Tag: Mylo Capital Ltd

Weep for Wales 17

On By JacIn Colonialism, Colonisation of Wales, Corruption82 Comments

PLEASE APPRECIATE THAT I GET SENT MORE INFORMATION AND LEADS THAN I CAN USE. I TRY TO RESPOND TO EVERYONE WHO CONTACTS ME BUT I CANNOT POSSIBLY USE EVERY BIT OF INFORMATION I’M SENT. DIOLCH YN FAWR

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I suppose that when I wrote the original Weep for Wales two years ago I assumed it would be a one-off; I certainly didn’t think it would grow into a saga, with an ever-lengthening cast of characters. But here we are at Weep for Wales 17. Quite incredible.

What’s more, to the untrained eye it might appear that I’ve vacated my keyboard to join the cast! Confused? Read on . . .

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WHERE WERE WE?

Weep for Wales 16 came out 2 January and in it I told of a dispute between Paul and Rowena Williams, who had owned Plas Glynllifon since April 2016 and the Seiont Manor Hotel since December of the same year, and Myles Andrew Cunliffe, who stepped in towards the end of 2018 when the Williams duo ran into financial problems.

The two sides are now engaged in a curious spat that seems to be about Cunliffe not submitting accounts to Companies House for Plas Glynllifon Ltd. Perhaps even changing the accounts that were given to him by Mr and Mrs Williams to file with CH. As I’ve remarked, it was an odd business because the accounts referred to the period before Cunliffe got involved. They really had nothing to do with him.

(I should add that the accounts were given to Cunliffe because he has the codes needed for online submission to Companies House. But seeing as they must have the original I can’t help wondering why Paul and Rowena Williams couldn’t submit the accounts by post.)

For whatever reason, the accounts were not submitted and the case was heard 17 January.

Click to enlarge

When I read that headline I just had to go and lie down. ‘Illegality and fraud’! Is Paul Williams suggesting that Myles Cunliffe is dishonest?

Whatever next? Will some scoundrel try to tell us that the supreme pontiff is not a Calvinistic Methodist; or that our ursine friends are guilty of sylvan defecation?

The judge seemed to lean towards Cunliffe, adding,

“There are fundamental underlying questions about the sale of the properties that cannot at this stage be resolved in these proceedings.”

He added there are “fundamental issues of fact that have to be resolved”.

Too true, boss; and the best of luck getting facts out of those involved. Facts! Did I just say facts?

Lockdown has now of course intervened to block any resumption of the case.

But let’s go back a bit, to when Myles Cunliffe first appeared in Gwynedd, and the Daily Post described him as an ‘investor’. Cunliffe himself had this to say in December 2018:

“We have the funding needed to complete the project that Paul and Rowena Williams have started.

“Work has slowed down at Glynllifon but this will change shortly, within four to six weeks, and will step up.

“I am a finance guy, I started up with car finance and have moved into property with a property investment company.

“I can bring the funds to make this project happen.”

“The short term aim is to be open within six months as a hotel and wedding venue.”

There were no weddings, no openings, nothing. Not a penny spent on Plas Glynllifon, while the going concern, the Seiont Manor Hotel, was run down with staff not paid. Seiont Manor soon closed . . . ‘temporarily’.

Despite this ‘temporary closure’ being announced in early January receivers had already been appointed before Christmas, and Cunliffe would have known they were on their way even before then, so why the crap about ‘temporary closure’?

Rural Retreats & Development Ltd, which owns Seiont Manor, has two directors, Paul Williams and Myles Cunliffe. There are seven outstanding charges against the company for various parcels of land and property, with further charges against Seiont Manor itself listed on the title document.

The mansion, Plas Glynllifon, is owned by Plas Glynllifon Ltd. Receivers were appointed 17 December (the same day as for Rural Retreats & Development/Seiont Manor). The company’s directors are Cunliffe and Rowena Williams. There are eight outstanding charges with Together Commercial Finance Ltd.

Plas Glynllifon. Click to enlarge

The outstanding charges would appear to give Together Commercial Finance Ltd of Cheshire a claim on just about everything at Plas Glynllifon and Seiont Manor.

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MYLES CUNLIFFE ET AL

You’ll recall that when he first appeared Owen Hughes at the Daily Post reported, “Now Mylo Capital Limited – run by ‘finance guy’ Myles Cunliffe – has entered into a 50/50 partnership on Glynllifon and Seiont Manor”; and later in the same piece, “Mr Cunliffe has a background in car and property finance and is currently chairman of property development firm Etaireia Investments PLC”.

So where are these companies today?

Let’s look first at Mylo Capital. Despite Owen Hughes’ encomium Mylo Capital, formed in September 2017, never really took off. It only ever filed accounts for a dormant company and now, with documents overdue, it appears to be drifting towards the rocks.

For a while, Cunliffe’s co-director was Dennis Rogers, a sometime resident on the Isle of Man, who may have been involved with the funny money funding for the EU referendum campaign. I’m referring now to the £8.4m that Arron Banks can’t account for. I wrote about Dennis in Weep for Wales 13.

One-time Brexit Party candidate Rogers has been involved with a number of companies that seem to enjoy a lifespan comparable to that of a mayfly.

The registered IoM office for a number of Dennis Rogers’ companies was the white building, a former pub. The redbrick building was the address for Arron Banks’ Rock Holdings Ltd, identified by John Sweeney of Newsnight as the conduit for the mysterious £8m used in the EU referendum campaign. Rogers was a nominee director of Rock Holdings, probably nominated by the person who gave the money. So who in Rogers’ circle would have that kind of loot? Click to enlarge

The other Cunliffe company mentioned by Owen Hughes was Etaireia Investments PLC, which went into administration 1 July, 2019. Formed in March 2007 as Aquarius Media PLC (changing the name in 2011), with Cunliffe and Rogers joining in 2018.

Do you see the pattern? Companies get into trouble and along comes Myles Cunliffe offering ‘investment’ . . . but it never seems to work out for those who hope they’re being helped. That’s because Cunliffe and Jon Disley, the ‘King of Marbella‘, and the man Cunliffe fronts for, are said to use the companies for their own purposes before letting them fold.

What are those purposes? This article might explain better than I can. I have grabbed a section of it from which you might recognise Cunliffe’s modus operandi.

Click to enlarge

Yes, it’s all here; diamond geezers, Costa del Crime, dirty money, Brexit, BritNats.

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WHAT ELSE HAS BEEN HAPPENING?

In March it was reported that a considerable amount of scaffolding had gone missing from Plas Glynllifon. Paul Williams blamed Scousers (why does everybody pick on them?) and GogPlod is investigating.

Though things are rarely straightforward with these people. So I was not surprised to read Paul Williams suggest that the theft had actually occurred last summer. His theory being that the thieves took advantage of the scaffolding being dismantled by the equipment’s owners to grab some for themselves.

Whatever the truth, it was nice to read about a bit of honest thieving at Plas Glynllifon.

‘Now you see it . . . ‘ Click to enlarge

We established that the Seiont Manor Hotel is owned by Rural Retreats & Development Ltd, which has Paul Williams and Myles Cunliffe for directors. We also saw that the place is closed and that receivers were appointed 17 December. Yet there are, or have been, three other companies carrying the Seiont Manor name.

There was Gwesty Seiont Manor Ltd, set up by Paul and Rowena Williams in September 2016. Strike-off action began in February 2019 and was completed 21 May. The only accounts filed were for a dormant company. Another ‘mayfly’ company that appears to have done no business.

Then there was Seiont Manor Hotel Ltd, which enjoyed an even shorter lifespan, from 3 April 2018 to 10 September 2019. The only director was Rikki Reynolds and nothing was ever filed with Companies House. Remember Rikki, at one time the Williams duo’s right-hand man?

Where is he now?

A trio of ‘developers’ looking over Plas Tŷ Coch, a property they never had the money to buy, let alone develop. Click to enlarge

The image above is from a Daily Post report of February 2018 in which we read that Paul and Rowena Williams had bought both Plas Tŷ Coch and Plas Brereton, near Caernarfon, with ambitious plans for these properties.

The truth was that they hadn’t bought either property, and never did. It was yet more bullshit repeated verbatim by a desperate media.

Yes, I know the problem, journalists are overworked and don’t have time to check things out. But even when the Daily Post knew the truth about Paul and Rowena Williams it still kept publishing blurb after blurb that could have been dictated by the Gruesome Twosome themselves.

An all too common problem; almost as if the Welsh media is under some political directive to publish only good news, even when it’s lies.

