Borders Railway booming along its entire length

by LESTER CROSS

The five stations closest to the northern end of the Borders Railway experienced an even larger increase in passenger demand last year than their booming counterparts further south, figures based on ticket sales have shown.

As we reported yesterday, the stations at Gorebridge, Stow, Galashiels and Tweedbank experienced an uplift in user numbers ranging from 19 to 32 per cent in 2023/24, according to recently published data from the national railway authorities.

But the statistics are even more striking when the latest usage totals for stations at Brunstane, Newcraighall, Shawfair, Eskbank and Newtongrange are set alongside the equivalent numbers in 2022/23.

Here is what the tables of data show:

Brunstane - 2023/24 162,702 (2022/23 109,944) increase 47.9%.

Newcraighall - 250,388 (177,804) increase 40.8%.

Shawfair - 64,520 (44,362) increase 45.4%.

Eskbank - 274,640 (202,734) increase 35.4%.

Newtongrange - 153,434 (114,918) increase 33.5%.

Supporters of the campaign to have the 30-mile rail route extended at least as far as Hawick in the short-term claim this set of figures should pile pressure on the UK Treasury to stump up £5 million as their half of a £10 million project to assess the feasibility of the proposed extension right through to Carlisle.

Local MSP Christine Grahame (SNP) whose constituency includes the four southernmost stations on the existing line has already indicated she will be writing to the UK Government urging them to match the Scottish Government's commitment to fund the study.

Meanwhile Marion Short, who chairs the Campaign For Borders Rail told us: "The stats certainly make for very interesting reading and are indicative that there is now an even stronger demand for train travel within the Borders.

"I would be hopeful that this encourages people to travel into the Scottish Borders for tourism purposes.  I will definitely be cascading this information to my many contacts politically, those in transport agencies, Borderlands Growth Deal Group as this overall increase from 22/23 has to have a significant impact on the decisions of both Governments relative to the release of the feasibility study funding".

She said the campaign members had been delighted to hear the announcement of a proposed new Center Parcs [700 lodges and assorted holiday facilities] development near Hawick and were hopeful that would strengthen the case to build the second phase of the railway from Tweedbank via Hawick and onwards to Carlisle.  

"The criteria publicised by the UK Government for any new project is that it would lead to economic growth and certainly this new development would enhance that criteria and correlate with the railway towards the regeneration of the whole Scottish Borders area", said Ms Short. "It is seen locally as a terrific boost."

Notwithstanding visitors attending the Center Parcs village, the provision of the railway would be most helpful for anyone working there, facilitating transport connectivity.  The process for determining the Center Parcs planning application would run ahead of the railway feasibility study, and the Transport Assessment which would form part of the planning application would have to outline the impact on existing road infrastructure. 

Massive rise in Borders rail passenger numbers

EXCLUSIVE by LESTER CROSS

Campaigners for an extension of the Borders Railway beyond the Tweedbank terminus will have welcomed newly published figures which show numbers of travellers increased by more than 30 per cent at some stations during 2023/24.

Following confirmation of the strong sets of data for stations in her constituency, Borders MSP Christine Grahame told us she would use the figures to put pressure on the UK Treasury to release cash for a long-awaited investigation into the case for reinstating the rest of the former Waverley route.

While nationally, Scotland enjoyed a 16% uplift in passenger journeys, local figures for stations on the southern section of the Borders line exceeded that impressive rise by a considerable margin.

Estimated passenger entries and exits by station, based on ticket sales, revealed the following statistics for four of the stations along the route:

Tweedbank - 399,460, a 32.4% increase on the 2022/23 figure of 301,528; Galashiels - 320,406, up by 19.2% on the previous year's total of 268,720; Stow - 75,818, 26.7% above the 2022/23 number of 59,806; and Gorebridge - 122,968, 32.9% more than the previous year's estimate of 92,486.

According to the publication which covers every railway station in the UK, some ticket sales and ticketless travel are not included, which may mean that usage at some stations is underestimated.

A £10 million feasibility study to see whether an extension of the railway through the Borders to Carlisle would be financially viable remains on hold after the UK Government 'paused' its commitment of £5 million following this year's General Election.

Christine Grahame, the SNP MSP for Midlothian South, Tweeddale and Lauderdale, told us: "These figures prove what myself and all those campaigners always knew, that the railway would be a success. 

“This demonstrates the potential for the Borders people and the Borders economy with an extension through to Carlisle.

