchair adaptations in one of their wheelchair accessible bungalows for a few years now? I look forward to hearing from you soon. Marie From: Shokat Lal < Shokat_Lal@sandwell.gov.uk > Sent: Monday, March 24, 2025 8:50:59 PM To: MarieBrownUK@outlook.com < MarieBrownUK@outlook.com > Subject: Responding to Linkedin message Hi Marie, I am just following up on the message you left on Linkedin on Sunday. I understand that there are some issues which you have raised and a number of officers need to look intoi, I have been told that they are looking into those and will be coming back to you but I would be happy for you to let me know the exact issues that need resolving? Thank you Shokat Shokat Lal Chief Executive Sandwell Metropolitan Borough Council Sandwell Council House Freeth Street Oldbury B69 3DE Office: 07721 687878 www.sandwell.gov.uk

From

Marie Meronym <wobblywandereruk@outlook.com>

To

"Shokat Lal"

CC

—

BCC

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Named attachments

["2025 05 28 Council tax.pdf", "2025 05 15 Floating Support application closed because issues have been resolved.png", "2025 02 11 James McLaughlin Asst CEO Apology.pdf", "1000030221.jpg", "1000030226.jpg"]

Day 3 of hunger strike until SMBC provides legally required support for disabilities and James McLaughlin's response overdue since February. Refusal of aids and adaptations, floating support and carers is unlawful, the impacts on my physical and mental wellbeing are being well documented by multiple agencies who have seen recent correspondence between myself and SMBC staff, including not not limited to Fire Service, NHS, ambulance service, MP and more. Weight loss since returning to Sandwell. 61.5kg on February 17th 2025, 53kg presently because I can't afford food🤷🏽. 1 smoothie and 1 meal per day are not enough nutrition but without access to benefits I'm unable to afford more. Requested help to apply for benefits, aids and adaptations, carers etc multiple times but SMBC consistently refuse these requests and do not provide appropriate support for applications. Inaccessible housing - this property is not wheelchair accessible, I'm unable to follow the process to apply for aids and adaptations unless SMBC provides appropriate support, I'm unable to apply for alternative housing unless SMBC provides appropriate support. Vince McCalla closed Floating Support Request stating all issues were resoved. Staff up to CEO have ignored policy and procedure when communicating with me, correspondence demonstrates that the Equality Act and Human Rights Act are consistently ignored. Please provide wheelchair accessible housing, appropriate support for life admin/financial support, carers 6 hrs per week to assist with light domestic, social, shopping and community access, and James McLaughlin long over due response. I will not eat until appropriate support and housing have been provided but I will be publicly posting all correspondence as this is the ONLY way I've been able to access effective advice and support to challenge SMBC shenanigans. Sincerely, Marie Brown (I'll be changing my surname to Meronym by deed poll just as soon as I'm able to access the legally required support to do so.) Attached: examples of issues being raised

From

Marie Meronym <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

To

claudette_simon@sandwell.gov.uk

CC

MIDDLETON, Sue

BCC

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Named attachments

["2025 05 28 Council tax.pdf", "2025 05 15 Floating support application closed.pdf", "2025 02 11 James McLaughlin Asst CEO Apology.pdf", "2024 12 11 Stage 2 Complaint Response from Lisa Ellis.pdf", "2025_09_26_10_21_35 gas repair cancelled.mp3", "2025 04 16 Janet Millet Housing Officer confirms electric heaters.png"]