The third company we should look at is still in the land of the living, it is Seiont Manor Ltd. Incorporated as recently as 4 January 2019 with Myles Cunliffe as the sole director. But he pulled out in November and responsibility for this thriving concern fell on the shoulders of Thomas Jacob Hindle.

Do you remember Tom?

I originally thought that he was working for Paul and Rowena Williams and then ‘transferred’ to Cunliffe as his involvement increased. But now I suspect that Tom Hindle was already associated with Disley and Cunliffe before arriving in Wales.

My reassessment is due to the fact that Hindle hails from Cunliffe’s territory of north west England whereas the Williams’ tend to recruit their ‘associates’ from their stomping ground in the Birmingham and West Midlands area.

Hindle seems to have showed up at Seiont Manor Hotel around the time Cunliffe got involved.

Which might explain why Hindle was allowed to live in the seven-bedroom property alongside Fronoleu, near Dolgellau. Though it made getting to work in Caernarfon quite a commute. Is he still there? Maybe I’ll pop up and see.

Tom Hindle is almost certainly the ‘postman’ who delivers the threatening letters I have received from Myles Cunliffe. Here and here.

Fronoleu. The house is to the left and out of shot. Click to enlarge

Fronoleu is owned by Rural Retreats & Development Ltd which, as we’ve seen, is in the hands of receivers. No purchase price is quoted on the title document because the word is that Paul Williams bought the property at auction for over £300,000 and paid in cash.

There are two charges against Fronoleu with Together Commercial Finance Ltd.

Myles Cunliffe seems to have withdrawn from many companies over the past year, including one he’d been involved with since 2007, Lifestyle 4u Finance Ltd. Another company he’s left, one formed only last October, is Gen 5 PLC.

Though one company he is still involved with is Get me Finance Ltd. Apart from a brief appearance by faux Manxman Dennis Rogers Myles Cunliffe has been the only director since the company was formed in January 2010.

This, presumably, is the ‘car finance’ company Cunliffe alluded to in the interview with the Daily Post in December 2018. And yet, it’s difficult to see how, or why, this company stays afloat.

The most recent (micro-entity) accounts show net current assets of £52,644, but even this is an improvement of twenty grand on the previous year.

That’s what sticks out a mile. Legitimate companies file audited accounts showing income, expenditure, creditors, debtors, turnover, tangible assets, payments to HMRC, staff wages, etc., etc. And then you look at the companies that get mentioned on this blog and they’re the commercial equivalent of Mother Hubbard’s cupboard – bare!

Yet those connected with these companies drive around in brand new Range Rovers, live in big houses, and splash the cash like inebriated seafarers.

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JAC JOINS THE GANG!

In Weep for Wales 16 in January I reported that Myles Cunliffe and Tom Hindle had gone into the fitted kitchen business. Well, not really, it was the old MO of sniffing out companies in trouble.

One of those companies was Waterford Interiors Ltd. Which had begun life as Glynllifon Mansion Ltd in January 2019, became Waterford Interiors in December, and then, last week, the company name was changed to my name and post code.

As is now the practice, Cunliffe ceased to be a director in November and was replaced by Thomas Jacob Hindle.

Click to enlarge

As you can imagine, once I was made aware of this I contacted Companies House and told them that this had been done without my permission and I wanted it changed immediately.

I also contacted my political representatives and North Wales Police.

(UPDATE 16.06.2020: North Wales Police Victim Support Unit phoned me last week soon after I’d made my complaint, and yesterday a police officer phoned. We discussed the case and he was as amazed as I that Companies House allows this kind of thing. I suggested harassment but he seemed to say it needs more than one incident to qualify. So let’s wait and see.)

The Companies House response said:

‘Dear Mr Jones,

Thank you for your email regarding the above named company.

Whilst I have noted your comments and appreciate your concerns, the name in question was properly accepted for registration, as it does not contravene any of the provisions of section 66(1) of the Companies Act 2006. Therefore, we do not have the power to remove the company from the register or direct it to change its name.’

And that’s it, you can give a company any name you like.

I’ve commented before that Companies House is nothing more than a filing exercise. All that matters is that companies file documents on time, even if those documents are lies from beginning to end. Or contain no information at all.

Which explains why a bunch of clowns naming a company after me is perfectly legal. Now I have to worry about what that company bearing my name may be used for. What a system!

But as I’ve said before, financial crime is ignored in the UK. Though what else can you expect from a state that maintains the fiction of the Isle of Man and the Channel Islands being almost independent, and also has responsibility for most of the offshore tax havens around the world? A global dirty money economy co-ordinated from the City of London.

Financial crime is seen as ‘victimless’. And once money is in the system buying expensive cars, big houses, jewellery, 92 inch televisions, Bang and Olufsen sound systems, holiday homes, private education, etc, nobody gives a shit that it might have been made from drug trafficking, money laundering, child prostitution, or selling weapons to rogue states and terrorists.

What a system. What a state. What a reason to get out.

Before this latest brush with fame I had (metaphorically) mounted my horse, said, “My work here is done”, and was about to ride off into the sunset . . .

But once I saw what some twat had done I wheeled my nag around, interest rekindled.

♦

If anything I’ve written here is factually wrong, and can be proved to be so, then I will correct the mistake.

Threatening letters, however, will be handed to the police; and solicitors should save themselves the bother of writing, no matter how much they’re being paid. (And make sure you are paid, because those who ‘star’ on this blog are infamous for their reluctance to pay what they owe.)

♦ end ♦




Weep for Wales 15

On By JacIn Colonialism, Corruption31 Comments

PLEASE APPRECIATE THAT I GET SENT MORE INFORMATION AND LEADS THAN I CAN USE. I TRY TO RESPOND TO EVERYONE WHO CONTACTS ME BUT I CANNOT POSSIBLY USE EVERY BIT OF INFORMATION I’M SENT. DIOLCH YN FAWR

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I hadn’t planned on writing this, but a few things have cropped up. First, I received a letter from a firm of solicitors demanding that I take down everything I’ve ever written in the Weep for Wales series. Second, there was a news report yesterday that needs to be considered. Third, there’s the continuing confusion as to who owns what at Glynllifon.

But don’t worry, this is a ‘shortie’ . . . though if you have the time, and the patience, you’re welcome to go back to the very first episode. Just type ‘Weep for Wales’ in the search box atop the sidebar.

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THE LETTER

I can’t say too much because the writer claims copyright over the letter and insists that I don’t reproduce it. It was a mildly threatening letter which I also found offensive, especially the reference to my wife!

But you know me, boys and girls, I’m a reasonable man. All I ask is that complainants deal with specifics – show me that I’ve got something wrong, or made a mistake, and I’ll take it down or correct it. But it’s unreasonable to expect me to remove perhaps 35,000 words simply because certain people are embarrassed by their misdeeds and associations being made public. It’s an abuse of the law, and it’s also censorship.

The clients for whom Glaisyers of Manchester are acting are said to be Paul and Rowena Williams. That may be true, it may not.

I have replied, and here is that reply, transcribed from an e-mail.

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THE NEWS REPORT

The news report in North Wales Live (NWL), told us that overdue accounts for Plas Glynllifon Ltd risk seeing that company struck off the Companies House register. The accounts in question cover the period up to 31 August 2018 and should have been filed with Companies House by 31 May 2019. Which means they are more than six months overdue.

The striking off process can start automatically if a company ceases to file the required documentation. Though the process can be halted with an objection, which is what happened in this case, though the document doesn’t tell us who lodged the objection. One possibility must be Together Commercial Finance Ltd, which has no fewer than eight outstanding charges against this company.

Another possibility is that one of the bickering joint owners lodged the objection. For if we return to the NWL report we read that co-owner Paul Williams claims he wants to submit the accounts to Companies House while the other co-owner, Myles Cunliffe, says he wants his accountant to check the accounts before they’re submitted.

What’s odd is that the accounts cover a period before Cunliffe appeared on the scene, so why should he be so concerned over whether they’re true accounts or not?

What’s also odd is that NWL claims Paul Williams is the co-owner, but he’s not. The latest information with Companies says that Paul Williams ceased to be a director on 10 September.

Click to enlarge

And as we see in the panel below, Paul Williams ceased to be a shareholder 30 November last year, when his shares were transferred to Mylo Capital Ltd, Myles Cunliffe’s company.

It would appear that either Paul Williams is speaking here for his wife – and if that’s the case then it should have been made clear – or else she is director and shareholder in name only.

Click to enlarge

It would appear that there has been some kind of a rupture between Paul and Rowena Williams on the one hand and Myles Cunliffe on the other. A possibility further suggested by the recent filing history. This tells us that on the same day, September 10, Paul Williams ceased to be a director of Plas Glynllifon Ltd and the company’s address moved from Manchester to Seiont Manor hotel. A few days later the company’s address was changed again to Llwyn y Brain Lodge.

