Tower Hamlets, the east London council, sold off public buildings to associates of the Mayor and handed out grants to ineligible bodies, a damning Government report has found. The winning bidder to buy Poplar Town Hall offered a lower price than other bidders and ‘had an association’ with the controversial Mayor Lutfur Rahman, according to an audit by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC). The Mayor personally intervened in the awarding of council contracts, which lacked signed paperwork or audit trails, the report found. Hundreds of thousands of pounds in public money were awarded to local bodies that were not eligible for the money after the intervention of elected councillors, the report found. The audit was commissioned by Eric Pickles, the Communities Secretary, following allegations of cronyism, fraud and waste at Mr Rahman’s council.