A special team of accountants have been appointed to investigate Liverpool Council's £16 million energy disaster - as the council's finance chief says reserves will have to be used to bail out city schools caught up in the scandal.
Council bosses are under increasing pressure over revelations that a series of calamitous errors within the local authority have led to an extra £5m being added onto its own energy bill, with a potential total extra hit to the city of £16m impacting schools and the local fire service. An explosive meeting of the ruling Labour group on Monday night saw councillors calling for cabinet members and senior officers to consider their positions.
On Friday, the ECHO revealed the shocking litany of mistakes, including how council officers failed to inform the mayor or cabinet members that the energy supplier it was agreeing to extend its contract with, Scottish Power, had stopped supplying commercial customers. As a result, no contingency plans were made and the council was automatically placed onto a far more expensive deal.