“ The Scottish government remains committed to its £5 million contribution to that feasibility study for the extension, but the UK government has not committed to its £5 million contribution and as of September 2024 has put this “on hold”

Ms Grahame, who was at the forefront of efforts to have the Edinburgh-Tweedbank line rebuilt and brought back into service in 2015 added: “£5 million is a drop in a bucket in the UK finances and I am writing to the UK Treasury to request this small sum in the light of these figures, be reinstated so the first steps to the extension and growing the Borders economy, can begin."

The study forms part of the multi-million pounds Borderlands Inclusive Growth Deal. But Labour politicians have rubbished claims that the previous Tory administration had allocated funds for the study, and allege such claims were 'a work of fiction'.

Earlier this year, Scottish Borders Council agreed to proceed with the appointment of a senior project manager to oversee the various stages of the study. 

Councillors who approved the appointment were told the role will cover a three-year period at a cost of £220,000, funded 50/50 by the Scottish and UK Governments. The procurement of the Senior Project Manager would progress using the £110,000 available to draw down from Scottish Government until the full allocation was confirmed by the UK Government.

A report to council stated: "It is expected that the next step following the appointment of the Senior Project Manager will be the establishment of a dedicated Project Support Team, cash flowed upfront by the Council and the costs fully recovered from the £10m funding provided by UK and Scottish Governments via the Borderlands Deal."

The Campaign for Borders Rail, which backs efforts for a better service on the existing Borders Railway as well as pushing for the extension to Carlisle was approached for comment on the new passenger figures.

Meanwhile, there was an equally healthy increase in usage of the recently reopened Reston station on the east coast main line in Berwickshire. Numbers there rose from 13,190 in 2022/23 to 21,130 last year, an increase of more than 60%. 

Revised Teviot wind farm remains "unacceptable"

by EWAN LAMB

The scaled-down proposals for a giant wind farm in Teviotdale with the number of turbines cut from 62 to 53 would still have a detrimental impact on the area's conical-shaped hills and steep-sided valleys, according to a landscape expert who also condemned the original plan.

Scottish Borders Council is expected to finally reach a decision on Muirhall Energy's Teviot Wind Farm scheme south of Hawick in early 2025 after being granted several extensions by the Scottish Government's Energy Consents Unit.

A key element in the decision-making process will be the opinion provided by Siobhan McDermott, the council's landscape architect. 

In a report last year, Ms McDermott wrote: "Although there are no designated landscapes within the site, I suggest that the landscape of this area has a high local value arising from its perception of remoteness and relatively wild character, and an increased sensitivity due to the important routes in close proximity.

"The number and spread of turbines is threatening to turn this area into a wind farm landscape, with a consequence change of the landscape character from Uplands with Wind Turbines/No wind turbines to a Wind Turbine landscape. This increase in windfarms to the extent that it would become a windfarm landscape is, in my professional opinion a significant cumulative landscape effect.   The visualisations from many of the viewpoints (VPs) demonstrates how prominent and character changing a wind farm of this scale would be."

Her revised report, now published on the council's website shows Ms McDermott has not altered her views. She recommends that the council should object to the scheme.

The new report concludes: "I do not support a windfarm of this scale and with such large turbines on a group of hills that, in my opinion cannot accommodate them without unacceptable negative landscape and visual effects."

Ms McDermott explains that although her comment concentrates on the turbines and their landscape and visual effects, it is acknowledged that the dropping of the draft solar array proposal will have a positive landscape and visual impact on the immediate area where it was proposed. 

But she says the revised scheme does not markedly reduce the visibility of the array when seen from the selected viewpoints – there is no additional topographical containment achieved with the amended scheme. 

"The ZTV [Zones of Theoretical Visibility] mapping and visualisations provide a useful demonstration of just how little screening there is from surrounding areas, and this lack of containment coupled with the horizontal spread of turbines makes it highly visible and highly prominent in the landscape."

According to Ms McDermott, the complex topography of the site, seen by the juxtaposition of hills and ridges with an extensive network of watercourses in deep and steep-sided valleys suggests  that a wind farm of this scale cannot be accommodated without unacceptable effects on the landscape, both fabric and character. 

"These effects will especially diminish the character of the cone shaped hills such as Skelfhill Pen, Penchrise Pen and to a lesser extent, Maiden Paps, by virtue of surrounding or engulfing them with turbines.   While the remoteness, wild character and grandeur of scale currently remain the underlying character of the receiving landscape, these have already been modified by scattered forests. The addition of 53 very large turbines will further reduce or eliminate these characteristics".

The reduction in the number of turbines from 62 to 53 has not, in her professional opinion, mitigated the effects on the landscape. 