Janet Millet my housing officer housed me at Manifoldia Grange on February 17th 2025 knowing that it was a standard unit and not wheelchair accessible. She told me and Elizabeth Deegan in writing that an accessible kitchen had been ordered and the lead time was 2 weeks followed by 2 weeks fitting time. The kitchen wasn't ordered until May, this was one of many lies. https://youtu.be/vnSc1gyUR6U?si=Sd-xewnladzdExjC video of Manifoldia Grange demonstrating the barriers I faced there, I had multiple injuries requiring ambulance to hospital for treatment but staff at Manifoldia Grange kept stating it was wheelchair accessible, it was also very cold, time stamped photos of thermostat etc show 12 degrees etc. https://youtu.be/lMKR-htaYkU?si=9EPUwxFCToOPjBBA 24th March I had been injured so many times I needed crutches to walk instead of the hiking sticks I'd been using but OTs, Mandy Amos, Janet Millet, Lisa Ferguson and other SMBC staff refused to help me apply for aids and adaptations or support, they also told lies in a way to cause confusion. I have texts and emails from them and senior management at SMBC (James McLaughlin and Shokat Lal included) during this time but they have not provided response ignoring policy and procedures for formal complaints (in most circumstances this could be described as "Gaslighting" and my social media meltdowns were in real time between these emails and texts etc. https://youtu.be/8PzpQo4Glj8?si=hBbww1SihiW2dbSu conversation with Mandy Amos and (I think Lisa Ferguson) where we discuss safe options for me, Mandy describes 3 Manifoldia Grange as a STANDARD UNIT and admits it is not wheelchair accessible, we discuss the possibility of using the accessible toilets at the local swimming pool etc. 27th March https://youtu.be/GhKAwDFv6HA?si=eb7KQbhZli29j6x3 floating support worker arrived but I couldn't let her in, too many injuries to walk without crutches and I had been crawling to complete some tasks for days (witnessed and recorded by crisis team who were supporting my mental health during this distressing stay at manifoldia Grange and telling me to call the council - a trigger for my PTSD 🤦🏽🤷🏽) https://www.facebook.com/share/v/1JBTnPTn7Q/ https://www.linkedin.com/posts/mariebrownsmbctenant_appreciate-my-reputation-as-sandwell-crazy-activity-7309575708559790081-S3-K?utm_source=social_share_send&utm_medium=android_app&rcm=ACoAAD8bjKABr6-byMDXn4kC7AnHQIF6n2aycwA&utm_campaign=copy_link I was stuck in bed without access to water or a toilet until 4.30pm despite Lisa knocking the door at 1.30pm claiming they didn't have keys, Mandy Amos was grinning and laughing at my condition, refused to help separate my wheelchair from the electric adaption so I could use it inside the flat and helped me reach the bathroom so I could go to the toilet, then to the couch where she left me with a bottle of water and some cheese and biscuits promising to return in twenty minutes to separate the wheelchair. Instead of separating my wheel hair to enable to go move around the flat independently, Mandy told me in an email that she would not be returning that day after all, I would have to wait for uncommissioned carers to attend the following evening (meaning I'd be unable to access the toilet, water or food for another 24 hours) Many more photos, emails, texts and videos in OneDrive that contradict Janet Millet and Mandy Amos claims that SMBC have EVER offered me wheelchair accessible accommodation but I need to meet face to face to show them in chronological order. I returned to the bungalow in Boldmere Court because even without a kitchen or was warm and safer than Manifoldia Grange, until Janet Millet had the boiler disconnected and requests for appropriate support unaddressed. NHS kept me in Rowley Regis hospital for weeks trying to arrange paperwork support and temporary adaptations before discharge but on September 11th at a discharge planning meeting I was not invited to attend, Janet Millet refused all proposals and told ward staff SMBC will not adapt the property. I asked for an advocate to help me appeal the discharge decision, but ward staff refused this and said if I didn't leave immediately, they would call security. I have been sleeping in my car to avoid further injuries since then. Today the boiler was supposed to be reconnected but Janet Millet had blocked it again. Please help as I can't afford food, drinks or fuel to stay warm because housing officer does the opposite of what a housing officer is supposed to do (or she does not protect Welfare or ensure home is safe and warm) Scores of emails to validate anything I have paraphrased, my words can be ignored and only SMBC voices/emails viewed, I accept my MH issues mean people don't believe me. 🫣🤷🏽🤦🏽 Sent from Outlook for Android

From

Marie Meronym <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com>

To

"Sandwell Enquiry"

CC

"James McLaughlin"

BCC

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Named attachments

["2025 10 25 GP letter from Dr Rostamipour AUTISM.pdf", "image001.png"]

