Neil Wilby Media

An article published yesterday, by Neil Wilby Media, carried a report of an extraordinary civil claim brought by a local magistrate against a parish council in picturesque South Devon (read in full here).

Briefly, the claimant, Lucinda Ellicott, issued proceedings against Berry Pomeroy Parish Council (BPPC) over a smear propagated by its Clerk, Susan Watt, falsely alleging that Mrs Ellicott had received a ‘harassment warning’ from the police.

The claim form was filed in June, 2021, involved four court hearings in three different court centres, including a costly but failed strike out application by the Parish Council’s lawyers, and the case was finally concluded before a circuit judge in Exeter County Court on September 1st, 2023. Lucinda was awarded non-material damages for distress and a substantial contribution to her fixed fee costs.

In the first version of yesterday’s article, the legal costs incurred by BPPC were estimated to be £20,000. A source adjacent to the case strongly contends that the final costs are much nearer to £40,000.

Incredibly, they include fees for a ‘Legal 500’ barrister, Ben Hamer. who recently appeared as junior counsel for the defendant in the rather higher profile Rebekah Vardy -v- Coleen Rooney ‘Wagatha Christie’ libel trial.

He was on the ‘winning’ side on that occasion, but definitely did not relish ‘losing’ to a lay litigant whom he, quite legitimately, attempted to blind with complex case law and argument. A local whistleblower says the amount paid by the Parish Council, or their insurers, is ‘outrageous’ in what s/he describes as a ‘futile’ defence of the Ellicott claim. Ben Hamer, equally incredibly, was instructed by a partner in the London office of solicitors, DAC Beachcroft, a very large firm, employs 1100 solicitors. David Knapp specialises in the defence of complex liability claims, particularly those brought against the public sector.

Before the trial at Torquay County Court in December, 2022, for which Mr Hamer made the pleasant, if expensive, return journey from London to Devon, Susan Watt (via her solicitor, Mr Knapp) claimed her husband had suffered a heart attack, and needed a stent fitting, in order to justify a request for an adjournment of proceedings for three months. She said that she would have to care for him around the clock. When the claimant refused, and proposed that Mrs Watt could give her evidence by video link, Robert Watt made a miraculous recovery and appeared, a picture of health, with his wife at court a week later.

More seriously, it has also emerged that Susan Watt gave false testimony on oath in court (as captured in the transcript of that hearing) when she clearly stated that the company to whom she had awarded a controversial contract for a new playground, in neighbouring Marldon, was not filing for insolvency in August, 2019 when they signed the deal. A quick search of Companies House records reveals that they were. They owed creditors £0.4 million at that time. 

It was over the challenge to the legitimacy of that contract, its value and, indeed, the questionable need for a new playground at all, that first brought Mrs Watt, Clerk at Marldon Parish Council at the time, and Mrs Ellicott, a parishioner, into contact.

It is not the first time that Mrs Watt has given questionable witness box evidence, either. In 2015, a Crown Court jury in Bradford didn’t believe her account that her former employer, Ralph Christie, a Crete-based property developer, had been involved in multi-million pound money laundering (read full story here).

The whistleblower has also set out their understanding of the position over Susan Watt’s departure from her role at Marldon. Given what is already in the public domain about her questionable demeanour and reprehensible behaviour it has more than a ring of truth: ‘She resigned. However, after bullying at least four Councillors from their position, she had the audacity to claim they had bullied her and they paid her off with a four figure sum’.

Mrs Watt remains in post at Berry Pomeroy, for the time being at least. This, says the whistleblower, is ‘after Marldon taxpayers were, effectively, fleeced by the Clerk and a number of tame councillors, for a playground rebuild that we didn’t need (which is sub-standard to the original one), leaving us repaying a loan of £50,000, using up all of our Section 106 Grant Funding and raising our Parish Council tax by a whopping 72%’.

‘Now, Mrs Watt has decided that ‘what Berry Pomeroy needs most is, you’ve guessed it, a new playground, built by our insolvent friends in their re-badged company: Rhino Play (SW) Ltd. The only reason this unwanted project has been held up is that there is a problem with hedging or land which has prevented the work’.

The whistleblower has also given advice on how to circumvent the Clerk’s bizarre exercise of control over all parish councillors’ emails (which is posited as illegal as parishioners and other stakeholders should have a right to contact them directly). It is suggested that contact be made via Cllr Samantha Penfold who is not only a Berry Pomery elected Member, but also a South Hams District councillor. 

Susan Watt has again been offered right of reply and Cllr Penfold has been invited to provide or facilitate a statement dealing with the allegations set out in this article.

Follow Neil Wilby on Twitter (here) and Neil Wilby Media on Facebook (here) for signposts to any updates.

Page last updated: Tuesday 19th September, 2023 at 17h45

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