Ex-Tower Hamlets Mayor Rahman ordered to disclose 5 years’ earnings by High Court
Tower Hamlets ex-mayor Rahman (inset) ordered to disclose earnings for last five years - Credit: Archant
Deposed ex-Mayor Lutfur Rahman has been ordered by the High Court today to disclose his income going back five years and tax returns back seven years.
He has had £350,000 in assets frozen following April’s Election Court trial which barred him from office for five years for fraud and malpractice during last year’s local election for Tower Hamlets mayor in East London — but still hasn’t made any payment towards legal costs, a judge heard.
Election petitioners led by writer and TV producer Andy Erlam had gone back to the High Court because Rahman had failed to pay the first £250,000 instalment of legal bills for the original six-week hearing.
Rahman had to pay their legal costs at £500,000—and hand over £250,000 on account, Election Commissioner Richard Mawrey had ruled.
But that never happened. Nothing had been paid, Erlam’s barrister Francis Hoar told today’s hearing.
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Rahman had been shown to be “in substance, dishonest”, the barrister added.
Judge Justice Edis ordered Rahman to disclose income back to 2010, the year he became mayor, and tax returns back to 2008 when he first became Leader of Tower Hamlets Council. His assets were frozen to the value of £350,000.
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Rahman was accused at his Election Court trial of postal vote rigging and ballot paper tampering in evidence of “an alarming state of affairs in Tower Hamlets”.
It didn’t result from the East End’s racial or religious mix in the population, nor from any social deprivation, Judge Mawney said at the time—but the result of “the ruthless ambition of one man”.