Dear Team Manager, I am formally escalating the failure to provide me with a copy of my Care Needs Assessment conducted by Ali Asghar on 6 January 2026. Despite repeated written requests, I have not received the document. Since that assessment: • No action has been taken to secure the toilet frame. • I am holding urine and bowel movements for up to ten hours between care calls or calling emergency response teams to prevent falls. • My health is being impacted by dehydration and bowel retention. • Following an injured elbow sustained on 22 January 2026, the STAR Team have attended four times daily since 23 January 2026 to act as human grab rails. This arrangement is not a sustainable or lawful substitute for making a bathroom wheelchair accessible within a bungalow and garden that remain inaccessible. I understand attempts by the Community Alarm Team to escalate safeguarding concerns have been blocked by Adrian Scarrott. A response from James McLaughlin to earlier escalation is now over one year overdue. In addition, I have received rent debt correspondence relating to Manifoldia Grange and continue to experience unresolved council tax and benefits issues (no housing element payments, no disability uplifts). Floating Support assessment on 6 January 2026 concluded they would not assist with rent, council tax, benefits, or utility debt matters. I have a medico-legal appointment on 24 February 2026 regarding the 5 December 2022 fall and subsequent documented injuries. The Care Needs Assessment is directly relevant evidence. Continued failure to provide it will be documented as part of that process. Please provide the full assessment immediately and confirm why it has not been released upon request. If not received by 17 February 2026, I will escalate further. Regards, Marie Meronym 🧑🏽‍🦽🧠 Euan's Guide 💭🧑🏽‍🏫 Facebook 🧑🏽‍🦽🧠 Google Maps 📸 Instagram 🧑🏽‍🏫 LinkedIn ⚖️ X 📹 Youtube From: Sandwell Enquiry <Sandwell_Enquiry@sandwell.gov.uk> Sent: Friday, March 21, 2025 9:55:22 am To: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Subject: RE: Social worker contact request Good Morning Thank you for your email. To process your request please can you provide me with your date of birth and full address, so I am able to access your record thank you. Kind Regards Alisha Sanyar Customer Service Advisor Sandwell Enquiry Independent Living Team T: 0121 569 2266 E: Sandwell_Enquiry@Sandwell.gov.uk W: www.sandwell.gov.uk To understand more about why we collect your information, what we do with your information, how you can access your information, your personal information rights, how and to whom to raise a complaint about your information, please visit our privacy notice page at http://www.sandwell.gov.uk/privacynotices From: Marie Brown <MarieBrownUK@outlook.com> Sent: 21 March 2025 01:03 To: Sandwell Enquiry <Sandwell_Enquiry@sandwell.gov.uk> Subject: Social worker contact request You don't often get email from mariebrownuk@outlook.com . Learn why this is important CAUTION: This email originated from outside of the Council / Children's Trust. Do not click links or open attachments unless you recognise the sender and know the content is safe. Hi I would like to request a call from Tracey, my social worker please, I do not have a direct number for her and can't remember her surname. I have concerns about my safety navigating Manifoldia Grange because this building and grounds are NOT wheelchair accessible and I have had a few falls. Could we please meet face to face at Manifoldia Grange to look at the challenges and find solutions that will keep me safe during my stay here? I also need help with the practical challenges of living in a space that is not wheelchair accessible and would like to ask for help to assess this please. Additionally universal credit ended a call today because I was not able to recall a movie or gig from 40 years ago to pass the security screening. I was sanctioned because I failed to provide requested information and I would again like to request support with life admin as per my GP notes to both avoid further sanctions, and to address the back log of correspondence that has built up since my last admin support worker was removed two years ago? My Motability car is not suitable for my wheelchair equipment so I am applying for a grant towards a WAV but i need to provide a letter from universal credit with my home address on it, I have not been able to provide this or complete the process and my existing vehicle is nearing 5 years old, the maximum time the Motability scheme will allow me to keep it. Could I please request appropriate support to apply to Motability for a new vehicle. Finally, I would like to ask how to access the communal space/room/desk at Manifoldia Grange please. I am available on 07452940500. Many thanks Marie Brown

From

Marie Meronym <MarieMeronym@outlook.com>

To

"PATIENT-EXPERIENCE PALS"

CC

"Alex Garven"

BCC

—

Named attachments

["2025 02 11 James Mclaughlin Apology p1.pdf", "2025 05 06 SMBC OT Emma Jones.pdf", "2023 03 06 Final Draft Mins MDT 6.3.23 MB295269 - Minutes approved 18th May 2023.pdf", "Maria wiseman.pdf", "GP Letter Dr Rostamipour.pdf"]

Dear PALS Team, I am currently an inpatient at Midland Metropolitan Hospital and am seeking assistance regarding discharge planning and access to advocacy support. Ward staff have indicated that I do not qualify for an advocate because I can communicate verbally and do not yet have a formal autism/ADHD diagnosis recorded in my NHS notes. However, I experience significant difficulty managing complex information, paperwork, and coordination between services due to neurodevelopmental and physical conditions. These difficulties directly affect my ability to participate fully in discharge decisions. I am not refusing discharge. My concern is that my home environment currently presents significant accessibility barriers, including issues with safe toileting, kitchen use, and fall risk. These matters are known to external agencies and are being addressed with the support of an independent advocates whose contact details are below. I offered to supply documentation regarding my autism assessment and housing-related risks, but this was declined so I've attached it here with appropriate escalations to assistant CEO of SMBC whose promised response is outstanding - please note the date. I am requesting: Clarification of my entitlement to advocacy support under the Care Act 2014 and hospital discharge guidance Assistance to ensure I can participate effectively in discharge planning Liaison with my external advocate, Elizabeth Deegan (Aspire) Helen Charles (Sandwell Advocacy) 01215208070 Jekaterina (West Midlands Fire Service) 07973810556 Maria Wiseman (Community Offer) email attached with contact details Assurance that discharge will be to a safe environment with appropriate support in place I am keen to work cooperatively with the team and achieve a safe, sustainable discharge plan. I would be grateful if this request could be recorded formally and reviewed as soon as possible. Thank you for your assistance. Yours sincerely, Marie Meronym Non-Chronological Records 🧑🏽‍🏫💭 DEI Concerns DEI Education Personal 📸 Instagram ⚖️💭 LinkedIn 🧑🏽‍⚖️ X 📹 YouTube