David Flowers, who lost his job over the fiasco, made the accusations yesterday as he warned that he would not be made ‘a convenient scapegoat’ for Treasury Minister Philip Ozouf.
Mr Flowers said that the collapse of the deal to buy the Lime Grove office block was due to the minister’s delays and attempts to renegotiate the deal by his team. Senator Ozouf made ‘a foolish gamble and lost’, he added.
Speaking to a Scrutiny panel the day after his departure from his job as head of the Property Holdings department from the States was announced, Mr Flowers said that the collapse of the deal resulted from the minister’s delays and attempts to renegotiate the deal. And he insisted that the failure has put back the relocation of the police station by at least two years, and that the lease signed by State Street – who acquired the Green Street roundabout building at the last minute – valued it at between £1 million and £3 million more than the price the States had initially agreed.
Full story in Saturday’s JEP