Seiont Manor hotel is owned by Rural Retreats & Development Ltd, another company that appears to be jointly owned by Rowena Williams and Myles Cunliffe, and also uses the Llwyn y Brain Lodge address. Following the Plas Glynllifon Ltd pattern the accounts are also overdue and there are 7 outstanding charges with Together Commercial Finance Ltd.

Click to enlarge

Though what’s different is that although Mylo Capital Ltd and Rowena Williams are shown as the shareholders, with 5,000 shares each, the two directors are Cunliffe and Paul Williams. Again suggesting that Rowena Williams is just a name. Though, admittedly, the statement showing the distribution of the shares is a year old, so things might have changed.

So we have two companies, Plas Glynllifon Ltd and Rural Retreats & Development Ltd, each of which is weighed down with debt, and both of which are reluctant to submit accounts. What can it all mean?

UPDATE: The story made it into the Daily Post this morning.

UPDATE 11.12.2019: Comments made to this blog and information received by other means about staff not being paid at Seiont Manor have apparently been confirmed by this story in today’s Daily Post.

True to form, Myles Cunliffe threatened North Wales Live (the online edition of the Daily Post) with legal action if they published the story. “When asked about this the company did not comment on the wages delay and a statement on behalf of joint owner Myles Cunliffe said legal action would be taken if North Wales Live continued to publish any article.”

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WHO OWNS THE PILE?

If you go back to Weep for Wales 14 you’ll see that there is some confusion about the ownership of Plas Glynllifon, the mansion that lies at the heart of the sprawling estate with countless other buildings including those used by Coleg Glynllifon.

In the hope of clarifying things I’ve been in contact with Grwp Llandrillo-Menai, which originally owned the mansion.

The confusion – certainly my confusion – is due to the fact that the title document that mentions the big house, CYM8531, says that the mansion is owned by Grwp Llandrillo Menai. Yet the Grwp insists the mansion was sold in 2003 to Glynllifon Ltd, which went bust, with the mansion being subsequently bought by Plas Glynllifon Ltd in 2016.

Plas Glynllifon. Click to enlarge

And the sale is indeed confirmed by an old title document for CYM127981, which shows that in April 2003 Coleg Meirion Dwyfor (now part of Grwp Llandrillo Menai) sold “Glynllifon Mansion House and surrounding land” to Glynllifon Ltd for £500,000. With CYM127981 being extracted from CYM8531.

But now, the same title number, CYM127981, held by Plas Glynllifon Ltd, only mentions “land adjoining Glynllifon College”. Where’s the mansion gone?

I’m now waiting for Grwp Llandrillo-Menai to get back to me and confirm that things have been sorted out with the Land Registry. Because I’m still confused.

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A LITTLE ROUNDUP

Other than what I’ve just told you, not a lot has happened since Weep for Wales 14 was published 21 October. But as we know, there’s always something to report in this saga, so here’s a list, in chronological order:

And that’s it until the next time.

♦ end ♦

 

Weep for Wales 14

On By JacIn Colonialism, Colonisation of Wales, Corruption, Tourism, Welsh Government, Welsh Media63 Comments

PLEASE APPRECIATE THAT I GET SENT MORE INFORMATION AND LEADS THAN I CAN USE. I TRY TO RESPOND TO EVERYONE WHO CONTACTS ME BUT I CANNOT POSSIBLY USE EVERY BIT OF INFORMATION I’M SENT. DIOLCH YN FAWR

♦

Those who’ve followed this saga will know that we started off with Paul and Rowena Williams – and a colourful supporting cast – in Powys, at the Knighton Hotel and the Radnorshire Arms in Presteigne.

After allegedly selling their property empire in Powys and beyond to their associate, convicted fraudster Keith Harvey Part(d)ridge, for a reported £11m, Paul and Rowena decided to focus their entrepreneurial genius on Gwynedd. In particular, Plas Glynllifon, which they apparently bought in 2016.

Things did not go well, and it was no surprise when we witnessed the entry onto the stage of Myles Andrew Cunliffe of Lancashire towards the end of last year. Described by Paul Williams at the time as a ‘finance guy’ who was going to help them out of the hole they’d dug for themselves.

Anyone late to this feast may catch up with earlier servings here: Weep for Wales, Weep for Wales 2, Weep for Wales 3, Weep for Wales 4, Weep for Wales 5, Weep for Wales 6, Weep for Wales 7, Weep for Wales 8, Weep for Wales 9, Weep for Wales 10, Weep for Wales 11, Weep for Wales 12, Weep for Wales: A statement, Weep for Wales: further threats, Weep for Wales 13.

Some of those towards the end of the list will need explaining, so read on . . .

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UPS AND DOWNS

Just before Christmas I had a letter from a firm of solicitors in Chester demanding that I remove everything I’d ever written about Paul and Rowena Williams. I considered this to be an absurd and unreasonable request.

Which is why I refused to comply. Here’s the letter, together with my reply.

Though I wondered about that letter. Why would the Gruesome Twosome suddenly suspect that their glowing reputation for ethical dealings, paying suppliers and others on time, and not in any way being involved in mortgage fraud, was being sullied? Which is why I suspected that the letter had been prompted by Cunliffe, perhaps when he, or others, realised how well known the Williams gang had become.

I heard no more from Manleys of Chester.

But on March 26 I received, after dark, a hand-delivered letter. This was clearly in response to what I’d written about Cunliffe’s business past and possible associates a week earlier in Weep for Wales 12. Where, among other things, I’d mentioned a number of companies formed and then dissolved without any accounts being filed with Companies House.

Even so, I have to admit that this letter made me pause for thought. A letter from a solicitor is one thing; but a, ‘We know where you live’ letter from a guy with shady associates, delivered after dark, is something else. I took down Weep for Wales 12.

It was put back on August 25, and was followed on the 26th by Weep for Wales: a statement.

Which prompted a second hand-delivered letter from Myles Andrew Cunliffe on August 27. (This one pushed through my letter-box in daylight.) Another rambling missive listing ‘threats’ against him and his family that were never made, but threatening to put things right by ‘eradicating’ me! A clear threat on my life which I reported to North Wales Police.

After a few back-covering alterations Weep or Wales 12 went back up on August 29. Weep for Wales 13 soon followed. And now, here we are with Weep for Wales 14.

I should add that North Wales Police are still trying to get hold of Cunliffe, to warn him that threatening to ‘eradicate’ people is not the thing to do, but he’s proving elusive. As this text message from the NWP officer involved makes clear.

Text message received from North Wales Police. Click to enlarge

My position remains as it was set out in my response to Manleys of Chester and elsewhere. If I’ve made a mistake, then convince me of my error and I’ll amend it or remove it. But any threats will be passed straight on to North Wales Police.

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GOING FOR A SONG

In Weep for Wales 13 we learnt that after the liquidation of the holding company, Leisure & Development Ltd, the various pubs, hotels and caravan parks involved went up for auction.

I’m informed that all have been sold with the exception of the two Powys properties. Though it’s rarely that simple with the Williams gang.

For a start, I’m told that the Knighton Hotel was sold to someone who immediately put it back up for auction! Perhaps after realising that Paul and Rowena Williams still owned parts of this substantial property. They may still own the cellars!

Knighton Hotel, both stone and mock Tudor. Click to enlarge

When it comes to the Radnorshire Arms, a former regular at that hostelry tells me, “The Rad is awash with Chinese whispers, a local consortium, local millionaire, far away millionaire and possibly Donald Trump’s chiropodist are all interested!”

Though one thing worth pointing out, and a reminder of how Paul and Rowena Williams operate, is that when the Knighton Hotel went for sale at auction in May it failed to meet the reserve price of £375,000. It comes up for auction again on the 23rd of this month, with the guide price down to £310,000. “We expect some strong bidding”, says a hopelessly optimistic auctioneer.

UPDATE 23.10.2019: The Knighton Hotel did not sell.

Yet when the Knighton Hotel was bought in 2015 by their company Leisure & Development Ltd the Williams pair claim to have paid £2,881,599. In reality, they paid nothing – because they already owned it. But they still got a loan from the National Westminster Bank.

And it was the same with the Radnorshire Arms, for which they claim to have paid £3,487,049. Again, they got a loan from the NatWest.

And that’s why the NatWest is owed £6,202,405.45. But of course this has nothing to do with Paul and Rowena Williams – because they sold Leisure & Development Ltd and everything the company owned to Keith Part(d)ridge in February 2018 – don’t you remember!

