Meeting documents

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a) notes the current position of the 2004/2005 capital programme;

b) approves the adjustments to and incorporation of additional funding to the 2004/2005 programme as detailed in paragraph 4.1;

c) approves delegated authority to the Chief Executive, in consultation with the Executive Member for Resources (or his nominated substitute from the Executive) and the Executive Member for Tourism, Leisure & Culture, to draw down up to £3.4m from the general risk reserve for remedial works to the Spa Project, subject to any draw down from the reserve being reported regularly to the Executive as an `officer decision' report.

d) approves the basis for spending on the Spa Project as set out in paragraph 4.4.

e) note the proposed drawdown of £750,000 from the capital programme risk reserve in respect of the acquisition of Bath Sports Centre from the Bath Recreation Ground Trust, which will be the subject of a report to Council later this month.

f) approves the allocation of a sum of up to £35,000 funding from slippage for potential remedial works to the spa water boreholes and the virement of £150,000 from the Western Riverside project budget for a city centre retail impact study.

g) notes the current position of available resources.

· Education - A grant of £101,705 for Travel Advisors has been allocated to be devolved directly to schools. A capital receipt of £343,000, received from the sale of land at Weston-all-Saints school, has been earmarked for education capital expenditure. The Executive Member for Education has approved the transfer of £500,000 NDS Modernisation budget to Property Services.

· Social Services - Grant of £96,000 has been approved for Information Management and also £21,000 for Integrated Children's Services IT.

· Economic Development - the brought forward funding from 03/04 for Norton Radstock SRB has been increased by a £133,000, due to an error between grant funded and council funded expenditure. Planning schemes totalling £47,604 have been transferred from Transport budgets.

· Trading Services - an additional £13,000 of s.106 funding is to be allocated to play areas.

· Corporate - Government grant of £350,000 has been received for E-government projects.

· The following budgets have been approved by Executive Members to be funded from unallocated sums contained within the capital programme approved by Council in February:

Small Must Do Schemes Budget (£250,000)

Headroom Creation Budget (£1,000,000) The following schemes have been approved on the basis that the respective Services' revenue budgets will be reduced in future years by a sum equivalent to the capital financing costs. They are therefore fully self-financing.

Unallocated (£300,000) - a sum of £105,000 to upgrade meeting room facilities at Keynsham Town Hall.

4.2 Council in July agreed to vire £250,000 from the Long Term Income Sustainability budget to provide for the cost of major projects programme management.

4.3 As part of the same report, Council in July considered a review of the capital programme and agreed a series of recommendations. These included a reassessment of the level of risk contingency required within the programme. Council approved the Resources Director's assessment of £10.5 million and agreed that funding should be built up over time from a number of funding sources. As a result of changes in profiling and financing assumptions £3million is available now and therefore the risk reserve has been increased to £5.1million.

4.4 The review also proposed a review of the budget management rules affecting the capital programme, to clarify the specific rules applying to major projects, in recognition that, for example, the approvals mechanism for allocation of the major projects risk reserve is not sufficiently clear. That review is being undertaken and will be reported to Council in November. However, in the mean time, in view of the current situation with regard to the remedial works required to the Spa Project, the Chief Executive, as project sponsor, needs the ability to draw down from the general contingency reserve. The current approved budget is £26.043m plus £2.58m of specific project reserve giving a total of £28.623m, however the latest reported figures to the Overview & Scrutiny Panel is much higher at average risk, and it is imperative that the Chief Executive has the ability to procure the necessary remedial works as these are identified and specified. The general risk reserve currently stands at £4.4m in capital cash, after the deduction of £750,000 referred to in paragraph 4.5 below. A review of other major schemes does not suggest that any other calls on the contingency will be made in the near future (the Combe Down Stone Mines project on this agenda does show a need for substantial contingency provision, however this will not be needed in the short term), and it is anticipated that a substantial level of capital receipts will be received during the current financial year to increase the cash position once again. It is therefore proposed that delegated authority is given to the Chief Executive, in consultation with the Executive Member for Resources (or his nominated substitute from the Executive) together with one other Executive Member. Any draw down from the risk reserve will be reported retrospectively to the Executive, and the level of contingency reserve will be monitored by the Resources Director in conjunction with the Executive Member for Resources.

4.5 In respect of the purchase of the Bath Sports Centre from the Recreation Ground Trust, the Council has recently heard from the Charity Commission that the receiver manager is "satisfied that the best price reasonably obtainable is by means of a sale of the freehold to the Council for the sum proposed" for the sports centre and car park. The Council had offered £750,000 and this sum was taken into account when setting the new capital contingency reserve. It is therefore proposed to draw down £750,000 from the reserve, and to report this to full Council for approval at its meeting later this month.

4.6 It is proposed to allocate a sum of up to £35,000 from slippage for potential remedial works to the spa water boreholes. This work is needed to ensure that the boreholes are in a proper state of repair and the budget will provide for initial investigations plus a contingency for remedial works, to be assessed following investigations.

4.7 Finally, it is proposed to carry out a masterplan framework study in respect of Bath City Centre and the Twerton Riverside area. The work will enable the Council to make strategic decisions regarding the development capacity and value of its own sites; to make strategic decisions regarding its partnership with Grosvenor Estates and to prepare a robust case regarding the future retail capacity of Bath for the long term. The work is urgently required to feed into the Local Plan inquiry process. The cost is estimated at £150,000 and it is proposed to vire the funding from the 2004/05 Western Riverside project budget.

4.8 Spend to the 30^th June totalled £6.38million (£5.25million net of grant funded Stone Mines expenditure and Bath Communities grant funded expenditure or 45% of profiled spend). Profiled spend to 30th June, excluding grant funded Stone Mines expenditure, was £11.7million. Transport spend for the quarter is an adjusted figure provided by the Finance Manager which allows for the inclusion of capital salary recharges and 03/04 accruals adjustments.

4.9 Details of the current programme are given in Appendix 1.

5. Details of profiled spend are given in Appendix 2.

6 RESOURCES

6.1 Details of revised resources are as follows: