Issue - meetings

The Head of Strategic Finance and Property presented the report to the Committee. He said there had been a technical breach of the counter party limit for a period of two days, which had previously been reported on. This had been caused by a large payment from Central Government for business support grants. Therefore, the increased limit had been proposed.

The Chairman said that most of the structural borrowing had matured and asked if there was only around £1.5 million remaining to pay. He also asked about the need within the capital budget to borrow funds and commented that this was a good time to borrow due to low and stagnating interest rates.

The Head of Service said the Chairman’s understanding of outstanding borrowing was correct and it had not made financial sense to reschedule any of this remaining debt due to the punitive repayment terms set by the Public Works Loans Board (PWLB) which made early repayment more expensive than carrying the debt through to maturity. It would be difficult to foresee that borrowing would be as cheap again as it was currently. When borrowing, the Council would secure fixed interest rates, and the term of the loan would be tailored to the specific use of the funds. The Council would need to ensure it could service all debts and stay within its borrowing limits. Whether this would hamper the Council’s spending plans depended on the Old River Lane project and what kind of debt profile resulted from this, as well as a number of other factors. The various permutations would become clearer once the format of the capital programme reporting was changed.

RESOLVED – that the report be received.