Project linked to Mayor aide sued by LDA

A project closely linked to Ken Livingstone's aide Lee Jasper is being sued by the Mayor's London Development Agency.

The LDA is taking legal action against Brixton Base - of which Mr Jasper is patron and self-styled "champion" - over £18,000 in unpaid rent.

The sum is being demanded back from the south London organisation despite it receiving a £287,000 grant towards "premises" from the LDA.

The revelation is the latest development in the growing furore over cash given to groups linked to Mr Jasper. Brixton Base is one of the groups which has benefited from LDA grants. Director Errol Walters is a friend of Mr Jasper and has shared office space with him in the past.

BBC London reported that LDA auditors - sent to carry out an emergency investigation of Brixton Base in October - had found that at least £193,000 was unaccounted for. The auditors went in because for several months they had received no answers from Brixton Base to their questions about where the money went. A promised business plan, which the LDA paid for, was not delivered.

As the Standard reported last week, Brixton Base appears to have done little despite receiving more than £535,000 in LDA funding over the last two years. A sum of £230,000 from the funding was to run three short training projects.

But the director of one of the projects, Shango B'Song, told the Evening Standard he had funded most of it out of his own pocket and saw only £8,000 of the LDA grant given to pay for it.

The revelations raise more questions over Mr Livingstone's credibility. As the Standard reported last week, 11 organisations run by friends or business associates of Mr Jasper have received at least £2.5 million in City Hall money - mostly from Mr Livingstone's LDA - with little, if anything, to show for it.

Responding to that report, the Mayor claimed last week that "every one of those projects, the LDA has a full audit trail of, and has complete chapter and verse on how money's been spent."

The facts of the legal action against Brixton Base - and the missing sums found in the audit - was not revealed by the Mayor when he was questioned about the grant last week. The revelations triggered demands today from London Assembly Tories for it to be recalled in emergency session. Lib-Dem Assembly leader Mike Tuffrey called the revelations "deeply shocking," saying that Mr Livingstone had been giving "a misleading impression".

Mr Tuffrey called today for the appointment of fully independent auditors, rather than LDA-employed auditors, to investigate the grants.

Richard Barnes, Tory group leader, said: "Things are crumbling very fast for Livingstone now. I will be asking the group today to call for an emergency meeting of the Assembly to call in the District Auditor."

The LDA and the Mayor's office have so far refused to answer the Standard's questions about Brixton Base.

Instead, the Mayor described the Standard's story as a "tissue of lies" and a "racist smear campaign". The LDA refused to comment on the new revelations last night. The BBC quoted a mayoral official as admitting: "There may be discrepancies, but it doesn't mean there's a problem."