The turbines will affect a significant change to the perception of the landscape over a wide area,  with the spread of large turbines along the ridges, often engulfing the more characterful discrete hills, diminishing the character of the natural assemblage and from several viewpoints appearing to step down into the smaller scale upland fringes and valleys that separate the ridges and tops. 

"Even with a reduction of the number of turbines, the proposal remains very prominent and character changing in the landscape. 

"The revised visualisations demonstrate that despite the removal of nine turbines, with a very slight reduction in the horizontal extent of the view occupied by turbines, the proposed wind farm remains very prominent along the skyline from the majority of the representative viewpoints. Nor do I think there has been a significant reduction in the magnitude of change."

Despite the reduction of the number of turbines from 62 to 53, there has not been a notable reduction in significant effects on sensitive receptors both near and further afield, adds Ms McDermott.

"The array remains prominent in many views and dominates the hills onto which it is being located and in the worst examples diminishes what are widely seen as feature hills within the hill group. From Rubers Law, almost 15 km from the array, the discrete hills seen in the middle ground are dominated and diminished by the turbines that occupy a very wide horizontal extent of the view, with one turbine appearing to be sticking out of Skelfhill Pen."

'Insolvent' Jedburgh pool had smallest deficit in Borders

EXCLUSIVE by OUR LOCAL GOVERNMENT EDITOR

The financial losses suffered by six swimming facilities managed by the Live Borders trust are considerably larger than the deficits which helped councillors to pull the plug on Jedburgh's Laidlaw Memorial Pool (LMP) and force its closure.

Figures from a reliable source passed on to Not Just Sheep & Rugby reveal that the Live Borders centres with pools in Eyemouth, Kelso, Galashiels, Selkirk, Hawick and Peebles had a combined shortfall of £1.319 million in 2023/24, a 25% increase in their operating deficit of £1.059 million during the previous financial year.

Hawick's Teviotdale Leisure Centre lost £547,434 last year while the smallest deficit of the six Live Borders facilities was the £69,004 racked up by Galashiels Swimming Pool.

Meanwhile, draft accounts for Jedburgh Leisure Facilities Trust [JLFT] which now faces liquidation show the LMP registered a 2023/24 loss of £30,517.

Members of Scottish Borders Council last month voted by 26 votes to four to reject a request from JLFT for an additional £80,000 to keep the Jedburgh pool open until the end of the current financial year. Both trusts have already had to be bailed out after running into financial difficulties

It is not clear whether the councillors had the figures for the Live Borders pools in front of them when they took their decision. Now, Jedburgh is left without swimming facilities with its pool mothballed pending a review of all Borders pools which could result in all of the centres being taken back under local authority control.

The council was told the Jedburgh trust currently had around £20,000 available in the bank and an immediate wages bill of £20,000 due on December 1st. In addition, the trust had current debts of £55,000. Without immediate financial support, JLFT would cease to trade. 

"The trust is no longer in a position where it is financially viable without the sourcing of further additional funding.", according to a report by council director of finance Suzy Douglas. "The Council has already provided substantial financial support in the form of Capital and Revenue grants."

A governance review had highlighted areas of weakness within JLFT’s governance which contributed to JLFT’s financial position. 

Our source has compiled their own version of events which led to the devastating decision to close the pool, at least temporarily.

They explained that LMP initially received a management fee of £137,000 from the council to be increased annually by inflation. But, in fact, the figure has gone down, not up, over the years to £115,000. The trust had saved SBC about £200,000 a year when it took over the running of the pool in Jedburgh.

We were told: "It’s been going well in the intervening 21years, increasing the number of users by 300 per cent and investing about £750,000 over the years to improve the facility through external grant applications from various sources such as EU Leader.

“It managed to survive COVID though many pools throughout the country didn’t.  It did receive a one-off grant of £127,000 from SBC for energy saving measures, used mainly to replace the 40-year-old inefficient and unreliable gas boilers."

But it is claimed the trust's ability to continue was jeopardised two years ago when energy costs increased by £60,000 a year, although it managed to cope until earlier this year.

 JLFT told SBC in August it was close to insolvency and a paper was prepared for councillors to consider.

According to our source: "The pool received the quarterly management fee in advance and £40,000 from SBC’s reserve. The conditions were that South of Scotland Enterprise (SOSE) would advise Trustees on improving their finances and governance, and that JLFT should do Debt Consolidation.

"JLFT found out a few days before the November Council meeting that SOSE had proposed reducing opening hours to just one shift of  seven hours a day opening and a grant of £80,000. That had previously been discussed as a possibility of reduced hours, among other possibilities, but it was obvious Council would never agree to that proposal”.