From the administrator’s progress report, August 2019. Click to enlarge

That’s how they operated their mortgage fraud. They borrowed money from the National Westminster Bank to ‘buy’ properties they already owned. Where’s the money now? Who knows? Well, obviously, Paul and Rowena Williams know, but they aren’t telling. And, worse, nobody seems to be asking.

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WHAT’S HAPPENING IN GWYNEDD?

I’ve mentioned Plas Glynllifon, the vast pile at Llandwrog, south of Caernarfon, but there are, or were, other Gwynedd properties in the Williams portfolio. The Seiont Manor hotel and restaurant at Llanrug, and the Fronoleu country hotel and restaurant near Dolgellau.

Plas Glynllifon. Click to enlarge

The Seiont Manor seemed to be a going concern, but the empty Fronoleu was just left to deteriorate further. Though I’m informed by a good source that the Fronoleu has very recently been bought.

So let’s look at what’s left of the Williams-Cunliffe empire after the collapse of Leisure & Development Ltd.

Polvellan Manor Ltd was dissolved on September 17. The only director at the end was Keith Harvey Partdridge.

Rural Retreats & Development Ltd is still with us, the two directors being Paul Williams and Myles Cunliffe. Though the shares are equally divided between Mylo Capital Ltd (a Cunliffe company) and Rowena Williams. After changing its registered address in December from Plas Glynllifon to a Manchester office, it moved again last month to ‘Llwyn y Brain Lodge, Llanrug’.

Llwyn y Brain may be close to Seiont Manor. Certainly the eatery at Seiont Manor is known as Llwyn y Brain Restaurant. Though seeing ‘Lodge’ in the name makes me think of the house at the end of the drive, on Llanberis Road. This picture shows the Lodge looking south west to Buarthau; Seiont Manor itself is north east of the Lodge.

Image courtesy of Geograph. Copyright Eric Jones. Click to enlarge

The lender taking the hit on Rural Retreats & Development Ltd is Together Commercial Finance Ltd of Cheadle in Cheshire with seven outstanding charges. In addition, this company has made four loans on the Seiont Manor itself.

Rural Retreats & Leisure UK Ltd drifts along directorless since the mysterious Michael Jones – who is listed as holding all the shares – left on the last day of July. Companies House is still waiting for the accounts due by 31 December 2018. There is a charge held by the National Westminster Bank against everything the company owns.

Companies House has been informed of the situation but has taken no action.

Plas Glynllifon Ltd is in no better health than the other companies. It too shuffled from Plas Glynllifon to Manchester and now Llwyn y Brain Lodge. The two directors are Cunliffe and Rowena Williams (Paul Williams resigned last month) and the shares are split equally between Rowena Williams and Mylo Capital Ltd. It should go without saying that the accounts are overdue.

There are eight outstanding charges against Plas Glynllifon Ltd, all with Together Commercial Finance Ltd. Plus three on this title which I believe includes the big house.

Gwesty Seiont Manor Ltd was dissolved in May.

The Seiont Manor Hotel Ltd was dissolved in September. The final resting place being the Leintwardine office of accountant John Duggan, another convicted fraudster who’s been used a lot over the years by Paul and Rowena Williams.

Looking at the extant companies and the properties not in the hands of receivers I found 15 charges against companies and seven against properties, all with Together Commercial Finance Ltd.

But then, Commercial Finance Ltd itself has nine outstanding charges with the Royal Bank of Scotland. It’s the money merry-go-round.

  • ‘Respectable’ banks raise money
  • They will lend to chancers, fraudsters and con artists – once
  • ‘Respectable’ banks also make loans to lenders of last resort like Together Commercial Finance Ltd
  • Lenders of last resort then lend it to chancers, fraudsters and con artists who have exhausted their credit with ‘respectable’ banks.
  • Chancers, fraudsters and con artists from England use money from both sources to buy property in Wales
  • This may involve mortgage fraud, tax evasion and other ‘sidelines’
  • Few if any jobs will be created for locals, certainly no good jobs
  • These scams are hailed by ‘Welsh’ media and politicians as ‘investment’
  • Once they’ve got enough money stashed away, aforementioned chancers, fraudsters and con artists go belly-up or leg it
  • News media and politicians ignore such outcomes
  • Receivers, security firms, auctioneers, etc – all from England – make money from property of liquidated companies
  • The losers will be local staff, tradesmen and suppliers
  • Wales loses out in every sense, especially if con artists have received public funding, which happens far too often
  • Chancers, fraudsters and con artists start up again and cycle repeats itself
  • Alternatively, their assets are taken over by serious crooks who use them to ‘refresh’ money from other ventures

This is not the capitalist system I support, and I find it worrying that so many agencies that should be intervening seem to dismiss it as ‘victimless’, white collar crime. It may even be regarded benevolently because it generates wealth and puts money into the UK economy, like drug trafficking and other criminal activity.

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THE BIG HOUSE

In the past few weeks I have received many notifications from Companies House regarding Myles Andrew Cunliffe and companies with which he’s associated, plus information from other quarters. So let’s look at just some of it.

I’ve mentioned Llwyn y Brain Lodge already, the new ‘home’ for Rural Retreats & Development Ltd and Plas Glynllifon Ltd, well it’s also the new address for the following Cunliffe companies:

Which suggests that Myles Andrew Cunliffe is settling in nicely. Though in the case of the second company in the list, it transferred to Llwyn y Brain on September 16 but Cunliffe ceased to be a director on the 18th. Which is odd, because the only director remaining has no known connection with Wales, and he joined on the very day Cunliffe left.

In addition to these companies, Cunliffe joined Save and Support PLC (Incorporated 25 April 2019) as a replacement for James Ellis.

UPDATE 22:20: Save and Support may provide a thread worth following. On 20 August, the day that Cunliffe’s associate, Sean Colin Hornby, joined Save and Support PLC, three directors left. These were: Peter John Parry, Adam Peter Parry and Joseph Peter Parry, almost certainly father and sons.

We find them again at Parry Investment Group Ltd and Save and Support Group Ltd. It’s reasonable to assume that Save and Support Group Ltd is linked with Save and Support PLC.

What makes this interesting is that Parry senior is also a director of Creating Enterprise CIC, a subsidiary of Cartrefi Conwy Cyf, which is based in Mochdre, just a hoot and a holler from Grwp Llandrillo-Menai’s Llandrillo campus.

Elsewhere, you will remember that in the previous episode we looked at the strange case of Cunliffe’s business partner Dennis Rogers, and the possible connection with Arron Banks and the mysterious millions that funded the 2016 Leave campaign. (If you haven’t read it then I suggest you read Weep for Wales 13 now.)

It seems that since Weep for Wales 13 appeared on August 31 Dennis Rogers has been reducing his profile, ceasing to be a director of a few companies. I hope it was nothing I said!

But this section is titled The Big House for a reason. In the previous post I linked to this story from North Wales Live on July 8 which told us that Paul and Rowena Williams had bought Plas Glynllifon in 2016, and that Myles Andrew Cunliffe was now a 50/50 partner.

Image courtesy of Daily Post/North Wales Live. Click to enlarge.

But then I got to wondering . . .

As you can imagine, I’ve got hundreds of documents and images for Paul and Rowena Williams and their associates – but did I have the Williams’ Land Registry title document for Plas Glynllifon? So I started searching.

All I could find for the Williams duo relating to Plas Glynllifon was this title document which refers to ‘land adjoining Glynllifon College’ for which £630,000 was paid in 2017. But nothing for Plas Glynllifon. So I went back to the Land Registry and did a map search.

I soon found the title for ‘The Mansion House and Glynllifon Estate’. The ‘Mansion House’ must refer to Plas Glynllifon. Which tells us that it’s all owned by Grwp Llandrillo-Menai, of which Coleg Glynllifon is a part.

Click to enlarge

In which case, how could Paul and Rowena Williams have bought Plas Glynllifon in 2016? And how could Myles Cunliffe now own half? I suppose there are a number of possibilities.

Perhaps the purchase of Plas Glynllifon in 2016 was not registered with the Land Registry. If so, why not? Why register the purchase of ‘land adjoining’ but not the Plas itself?

Maybe the Plas wasn’t purchased at all, maybe Paul and Rowena Williams entered into some kind of lease or rental agreement with Grwp Llandrillo-Menai. If so, what are the terms of this agreement? (Though the only lease shown on the title document is for an electricity sub-station.)

I’m genuinely confused, so I’d like some answers to a few simple questions:

1/ Who owns Plas Glynllifon?

2/ If Plas Glynllifon is owned by Grwp Llandrillo-Menai, what arrangement does it have with Paul and Rowena Williams; and now, Myles Andrew Cunliffe, and whoever Cunliffe might be representing?

