Letter to the Chief Executive of the British
Council from the Director of International Education Connect Limited
Thank you for your letter of 7 October.
There is nothing vague about the allegations
in my letter of 26 August. I have not hitherto provided evidence
to substantiate them since, as observed before, the evidence here,
and a great deal more, is readily available to you in Spring Gardens.
1. I enclose a copy of the competing contract
that the British Council signed, while in formal agreement with
us, with "Education Websites Ltd" in September 2001,
and I would draw your attention to the following:
a) Clause 13.7 which provides for Education Websites
Ltd paying 15% of profits to the British Council. Given the competing
nature of the agreements, and the fact that our agreement did
not involve money changing hands, this was clearly prejudicial
to our interests.
b) Clause 22.3 where it says that UCAS and CSU
have "no liability whatsoever in respect of the Contract,
the Tender or otherwise". Both organisations were officially
named as being members of a contracted consortium.
Your Freedom of Information division (Chris
Campbell) informed me on 11 February 2005 that there had been
"no variations to this contract".
2. I enclose a printout of the circular
distributed by email to the accredited EFL sector on 15 January
2002 by Dr Neil Kemp, wherein he refers to members of a contracted
consortium of Hotcourses, UCAS, CSU and Yahoo. I further enclose
a printout of the web page with ECS news from 29 January 2002
wherein this same claim was made. As noted above, UCAS and CSU
had no liability, and there is no mention in the contract of Yahoo.
Since your organisation was at this time contractually committed
to supporting our publications with your "best efforts' this
deliberate high profile public misrepresentation was doubly damaging
and inappropriate.
3. Education Websites Ltd was, from its
registration on 6 September 2001 until 31 March 2005, company
no. 4282961. On this second date the name "Education Websites
Ltd" was assigned to another company, Remone Ltd company
no. 5323181 incorporated in 2005. This second company has, since
my last letter to you, been removed from the current register
at Companies House, but the records may be accessed through the
dissolved and previous names indices. You will thus be able to
verify that your chosen contractor was a £100 company.
4. You may be able to substantiate other
matters such as how our database came to be installed on all BC
computers worldwide by asking your staff. If you need copies of
the contract or waiver signed with my company, please let me know.
5. You say that "an allegation of plagiarism
to date is the only coherent complaint" we have put to the
British Council. I would normally not object to the term coherent,
but I repeat: we have never alleged "plagiarism". Everything
I have said about the miscued, inappropriate and artificial "investigation"
stands.
I cannot by definition substantiate a negative
that the British Council failed to inform us about the contract
signed with Education Websites Ltd—that is an issue for
you—but I think the evidence I enclose demonstrates rather
clearly that I was not the only one who was misled. I was however
the only one with everything to lose and the only one investing
hundreds of thousands of pounds in the cooperation with the British
Council, which I did in the belief that I was dealing with a fair,
honest and honourable organisation, and not one which having secured
our 100% commitment to cooperation would clandestinely undermine
our business, clone our business model and product, and take over
our market. That misjudgement has cost me a great deal. I trust
that those charged with your organisation's governance and accountability
will understand why there is so much in need of attention and
why despite your ongoing evasion and prevarication I have persisted
in trying to obtain redress in the years since these shabby events
took place.
There is plenty more evidence here, and more
again which is easily available to you. Pursuant to the NAO report,
you committed your organisation to mechanisms providing assurance
in respect of unfair competition. Clearly this is not just desirable
but essential. I have had a fair number of letters from the British
Council of the same dismissive genre as your latest and I put
it to you that it is now time for a radical reappraisal. If you
do not have the resources to investigate this professionally perhaps
we could agree on a qualified third party or ombudsman, as I suggested
4 years ago.
10 October 2008
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