The opinions of the LMP users, many of them from outwith Jedburgh, was that ”it’s the best pool in the Borders and any suggestion that it was badly managed doesn’t fit the facts and is meant to divert attention from Live Borders record." 

These are the financial figures we were given:

2022/23

Eyemouth Leisure Centre: income 242,089; costs £436,589; deficit £194,500.  

Kelso Swimming Pool: income £260,432; costs £390,265; deficit £129,833.

Galashiels Swimming Pool: income £341,502; costs £453,513; deficit £112,012.

Selkirk Leisure Centre: income £127,986; costs £266,294; deficit £138,310.

Teviotdale Leisure Centre: income £617,517; costs £940,856; deficit £323,339.

Peebles Swimming Pool: income £84,198; costs £245,589; deficit £161,392.

Jedburgh LMP: income £432,696; costs £489,243; deficit £54,547.

2023/24

Eyemouth Leisure Centre: income £177,483; costs £442,689; deficit £265,206.

Kelso Swimming Pool: income £296,807; costs £449,373; deficit £152,566.

Galashiels Swimming Pool: income £402,765; costs £471,769; deficit £69,004.

Selkirk Leisure Centre: income £166,804; costs £258,640; deficit £91,836.

Teviotdale Leisure Centre: income £575,415; costs £1,122,849; deficit £547,434.

Peebles Swimming Pool: income £195,716; costs £389,661; deficit £193,945.

Jedburgh LMP: income £459,392; costs £489,909; deficit £30,517.

Warnings over Borders incinerator fiasco ignored by Aviva?

by LESTER CROSS

Our coverage of Scottish Borders Council's disastrous dalliance with the waste incineration industry, resulting in the loss of at least £2.4 million of public money, apparently failed to impress bosses at the Aviva whose investor clients (UK pension funds in this case)  have had their fingers burned to the tune of around £350 million in similar circumstances, according to reports.

It has emerged that an Aviva shareholder, the late Barry Robinson, from Hull, warned the Aviva’s then Group chief executive Mark Wilson seven years ago of the dangers of putting cash into untried and untested technology being used in multi-million-pound gasification projects aimed at turning waste into electricity.

But despite Mr Robinson's intervention, and criticisms from other Aviva stakeholders, management of the investment giant continued to pour huge wads of their investors’ cash into so-called biomass plants in Hull, Boston in Lincolnshire, and Barry, South Wales.

Loans totalling £480 million were ploughed into the three sites by Aviva between 2015 and 2023.

However, just like the ill-fated £23 million waste incinerator planned for Easter Langlee on the outskirts of Galashiels, "the technology posed significant challenges that would require more investment to solve".

Our investigations into the Borders scheme which councillors were forced to abandon in 2015, revealed that the system being flogged to the local authority by insolvent outfit New Earth Solutions Group [NESG] was basically useless. And NESG's supposed offshore financial backers - Premier Group (Isle of Man) - could not come up with the money for the Galashiels incinerator.

Most of our information was gleaned via Freedom of Information requests to the council, several of which were rejected on 'commercial confidentiality' grounds. However, on several occasions the Borders authority was ordered to release the paperwork it wished to hide by the Scottish Information Commissioner.

A series of Not Just Sheep & Rugby articles published in August 2017 was used by Mr Robinson to back up his claims in his letter of September 2017 to Mr Wilson.

He wrote: "I understand that Aviva is investing heavily in UK infrastructure. Whilst this would seem sensible policy, I am perturbed by the enthusiasm for, (alleged), production of renewable energy by gasification of waste. I have been unable to find any evidence showing that gasification of waste to produce renewable energy works on an economically viable scale. Any 'evidence' supporting the validity of the technology seems to be dependent on small-scale experiments, the results of which are hyped-up so often that they appear to be evidence".

Mr Robinson claimed that many developers in this field seemed to have "an amoral disregard" for facts. They seemed prone to assuring investors that everything was going to plan, right up to the car-crash.

That was certainly true in Easter Langlee's case, with meaningless assurances from NESG repeatedly swallowed by those promoting the project.

According to Mr Robinson: "Jed Forrester, in his online blog, 'Not Just Sheep and Rugby' (entries for 20-27 Aug 2017), claims to have exposed a classic case of this in which Scottish residents will have to foot a £2.4 million bill for incompetence at all levels regarding a gasification plant at Easter Langlee. (I enclose copy)".

