At the end of March, it became known that the Municipality of Eindhoven would grant subsidies to Summa College without the consent of the city council. The municipality is now shedding light on the matter.
The ED (eindhovens dagblad, daily newspaper), reported the story of a financial advisor of the municipality after he was sacked. This happened after the advisor had sounded the alarm about alleged millions that were handed out without the consent of the municipal executive. The municipal council was not aware of the state of affairs either.
According to the Municipality of Eindhoven, the correct amounts were not mentioned, nor were they subsidies. It is not about €3 million, but about €1.6 million. For that money, language lessons were purchased from Summa for people in Eindhoven who cannot speak Dutch. It is about a purchase contract, for which the municipality also receives money from the national government.
Generous
Because of corona, not all activities could take place. After all, because of corona, it was not possible to attend lessons in class. Nevertheless, Eindhoven paid the full price. But Summa College was no exception: it was municipal policy to be generous with subsidies and similar expenditure in the social domain. The city council was well aware of this, the municipality emphasises.
Yet, the Municipality of Eindhoven commissioned an investigation into the way the money for Summa was spent. The investigation did not reveal any fraud. There was an illegality with regard to the mandate for the granting of goodwill, but this has been rectified, according to the investigators.
Whistleblower
Nor did the rift between the municipality and the financial advisor arise because the latter had expressed his reservations about the course of events. The hired advisor would have indicated, without being authorised to do so, that the payment to Summa College should be reversed.
“This led to the incident about Summa. The resulting conflict led to the termination of the hiring contract. The employee did not report any wrongdoing or invoke the whistleblower regulations”, according to the Municipality of Eindhoven.
Source: Studio040
Translated by: Bob
