21.01.2008

Scandal involving 1st Access Rentals

Scotland’s Sunday Mail has claimed that Stephen Connelly, owner of 1st Access Rentals of Carfin, Motherwell, faces a Department of Trade and Industry investigation after he transferred £230,000 to the access rental company from Glen Isla, a development company he also owned, that went-under holding around £300,000 worth of deposits from home buyers.

Connelly was the sole director of Glen Isla which purchased a site in Stewarton street, Wishaw, Lanarkshire, Scotland in January 2005 for £400,000, the company then obtained a £185,000 enterprise grant for the development.

Glen Isla also collected deposits from a number if buyers for the apartments that were planned to be built on the site. However the company was declared bankrupt before a single brick was laid.

A liquidator was appointed for the company in November with debts of around £500,000, just weeks after it had sold the site to businessman Alex Smith for £700,000.

The Mail also claims that Connelly transferred £230,000 of the sale proceeds to 1st Access Rentals a platform rental company that he also owns.
See full Sunday Mail article

Vertikal Comment

1st Access Rentals operates a fleet of mostly Haulotte booms and scissors while a sister company, 1st platforms Rentals operates a number of truck mounted lifts.

It is really too soon to comment any further, we will have to see what comes out any investigation, assuming that one goes ahead and whether any court action results over the transactions just prior to Glen Isla's bankruptcy.

One thing is for sure there will be pressure for the authorities to take some action, given that members of the public were directly involved along with the state.

Update

A lawyer acting on behalf of 1st Access Rentals Ltd has spoken and written to us this morning regarding the above article. pointing out that Glen Isla has nothing to do with an access company and suggesting that the whole story is being driven by one individual in Scotland who has a personal grudge against Mr Connelly of first Access Rentals Ltd.

We have offered to publish his letter and any other information such as the above that might help us present a fully balanced view.

If you have any comments or information that might help us in this endevour, annonymously or openly we would be pleased to hear from you.

Finally our rationale for reporting on this was that an article had appeared in a national newspaper, making signifcant public claims against a person running a well known access rental company.

Even though it was a sunday we were alerted to the article by readers of Vertikal.Net. and felt that there was clear interest in informing you of the said article.

Again we welcome your comments on the publication of this story.