Issue - meetings

To receive the Treasury Management Strategy 2018-19.

The Committee considered the Treasury Management Strategy 2018-19. 

During the discussion of this item the following points were made:

·           For 2018/19 external debt was estimated to increase by £61.5million to £206.7million.  This increase was a very prudent estimate and would be reliant on the delivery of the capital programme. 

·           Members were advised that a couple of tables within the report remained to be confirmed due to sensitivity around next year’s revenue budget. 

·           The Capital Programme was estimated to be £180million next year before carry-forward and over the next three years was estimated to be a total of £534.5million.  The Financial Planning Specialist highlighted the different asset types that this was broken down into.  This would be funded by £535million of resources. It was noted that there was a small surplus of funding which was currently estimated to be capital receipts.

·           Members were advised that with this ambitious Capital Programme came additional borrowing.  37% of this borrowing was for forward funding projects which would be funded by S106 or CIL, 41.5 % of borrowing was for invest to save projects e.g. new leisure projects, 17.5 % was for loans for Wokingham Town Centre Regeneration and Wokingham Housing Limited, and 4% was for approved borrowing (MRP funded).

·           The total forecast additional borrowing (£243.2million) would be fully met by a number of resources within 24 years.  During this period many large infrastructure schemes profiles would be refined during the build process which would have an impact on the borrowing forecast.

·           For 2018/19 the estimated returns on investments, both external and internal companies, was set to increase from the 2017/18 estimated outturn by £1.0million to £2.4million, rising to £2.9million in 2020/21.  This increase was mainly due to the return on the loans made to Wokingham Housing Limited and Wokingham Town Centre Regeneration.

RESOLVED:  That the following be recommended to Council for approval:

1)         Capital Prudential indicators, 2018/19;

2)         Borrowing strategy 2018/19;

3)         Annual Investment Strategy 2018/19;

4)         Flexible use of capital receipts strategy; 

5)         MRP policy; and

6)         Treasury Indicators: limits to borrowing activity 2018/19.