Agenda item

Report to follow.

This item is to provide additional details on the capital budget proposals for scrutiny.

This item was to discuss the additional information requested on the capital budget at the panel’s budget scrutiny meeting in December but Cllr Gordon expressed concern that only a small amount of additional information had been provided at late notice.

Peter O’Brien, Assistant Director for Area Regeneration, spoke about the Wood Green Regen (2) scheme (Capital Scheme 480). The Wood Green AAP has a significant role in setting the Wood Green capital allocation and in identifying the social and community infrastructure requirements under headings such as education, health & well-being, parks & open spaces, and sports & leisure. Funding for these may come from various sources including the NHS, Sports England and developer contributions. The decisions to allocate this funding to specific projects has not been made by the capital programme being considered by the panel, the funds are just put into a budgetary envelope to be drawn down over the period. Spending on specific projects using these funds would still require approval by Cabinet. Of the £39.279m total allocation over 5 years, £7.6m was allocated for education facilities, £3.3m for further education, £5.1m for health and wellbeing, almost £6m for parks, £0.25m for social and community infrastructure, £12m for sports and leisure, just under £5m for public realm.

Panel members said that this information should have been provided in writing in advance as this was difficult to follow and that without this it was not possible to scrutinise this information properly. Asked to advise on this the scrutiny officer commented that if the panel felt that they did not have sufficient information to make recommendations then the panel should convey this to the Overview & Scrutiny Committee ahead of its meeting on January 28^th. Dan Hawthorn, Director of Housing & Growth, suggested that there should, in future, be more discussion in advance between the officers and the Chair and scrutiny officer about the format of the information required by the panel.

Cllr Williams asked why Fortismere capital scheme had not been included in these capital figures. Dan Hawthorn commented that this may have been included in the Priority 1 section because, although it includes some housing, it is principally about facilities for the school. Cllr Williams said that it ought to have come to the Housing & Regeneration scrutiny panel because of the housing element.

Peter O’Brien responded to further questions from the panel as follows:

• On why the figures were so specific if the funds hadn’t been allocated to any specific projects, this was based on evidence of what the requirements are to meet the demand for various services and then calculations are made on that basis using standard metrics so the figures may therefore look quite precise.
• On the requirements for schools in the Wood Green Regen (2) capital scheme, school rolls are falling in parts of the borough and the AAP is looking across a 10-20 year horizon and at the expected requirements for primary and secondary schools.
• There is a general understanding that the borough’s parks are in need of investment which is reflected by the capital sums allocated.
• The low allocation for social and community infrastructure partly reflects the fact that some of this is falling under other headings such as sports & leisure but concerns expressed by the panel on the facilities available for youth services would be taken away and looked at.
• Of the £39m allocated for the Wood Green Regen (2) capital scheme, less than £10m is Haringey Council money as the remainder is expected to be brought in from other sources such as developers, the NHS or Sports England.
• The Strategic Investment Pot (Capital Scheme 481) is cash that was bid for from the Government’s retained business rates pilot. Funding came from three different pots, one for broadband & digital investment, one for investing in the Council’s commercial property and one for business support in the Upper Lea Valley area.

Dan Hawthorn responded to further questions from the panel as follows:

• Noting the panel’s preference for social rent rather than shared ownership tenure in relation to capital scheme 513, it was important to consider it in the context of the Council’s overall housing development programme rather than one scheme on its own.
• That on why the WOC capital forecast (Capital Scheme 512) is so flat (£5m in 2019/20 and then £8m every year for four years) this is a standard approach to capitalise the ancillary costs associated with the housing development. The figures show a provisional allocation for this but are likely to be updated in future years.
• It is possible that the WOC could be used to build non-social rent housing in order to make new housing development projects financially viable but no decisions had been made on this. There are more options available since the lifting of the HRA borrowing cap and this would be considered further by Cabinet in February.
• The Strategic Property item (Capital Scheme 482) relates to a programme that had started off as a programme of assessing and bringing up to standard of basic compliance the Council’s commercial property portfolio in preparation for the HDV but had now become a longer-term programme of improving the standards for tenants and to support income streams. The bulk of the investment is allocated for 2019/20 partly because of compliance reasons and the ambition to get the standards of the portfolio up quickly. The figures for later years could also increase as it becomes clearer what work is required.

AGREED: That the panel informs the Overview & Scrutiny Committee that it is not in a position to make recommendations on the capital budget due to insufficiently detailed information. The panel agrees that there should be a discussion about how this information is presented in future years.