3/ If Plas Glynllifon is owned by Paul and Rowena Williams/Myles Andrew Cunliffe and partner(s) – as they claim – why isn’t the ownership registered with the Land Registry?

UPDATE 05.11.2019: In the hope of settling the question of who owns Plas Glynllifon, the mansion, I wrote to Grwp Llandrillo-Menai.

The response I had yesterday was accompanied by a copy of the title document and plan for a sale of the Plas in November 2003. That sale was to Glynllifon Ltd, a company that was dissolved 24.06.2017. The sale was helped with a loan from the Welsh Development Agency. Though you’ll notice that Glynllifon Ltd was formed 07.11.2000. So why did it take so long to complete the sale?

The e-mail I received from the company secretary of Grwp Llandrillo-Menai concluded: “With regards to document CYM8531, thank you, the Grŵp will be following the matter of accuracy up with our Estate Solicitor and the Land Registry in due course.”

The clear suggestion being that the title document for Plas Glynllifon available at the Land Registry, showing the place to be still owned by Grwp Llandrillo-Menai, is wrong. I can only think that the Land Registry has not been notified of a change of ownership.

♦ end ♦

 

Weep for Wales 13

On By JacIn Brexit, Brexit Party, British Nationalism, Colonialism, Corruption, English Nationalism, European Union, Ukip37 Comments

PLEASE APPRECIATE THAT I GET SENT MORE INFORMATION AND LEADS THAN I CAN USE. I TRY TO RESPOND TO EVERYONE WHO CONTACTS ME BUT I CANNOT POSSIBLY USE EVERY BIT OF INFORMATION I’M SENT. DIOLCH YN FAWR

♦

LET’S RECAP . . .

I suppose the obvious place to start is with an update, or perhaps a brief résumé for those new to the saga. This approach will also help me ease back into the saddle.

Paul and Rowena Williams are an unsavoury couple who, by various means, built up a portfolio of hotels and pubs in Wales, England, and Cornwall. In 2015 they formed a company, Leisure & Development Ltd, that ‘bought’ properties they already owned at greatly inflated prices.

Paul and Rowena Williams. Click to enlarge

Obviously, no money changed hands but thanks to the grotesque over-valuations mortgages were secured against these fictitious purchases. This of course was classic mortgage fraud.

Though lenders would have required valuations, and I have always suspected that these were provided by Dudley Cross of Lambert Smith Hampton. Cross had worked with the Gruesome Twosome for years, he even served as a director of Leisure & Development Ltd until the whole shooting match was allegedly ‘taken over’ in February 2018 by convicted fraudster Keith Harvey Part(d)ridge.

The valuations were done in 2015, Cross joined the company in 2016.

Click to enlarge

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UPDATE

A while back I drew up a list of the companies with which Paul and Rowena Williams were involved. You can see it below, and here’s the pdf version, with working links to the Companies House entries.

Now for the latest news, working down the list from the top . . .

Click to enlarge

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There are moves by Companies House to strike off Polvellan Manor Ltd, the two-month notice dated 2 July. The last document filed was micro company accounts in April last year, showing a loss of  £1,033.

You’ll notice one charge against this company in favour of Debra Oswald, who is Paul Williams’ sister. To help you understand the chicanery behind this ‘loan’ I urge you to read this document sent me by someone who’d had dealings with Paul Williams in Cornwall.

The document is quite long, but it explains so clearly how Paul Williams operates.

UPDATE 18.09.2019: Polvellan Manor Ltd was dissolved via compulsory strike-off (by Companies House) on 17 September 2019.

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As reported, Rural Retreats & Development Ltd now has Myles Cunliffe and Paul Williams as directors with Cunliffe’s company Mylo Capital Ltd having ‘significant control’. The company address has moved from Plas Glynllifon to the second floor of 9 Portland Street in central Manchester. An address where we’ll find a number of Cunliffe companies.

There are seven outstanding charges with Together Commercial Finance Ltd.

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Leisure & Development Ltd was the main company for the Williams’ property empire and as I’ve mentioned this was supposedly bought on 1 February 2018 for £11m by Keith Harvey Part(d)ridge and Sukhbinder Singh Heer. As previously reported in this series, this company is now in administration.

There are twelve outstanding charges, nine with National Westminster Bank Ltd and three with Together Commercial Finance Ltd.

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Leisure & Development Ltd Licensed LLP went belly-up in July 2016.

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There were moves to voluntarily strike off Rural Retreats & Leisure UK Ltd in the middle of last year but it struggled on with Michael Jones at the helm. Jones was lost overboard on 31 July, which leaves this Mary Celeste of a company adrift.

A company with no nominated director is not a legally constituted company, so this irregularity has been referred to Companies House.

There is one outstanding charge with National Westminster Bank Ltd.

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Next up is Plas Glynllifon Ltd, where we find the Williams duo and Cunliffe listed as directors. With shares split equally between Rowena Williams and Mylo Capital. Despite the name, the company’s address is now on the second floor of the Manchester building I mentioned earlier.

More importantly, perhaps, Companies House has given notice that Plas Glynllifon Ltd risks being struck off in mid-October. This of course may be the desired outcome, because . . .

Click to enlarge

There are eight outstanding charges, all with Together Commercial Finance Ltd.

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Gwesty Seiont Manor Ltd was dissolved in May.

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Finally, we have the Seiont Manor Hotel Ltd, which might now be dissolved, seeing as Companies House issued the notice on 25 June.

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All of which suggests that the Williams portfolio is now reduced to Rural Retreats & Development Ltd. Though with nothing filed with Companies House since February, and seven outstanding charges, the future of this survivor must also be in question.

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UPDATE 2

Which takes the form of a quick roundup of changes I’ve been informed of in recent months. A few snippets from hither and yon.

Rikki Reynolds, right-hand man to Paul and Rowena Williams, said to know where the bodies are buried (metaphorically speaking), and who was running the Seiont Manor hotel, was sacked in March(?), presumably by Cunliffe. 

He is believed to be writing his memoirs.

On April 3 new company Seiont Manor Ltd, sole director Myles Cunliffe, transferred its address from Manchester to the hotel of the company’s name.

On July 8 North Wales Live reported Myles Cunliffe saying, ‘they were in the final stages of selling the site after coming to the conclusion they are not able to complete the redevelopment. He said: “At the mansion (Plas Glynllifon) it has not been feasible to take the site forward, we have not been able to realise Paul’s dream for the site and need a hotelier now to take the site to the next level.’

Pure bullshit. There’s more chance of sighting Lord Lucan riding Shergar through the grounds than there is of finding a ‘hotelier’ to take over a vast and cripplingly expensive to maintain building in the wrong location.

Plas Glynllifon. Click to enlarge

According to the administrator’s progress report on Leisure & Development Ltd, dated August 9, here is the state of play with the various properties:

  • The Knighton Hotel went to auction May 9, but failed to reach its reserve price.
  • The Radnorshire Arms in Presteigne is also unsold but there is interest.
  • The Bird in Hand (Ironbridge, Salop) continued trading, contracts being drawn up. So by the time you read this it might have been sold.
  • The Castle Inn and caravan park (Wigmore, Herefordshire) has been sold.
  • The Salutation Inn and caravan park (Berwick-upon-Tweed) sold for £215,000.
  • The Waves Bar and Resort (Seaton, Cornwall) sold in April for £501,000.

It seems the administrator might be stuck with the Knighton Hotel. A large establishment – made up of two separate buildings – with the sale complicated perhaps by the Williams duo still owning parts of the whole, certainly the former retail unit at ground floor extreme right.

Knighton Hotel. Click to enlarge

Going back to the administrator’s progress report, I found Appendix B interesting for it lists the creditors, something we’ll look at in a minute.

In the Notice of administrator’s proposals, dated 10 September 2018, we read that the six properties we’ve just looked at were valued at £11,887,828, according to documents lodged with the Land Registry.

Click to enlarge

So in 2015 Paul and Rowena Williams claimed to have paid £11,887,828 for those six properties, three of which have now been sold for perhaps just one million pounds. The largest, the Knighton Hotel, failed to reach its reserve price of £350,000 at auction.

As a matter of interest, according to the Land Registry document, Paul and Rowena Williams ‘paid’ £2,881,599 for the Knighton Hotel in 2015.

The most the administrator will make from the sale of all six properties is maybe £2m. Yet as you can see in the table below, taken from the same administrator’s report, NatWest is owed £6.2m on those properties. How is this possible?

Click to enlarge

It’s explained by Paul and Rowena Williams inflating the valuations to gain mortgages, in line with the example of the Knighton Hotel. And remember, they already owned all six of the properties, so they paid nothing!

