Woking Liberal Democrats Announce Partnership Approach to Stabilise Council Finances

• Woking Council will bring in additional resource to better understand finances
• Partnership approach will include Surrey County Council, government and private sector partners, while boosting existing 3-point plan
• Follows concern from central government on "excessive risks" taken by Woking Council, and letter received on 11th May by outgoing Conservatives

Woking Liberal Democrats today announce a new partnership approach towards stabilising the financial situation of Woking Borough Council (WBC) and to support the new administration's ambition to support economic growth across the Borough.

This new partnership approach will allow WBC to bring in additional expertise from Surrey County Council and will expand on an existing and constructive working relationship alongside the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC).

The council is anticipating a further response from DLUHC in relation to that department's existing involvement. Ministers of DLUHC wrote to the previous, Conservative leader in May 2022, concerned by the level of WBC debt, the highest per capita in the UK.

Cllr Ann-Marie Barker, Leader of Woking Borough Council, comments: "One of the main concerns from Liberal Democrats in Woking have always been the lack of commercial expertise and resources within the WBC team to steward investments involving commercial property, financial modelling and business strategy of such scale and complexity. Partnership working can provide the expertise needed to go forwards."

The new Liberal Democrat administration were asked, in the recent 13th October meeting of Woking Borough Council what they have been doing differently, since inheriting the issue. Cllr Dale Roberts, portfolio holder, explained at the time that in the face of an enormously complex financial situation, the new Liberal Democrat administration at WBC has adopted a three point approach since taking over in May. "We had an outline plan before we even took office," commented Cllr Roberts in the meeting.

Cllr Dale Roberts, Portfolio Holder for Finance and Economic Development at Woking Borough Council, expands on his three-point plan: "Our first priority has always been to take urgent preventative steps to stop the situation worsening. The immediate intervention in Victoria Arch, already projecting a further £53 million in costs, is the most obvious example. Our first update of the medium term financial strategy also set realistic income forecasts that reflect economic reality.

"Secondly, we want to ensure we have a robust and informed plan. We didn't want to repeat the same mistakes or make the situation worse. Therefore we have initiated immediate reviews of both the Thameswey and Victoria Square Woking companies, their business plans, and their funding requirements. Our team is also developing an asset management plan for the Council's own directly-owned properties. Some could generate capital receipts and some generate income but many need development before they will deliver best value. The previous administration would have just borrowed but we will not be able to do that and it would be the wrong thing anyway.

"Thirdly, we wanted to improve governance and reporting, to support future accountability. We have reviewed the Council's model for company governance which was approved by Council in July 2022 which ended years of potential conflicts of interest inherent in the previous model. Even though we only took control in May we have also implemented tighter project controls and undertaken a full review of the Borough's performance reporting.

"Partnership working will further support all these existing steps."

As a result of the new approach, the new WBC administration has proactively shared proposals with Surrey County Council's strategic finance and commercial teams to develop an improvement plan that, over time, will deliver considerable change to how the Council funds its investment strategy. In addition, alongside work by WBC teams, work has also continued constructively engaging with DLUHC.

Ann-Marie Barker concludes: "Ultimately, we want this plan to bring in new, alternative sources of funding into Woking and, at least in the longer-term, actually reduce the borrowing. First of all, we are reducing the past dependency of WBC on new debt every year."

For media enquiries please contact:

Cllr Adam Kirby, group head of publicity, Woking Borough Council Liberal Democrats

Adam.Kirby@wokinglibdems.org.uk