With the £6.2m figure accounted for by perhaps 50% mortgages on inflated ‘purchase’ prices plus interest.

Clearly, NatWest will be lucky to see a third of what it’s owed by Leisure & Development Ltd. Or less, after the administrator and others take their cut.

And spare a thought for the ‘Unsecured creditors’, owed £306,961.36. These will be suppliers, local tradesmen, staff, and others who really can’t afford to lose money, but these poor buggers won’t see a penny.

Moving on . . .

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MYLES CUNLIFFE AND FRIENDS

To believe the Daily Post, when Paul and Rowena Williams were at their lowest ebb a knight in shining armour came galloping in to rescue them. Under the gleaming armour was the manly physique of ‘finance guy’ Myles Andrew Cunliffe.

I always had doubts about Cunliffe, who was after all a small-time operator, offering finance on second-hand cars – why the sudden jump to stately homes? I touched on the answer in an update to Weep for Wales 12, in which I mentioned Jonathan Disley, ‘the King of Marbella’.

The link might be Neil George Cunliffe, who lives in Marbella. The two Cunliffes are from the same area and it’s reasonable to assume they’re related. And I find it difficult to believe that Neil Cunliffe, living in Marbella, does not know ‘the King’.

More recently, it seems Disley has been looking for investment opportunities back in Blighty, maybe Brexit has prompted this return. If so, this might be ironic, as I’ll explain in a minute.

Among the investment opportunities being considered was Blackpool football club. For it was being reported last year that Disley was in negotiations with Owen Oyston, the unpopular owner, to buy him and his family out. Also seen with Oyston in the directors’ box at Blackpool were Myles Cunliffe and Dennis Rogers.

Click to enlarge

So who is Dennis Rogers? Well, as you might have guessed, he’s another ‘businessman’, one who’s been involved in quite a few companies with Cunliffe. Companies such as Etaireia Investments PLC (both resigned as directors 27 March, 2019), Get Me Finance Ltd, Mylo Capital Ltd and Goldmann PLC (formerly Cunliffe Rogers and Ellis Capital PLC), which they both joined as directors 11 December 2018.

In fact, Rogers is quite an interesting character for a number of reasons. Earlier this month he was announced as the Brexit Party candidate for Warrington South . . . and then, two weeks later, he wasn’t. The story behind this abrupt change takes us to the heart of the possible Brexit connection.

Some trouble-making local checked Rogers out on the Companies House website and found that he had an Isle of Man address. Perhaps this one. Obviously there were some objections to this Manx resident standing for Warrington.

Though if you look at the address given for the company you’ll see that it’s in Holmes Chapel, Cheshire, where Rogers lives. That confusion is not clever.

But now it gets really funny, so stick with it . . .

After working as a Strategic Business Advisor for the IoM government Rogers kept up the pretence of Manx residency. But then, the fuss over his candidacy, and questions as to where he lived, and whether he paid tax, alerted HMRC, who I’m told are now making enquiries.

Though his IoM connections get even more interesting when I tell you that Rogers was a nominee director of Rock Holdings Ltd. And if Rock Holdings rings a bell then it might be because it’s the company that many allege Arron Banks used to channel money into the 2016 Leave campaign.

“A nominee director is a director appointed to the board of a company to represent the interests of his appointor on that board. He may be appointed by a shareholder, a creditor or another stakeholder”. So who appointed Dennis Rogers?

The Banks connection is spelled out in this report from Manx Radio from just a week ago: “Earlier this year, the Manx businessman (Rogers) was named as a nominee director for Rock Holdings Limited, a company which forms part of Arron Banks’ insurance empire.”

I bet you’re glad you stuck with it!

Going back to Goldmann PLC, we see that the secretary is Sean Colin Hornby. Hornby was a Labour councillor in Bolton until some misunderstanding over unlicensed taxis led to him standing as an Independent before he joined Ukip. Despite the rise of the Brexit Party Hornby stuck with Ukip and his loyalty was rewarded with re-election in May.

Click to enlarge

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ONE THING LEADS TO ANOTHER

The bottom line is that Cunliffe and Rogers work for Disley or, as it was put to me, they’re his front men. They are, effectively, employees.

It is further suggested that Goldmann PLC is Disley’s company. Rogers was removed as a director on August 16 due to the attention he was attracting from HMRC and possibly other agencies.

Something else that may be connected with the unwanted attention is that until 19 August Goldmann Ltd was known as Cunliffe Rogers and Ellis Capital PLC. I’m told that ‘Ellis’ is Tom Ellis, Disley’s son-in-law.

Obviously we are dealing here with ‘colourful’ and unorthodox businessmen, where what you see ain’t always what you get. The sort of people I write about all the time. Too often, in fact, because Wales attracts so many such chancers.

Which is why I find the Brexit angle, and the possibility it throws up, a welcome diversion. Let me explain.

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Earlier I provided an IoM link for Dennis Rogers. The company was National and Commercial Extwistle Ltd, with Rogers giving his address as the Trafalgar pub on the South Quay in Douglas.

In the image below, the Trafalgar pub is the white building on the left, and the redbrick building behind the pub is what I suspect are the old offices of Manx Gas, with the company’s new office building on the right. The old building is now called Murdoch Chambers.

Image courtesy of Google. Click to enlarge

Why am I telling you this?

Because in this report – and I can recall watching it on Newsnight – John Sweeney locates Rock Holdings’ (the Banks’ company we looked at just now) address to Murdoch Chambers. The report says:

“At the time of the referendum, Rock Holdings’ address had been registered at Murdoch Chambers, South Quay, Douglas, Isle of Man.

Newsnight visited the island this week and its first stop was to Murdoch Chambers, which now appears to be an accommodation address, facing a gas showroom overspill car park. The door was locked and no-one answered.”

I know the Isle of Man isn’t that big, and Douglas is a fairly small town by mainland standards, but even so, Banks and Rogers being neighbours strikes me as one hell of a coincidence.

Another company I found giving the Trafalgar pub as its address was The Bullion People Ltd. Secretary and sole director Jodie Rogers. This company was Incorporated 4 September 2012, filed nothing, and was dissolved 13 May 2014.

A further company registered in a pub that called time for the last time in February 2010 was The Cash Point Ltd. Same pattern, single share held by secretary and sole director Jodie Rogers. Incorporated 6 September 2012, nothing filed, dissolved 6 May 2014.

And it’s the same with the Dennis Rogers’ company. He served as secretary and sole director, the company was set up 2 February 2017, filed nowt, and dissolved 10 July 2018.

But back to Jodie . . . who I assumed was either the daughter born when Dennis Rogers was a twenty-year-old stripling, or his much younger wife.

Dennis and Jodie turn up together in other companies, but in some older entries she’s Miss/Ms Jodie Lee, which suggests they tied the knot. Let’s look at a few of these companies.

There was the Gold and Silver Exchange Ltd and Cash For You (UK) Ltd. Both short-lived and with no accounts published. Then there’s Collateral Business Centre Ltd. (Originally Goldmann and Sons Ltd). Incorporated 6 June 2013, filed only accounts for a dormant company, dissolved 27 December 2016.

Among the directors of Collateral Business Centre was Peter Currie. Check out the companies he’s been involved with, and see how many of them have been dissolved or liquidated after a similarly short existence.

We looked at companies in the Trafalgar with ‘cash’ and ‘bullion’ in their names. Now we can add, ‘gold and silver’, ‘lending’, ‘finance’, ‘currency’, ‘money’, ‘capital’, ‘cash’, and even ‘pawn’.

Companies that are clearly involved in moving money or trading in precious metals, but they don’t seem to do any business, they never submit accounts, and they go out of business very quickly before there’s too much tedious paperwork cluttering up their palatial offices.

There may be an honest explanation for businesses like this. Though if so, then I’m still waiting to hear it.

◊

CONCLUSION

We started with a couple of shysters and their hangers-on, and it was fairly easy to spot mortgage fraud. I now hear that Paul and Rowena Williams have been offered a very decent sum to hand over Plas Glynllifon, the Seiont Manor, Fronoleu (near Dolgellau), and Polvellan House in Kernow.

Fronoleu. Click to enlarge

We can but guess at the use to which these buildings will be put. But they are unlikely to be renovated. For now we seem to have moved into a different realm. Not only in terms of scale, and opacity, but also thanks to the possible political dimension.

Over the years I’ve copped a lot of criticism, I’ve had many critics, even threats. But it all seemed to ratchet up when I first mentioned Cunliffe, Rogers and Disley. Was it because they were afraid of their business dealings being exposed, or was it due to the Brexit connection?

The usual Remainer theory is that the Leave campaign was funded from the Kremlin, a tactic in Russia’s ongoing attempts to destabilise the West. But I think my old mucker Vladimir Vladimirovich gets a bad press – where’s the evidence he was slipping brown envelopes to Arron Banks or anyone else?

There is no evidence of the money coming from Russia. That £8.4m that Arron Banks can’t account for could just as easily have been found down the back of a Spanish sun lounger.

The links are there for all to see. Or maybe the key lies in the answer to a single question: Who insisted that Arron Banks make Dennis Rogers a nominee director of Rock Holdings, the alleged conduit for the money that might have swung the 2016 referendum?

♦ end ♦

P.S. A message to those who keep sending me letters and generally having unkind thoughts about me. I really don’t care what you get up to in Spain, or England, or the Isle of Man, or Timbuktu, but once you cross the border into my country I will take an interest. Because it’s my country, I love it, and I will protect it from people like you.

The message should be obvious: if you don’t want me to write about you – stay out of Wales.

 

Weep for Wales 12

On By JacIn Colonialism, Colonisation of Wales, Corruption, Tourism, Welsh Government, Welsh Media21 Comments

EXPLANATION: This post was originally put up on March 18 and taken down after I received a hand-delivered letter after dark on March 26. Having now given the matter considerable thought I have reinstated this posting and will continue with the Weep for Wales series.

A short explanation was posted in place of Weep for Wales 12, which garnered the comments you’ll see prior to the reposting on August 25.

It was taken down for a second time after another threatening letter from Myles Andrew Cunliffe on August 28, and reposted after a minor revision.

♦

Those who follow soap operas will be familiar with new characters appearing and old favourites being written out. And so it is with this saga that began with Paul and Rowena Williams. For as they (appear to) slip into the wings new figures take to the stage.

As I always say at this stage – and if you have a couple of hours to spare – you might want to catch up with previous instalments: Weep for Wales, Weep for Wales 2, Weep for Wales 3, Weep for Wales 4, Weep for Wales 5, Weep for Wales 6, Weep for Wales 7, Weep for Wales 8, Weep for Wales 9, Weep for Wales 10, Weep for Wales 11 and Weep for Wales 11A (section 2 of a larger post).

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PREVIOUSLY . . .

We left the story, at Weep for Wales 11A, having just met the latest addition to the cast in the form of Myles Andrew Cunliffe. So how is Myles settling in, and what have we learnt about him?

On 19 February Companies House was notified that Rowena Williams ceased to be a director of Rural Retreats & Development Ltd, the company that, apparently, owns Plas Glynllifon. This leaves Paul Williams and Myles Cunliffe as directors. Though the 10,000 shares are divided equally between Rowena Williams and Mylo Capital Ltd, which is of course Cunliffe’s company.

Gwesty Seiont Manor Ltd is in the process of being struck off. And as I also reported in Weep for Wales 11A, the registered office address for Seiont Manor Hotel Limited – sole director Rikki Reynolds – has moved from Plas Glynllifon to the office of accountant and convicted fraudster John Duggan in Leintwardine, Craven Arms. And now there is a third company using the Seiont Manor name in the form of Seiont Manor Ltd, which has a Manchester address and Cunliffe as sole director.

We also learnt that staff were not being paid at Seiont Manor. And the news spread within the industry to the point where warnings were being posted on social media.

Click to enlarge

What I may have neglected to mention is that Plas Glynllifon Limited, which owns the mansion and some land around, for which Paul and Rowena Williams ‘paid’ £630,000 in 2016, now has three directors; the gruesome twosome and Cunliffe. The registered office address for this outfit has also moved to the Manchester address used by Cunliffe, but nothing has yet been filed with Companies House to tell us how the shares are allocated.

Also worth noting is that there are no less than eight outstanding charges against Plas Glynllifon Limited, all held by Together Commercial Finance Ltd.

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NEW PLOT LINES

You’ll recall that in Weep for Wales 10 I reported on the former member of staff, a disabled man, who’d taken Paul and Rowena Williams to an Industrial Tribunal and been awarded £27,907.42. The details are here.

Well, there’s been another case and this time the award was just under £12,000.

You’ll notice in the report Paul Williams claiming he didn’t turn up in court because he didn’t realise the case was on. The implication being that had he known he would have scampered to the court-house, camped outside overnight, and then exposed this scalawag trying to besmirch his impeccable reputation.

Click to enlarge

This is pure Paul Williams. Whenever he’s called to an ‘awkward’ interview or meeting he avoids attending with some silly excuse – he’s gone down with Yellow Jack, been trampled by a runaway rhino, abducted by aliens . . .

The bloke is such a liar he should try his hand at writing. He could be the next Jeffrey Archer.

It should also go without saying that neither of those former employees awarded money will ever see a penny – for on his way to the bank Paul Williams will be ambushed by Jesse James and his gang!

Another piece of important news is that the Administrator’s progress report for Leisure & Development Limited came out last week. Here it is full. Section 1.1.2 says a lot about Paul and Rowena Williams. As does 1.1.7.

While I’m not holding my breath, 1.2 does offer hope that these bastards will get the comeuppance they deserve.

Click to enlarge

Interesting for its omission was any mention of the eleven million pounds earlier claimed by Paul and Rowena Williams, a sum that made them the biggest creditors. Because, you’ll recall, they said they’d sold Leisure & Development Limited to convicted fraudster Keith Harvey Part(d)ridge for £11m just before the company went belly-up but never saw the money.

All that’s left of the Williams empire in Gwynedd appears to be poor neglected Fronoleu, near Dolgellau. A Seiont Manor employee still lives in the seven-bedroom house near to the former restaurant, but his dreams of taking over a refurbished Fronoleu – which is what he was promised – have gone up in smoke.

Though maybe I shouldn’t say that, because I’ve had reports of a couple of suspicious fires associated with Paul Williams. One recent report tells of a fire at Plas Glynllifon:

” . . . there was a fire at the Plas on the Saturday before Halloween . . . all the students had left for half term . . . the fire which was in the courtyard at the back of the mansion and . . . that fire would have burnt the whole house down without any doubt . . . it had started in a bin that held aerosols and paint cans . . . I saw a land rover . . . driving . . . right by the fire, he could not have missed it. I presumed he (the driver) would have called the brigade . . . they had not received a call, and when . . . fire brigade arrive the same land rover drove quickly away from the mansion . . . “.

This could be dismissed as an accidental fire witnessed by someone with an over-active imagination, were it not for the timing. For by late October Paul and Rowena Williams knew their canoe was heading not for Goa but Shit Creek.

They were desperate. And that explains why, just a short time after the fire, Myles Andrew Cunliffe appeared on the scene.

Before leaving Gwynedd I should mention an e-mail I received from someone living near Fronoleu. The message said that the writer was distressed at the state of the (even more distressed) building and was prepared to buy it. So could I provide an address for the owners.

Fronoleu. Click to enlarge

All I could tell them was that I had sent my Christmas card (£20 note enclosed) to, ‘Paul and Rowena Williams, c/o Seiont Manor Hotel, etc‘.

Now we’re off to Cornwall, from where I’ve also received a number of interesting reports.

The first suggests that Keith Harvey Part(d)ridge is buying the Garrack Hotel in St Ives and plans to turn it into ‘accommodation’ of some kind. Staff at the Garrack knew nothing of Part(d)ridge until someone did an internet search and came across the Weep for Wales series, now the staff are very worried.

Though the question remains, for whom is Part(d)ridge buying the Garrack? And how unsavoury does the real buyer have to be to use Part(d)ridge as a front man?

Another convicted fraudster who’s done time is Stuart Paul Cooper who leases the Waves Bar from dissolved Leisure & Development Limited. A bit of a lad, Cooper, who likes to threaten people with violence or arson. (Often both.) Even though he runs the bar the drinks licence is obviously not in his name.

Waves Bar, Seaton, Cornwall. Click to enlarge.

The licence was originally held by Rowena Williams, who of course lived a few hundred miles away, so Cornwall County Council put a stop to that and it was transferred to Cooper’s live-in girlfriend Donna Armstrong, or Westmorland, or whatever name she might be using at any given time.

Companies House seem to know her as Armstrong and she was a director of the Waves Bar and Restaurant Limited, a company set up in April 2017 and dissolved in August 2018 without filing anything of note with Companies House. But then, in September 2018, she and co-director Richard Edward Mayfield set up the Waves Restaurant and Bar Limited.

Doesn’t anyone at Companies House think that’s a bit suspicious?

There is a third company, with Anderson as sole director, and this is Waves Resort and Leisure Ltd, Incorporated in September 2018. The other two can be dismissed as shell companies, but this third company has a single £25,000 share, which is intriguing.

(Cooper of course is disqualified from serving as a company director.)

Stuart Paul Cooper, has been imaginatively described to me as a ‘nose hoover’. Rikki Reynolds, who’s been running Seiont Manor, has a similar liking for the white stuff. And that’s not the only similarity, for here’s a story about Reynolds I was sent a while back but agreed to sit on. I’ve now had clearance to use it.

Click to enlarge

Talking of cocaine and similar substances, it is even suggested that the Waves Bar might be an entrepôt for exotic goods from faraway places landing at Looe.

Before leaving Cornwall, and Looe, I should remind you that there is still Polvellan Manor Ltd which presumably owns the property of the same name. Partdridge is the sole director, but the shares are split equally between him and Paul and Rowena Williams.

Also based at Polvellan Manor is Rural Retreats & Leisure UK Ltd, which the gruesome twosome tried to dissolve last year. The sole director here is the mysterious Michael Jones.

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AND THE LATEST ADDITION TO THE CAST

Now let’s turn to the new star of the show, Myles Andrew Cunliffe, who seems to have taken over both Plas Glynllifon and Seiont Manor, though official paperwork is still scarce.

As I’ve mentioned previously, Cunliffe’s early background is in personal finance and second-hand cars.

As is my wont when looking into the background of someone like Cunliffe I like to draw up a list of the companies with which they’ve been involved. And that’s what I’ve done. Here’s the document in pdf format with the company name acting as a hyper link.

I’m also making the document available in png format. The links don’t work of course but some of you may find it easier to follow. I suggest you keep it open in a different window.

Click to enlarge

If we look at the document – ordered by date of company formation – we see that the early companies were in the personal finance and second-hand car sector I mentioned. But then, from late in 2011, there’s a switch into property and freight. The two are separated by a black line.

Now let me explain the colouring. The ones shaded in blue are Williams companies that Cunliffe has taken over. The ones at the bottom, in pink, are perhaps replacement companies recently formed by Cunliffe. The ones shaded yellow are companies where Cunliffe’s arrival coincided – almost to the day – with the leaving of Baron Alex Bloom. (Of whom more in a minute.)

The unshaded companies are either dissolved, in the process of being dissolved, or else too new to know much about.

Right, so who is Baron Alex Bloom? An internet search throws up any number of stories about this colourful character, starting here in 2003. But after time in jail this millionaire’s son ‘bounced back’ in 2006. And to bring you up to date here he is in 2018 being accused of dishonesty by a judge during divorce proceedings. ‘Shome mishtake, shurely!’ as Lord Gnome would put it.

Picture courtesy of Daily Mail, click to enlarge

I’m not quite sure how this works, but if you check the chronology, you’ll see that Cunliffe very often becomes a director just before a company goes under. He’s almost like a priest called in to administer the last rites.

And that, I strongly suspect, is what’s happening in north Gwynedd. Cunliffe hasn’t been brought in to rescue Paul and Rowena Williams, there’ll be no money invested in Plas Glynllifon or Seiont Manor; he’s there for other reasons.

When you look through the property and freight companies Cunliffe has been involved with you’re immediately struck by the lack of what Woody Guthrie called the ‘Do Re Mi’, the moolah, the greenbacks.

Click to enlarge

It’s interesting that the Daily Mail account of the divorce proceedings makes clear that Mrs Bloom comes from a wealthy Russian family. Which means that for a while at least Baron Alex Bloom had links to serious Russian money. Maybe he still has.

Through Etaireia Investments – of which Bloom was and Cunliffe remains a director – we find links with the Oyston family estate. The name Owen Oyston will be familiar to football fans and to readers of Private Eye. This article from the Guardian will give you a flavour of the man.

This is not so much a dramatis personae as a cavalcade of grotesques.

UPDATE 20.03.2018: A cavalcade that has been joined by Jonathon Disley who, I am reliably informed, has stayed at the Seiont Manor more than once recently.

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THE BROTHER WE NEVER SEE ON SCREEN?

What I also found intriguing was that among the directors of Goldmann and Sons PLC we find a Neil George Cunliffe, some ten years older than Myles Andrew Cunliffe. Are they related?

So what do we know of Neil George Cunliffe?

His Linkedin profile takes us back to 1997 when he was a sales director for a timeshare company on Gran Canaria. He still lives in Spain, in Marbella, and is now a Spanish citizen, though his Linkedin profile does not list all the companies with which he’s been involved. I’ll try to fill in the lacunae.

Goldmann and Sons PLC Incorporated 24.07.2015.  (‘Financial intermediation not elsewhere classified. Other business support service activities not elsewhere classified’.) Neil Cunliffe was a director from 03.04.2018 to 06.05.2018. Myles Cunliffe was a director from 16.03.2017 to 19.10.2018.

The Vanguard Group Limited (‘Development of building projects’.) Incorporated 12.01.2017. Neil Cunliffe was a director between 04.04.2018 and 28.07.2018. No accounts ever filed with Companies House. This company was dissolved 05.03.2019.

Cunliffe Rogers and Ellis Capital (Spain) Limited (‘Central banking. Banks. Financial intermediation not elsewhere classified’.) Incorporated 14.03.2018, name changed from Goldmann and Sons (Spain) Limited in January 2019. Neil George Cunliffe was first and sole director until 01.08.2018 when he was replaced by Thomas James Ellis. No accounts yet filed with Companies House.

Vanguard Land Limited (‘Development of building projects’.) Incorporated 17.05.2018. Neil Cunliffe has been one of the two directors since Incorporation. This company was floated with share capital of 1,000,000 £1 shares. Cunliffe holds 499,000 of the shares. No accounts yet filed with Companies House.

Arden Wealth Limited (‘Management consultancy activities other than financial management’.) Incorporated 12.06.2018. Neil Cunliffe was one of the two founding directors and remains a director. This company was formed with share capital of £5,000,000 divided equally between the two directors. No accounts yet filed with Companies House.

Kenlife Consulting Limited (Management consultancy activities other than financial management.) Incorporated 29.10.2018. Cunliffe was the founding and sole director and holder of the single £1 share until 04.03.2019 when he was joined by a Dutch resident with an Arab-sounding name and an Omani. No accounts yet filed with Companies House.

Do you see the pattern here? – short-lived companies . . . forming and folding with no paperwork filed . . . people holding directorships for very short periods . . . foreign investors . . .

In my investigations I unearthed a whole stable of companies carrying the Goldmann label, and all follow the same pattern. They have either been set up very recently, which means it’s too early for accounts, etc, or, if they’re a few years old, then they’ve been dissolved. Either way, we know little or nothing about them.

Here’s a list of the Goldmann companies. You’ll see that a number of them have undergone name changes from Goldmann to Cunliffe Rogers and Ellis.

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THE FINALE

Anyone hoping to see Plas Glynllifon become a top class resort hotel, with high-rollers flying in and out of Caernarfon airport; or the Seiont Manor Hotel get mentioned in the Michelin Guide, should wise up and realise that’s not why people buy these properties.

And this doesn’t just apply to the current owners. Or to these properties.

Image courtesy of Caernarfon airport, click to enlarge

For we have a problem in Wales that I have mentioned before. While we may not have many mansions as grand as Plas Glynllifon we still have thousands of buildings for which there is no viable commercial future, so they get bought by the kinds of people we’ve looked at in the Weep for Wales series.

And it’s so easy.

On the one hand we have a self-styled ‘Welsh Government’, and local authorities – both bereft of ideas – desperately promoting tourism; to the extent that any shyster moving in and buying Neuadd Cwmscwt is hailed as the economic salvation of the area. Not only that – but he/she will very likely receive grants!

Then we have the local media. In the whole saga of Plas Glynllifon under Paul and Rowena Williams the Daily Post published one puff after another. To all intents and purposes the ‘paper was acting as a PR outlet for these crooks. I can imagine the DP editor phoning up Plas Glynllifon on a slow news day and begging, ‘Do you have anything you’d like us to publish for you, Mr Williams – anything!’

There are very few journalists left in Wales. Nobody seems to do background checks and ask the pertinent questions.

Finally, our police forces are overstretched and under-resourced, and no matter what they might suspect, they can do nothing. And anyway, sophisticated crimes like those we’re looking at may be out of their league and their jurisdictions.

We are at the stage now where we, as a country, need to make decisions about grand buildings that serve no purpose, have no future, and fall prey to a succession of undesirables who arrive announcing grand plans that never come to anything.

Rather than allowing Wales to become a haven for asset-strippers, mortgage fraudsters, money-launderers, etc., it might be best to compulsorily purchase and then demolish places like Plas Glynllifon.

♦ end ♦