And he concluded: "Please reply. I will be grateful if you will supply me with a clear written assurance that Aviva has investigated my complaint and agrees or disagrees with the comments I have made."

The cash for Aviva's 'calamitous' involvement in incinerators - dubbed by critics as the dirtiest form of power generation - has been channelled through an Aviva Unit Trust based offshore in Jersey which then loaned the funds to another Aviva subsidiary, based in the UK, called Aviva Investors Infrastructure Income No.3 Ltd.

As of December 2023, that company had total shareholders' deficits of £424 million, up from £313 million in 2022. Last year's operating loss of £111.4 million compared to a £92.6 million loss the previous year.

Yet the annual report stated: "The objective of the company is to achieve investment returns from investments in biomass projects".

The Guardian newspaper reported that Aviva now planned to put the three incineration plants into administration in an apparent bid to cut its substantial losses. 

The newspaper claimed the plants in Hull and Boston had generated far less electricity than planned, while the plant in Barry had been mothballed due to a planning row with the Welsh government.

Shlomo Dowen, national co-ordinator at the UK Without Incineration Network (UKWIN) was a friend and colleague of Mr Robinson as well as a fierce critic of the Easter Langlee failed scheme.

He said incineration was “harming recycling and exacerbating climate change”.

“Additionally, at a time when all efforts should be made to improve air quality, incinerators are harming the air that we breathe. And that is just one example of why incinerators are experienced as bad neighbours.”

Anyone thinking of following SBC and Aviva down the waste incineration route would do well to read the newly published 'Considerations for Potential Investors in UK EfW Projects' produced by UKWIN.

The document points out that the UK Energy from Waste (EfW) incineration sector is encountering a range of new and growing challenges that could significantly influence profitability, and this warrants careful consideration by potential investors in existing and new projects.

It adds: "At a time when the range of risks is increasing, the sector’s traditional model of mitigating risks, such as feedstock availability and regulatory changes, through long-term public sector waste contracts is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain."

The authors explore key risks that support the conclusion that investors should consider investing higher in the waste hierarchy rather than in new UK EfW capacity.

The full report can be accessed here:

https://ukwin.org.uk/Considerations-for-EfW-Investors.pdf

Project's potential haul of undiscovered Borders history

by LESTER CROSS

Dozens of previously unscheduled ancient monuments ranging from Bronze and Iron Age features to abandoned medieval settlements are thought to have been identified along the Tweed Valley in the first phase of a three-year archaeological project which is already exciting historians as well as Borderers involved in the research.

The results from an extensive study of LiDAR images - a sophisticated form of laser scanning - of an area stretching from Moffat across the Borders to Berwick come with the caveat that lots of on-the-ground work will be needed before conclusions can be reached.

But those participating in the £300,000 Uncovering The Tweed project, part of the ambitious Destination Tweed initiative, have been surprised that up to 200 new monuments may have lain hidden for centuries.

The first indications from the LiDAR detections were cautiously presented by Graeme Cavers, a director of AOC Archaeology, the specialists leading Uncovering the Tweed in an online review session.

Mr Cavers told his audience, including a number of those who made discoveries: "It is remarkable there is still so much out there".

The team's territory extends to two kilometres on each side of the river along its 90-mile route from source to mouth, and aims to provide a detailed archaeological record for future generations.

Some of the sites plotted on the project map are completely new and therefore unscheduled while others are believed to be additional features of registered monuments. The majority of the finds are in the upper reaches where the ground has been less disturbed by intensive ploughing.

Mr Cavers highlighted a number of the sites where additional research is likely to be needed to prove their authenticity.

He mentioned a Bronze Age terraced platform settlement, and said the project had possibly come up with up to ten new Iron Age forts and other monuments, adding to the 100 or so already identified in the region. Some of these new sites appeared to show evidence of timber roundhouses.

In one case, a substantial Iron Age settlement seemed to have gone undetected, even when a modern cable trench had been dug through it some years ago. Cairns, sheep stells [shelters] rig and furrow cultivation and enclosures also featured in Mr Cavers' presentation.

Moving forward in time, the LiDAR scans had also picked out a square feature close to Horncliffe village, near Berwick, possibly the site of a medieval village or a Roman camp overlooking the Tweed. 

In the same area, there are plans for an archaeological excavation next year at the location of a medieval hospital at Horndean.

And a few miles away at Ladykirk/Upsettlington the scanners are also thought to have landed on the remains of a village dating from the Middle Ages.

Finally, a site described by Mr Cavers as "the star of the show". At a location at Yair, not far from Galashiels, lies a feature measuring 30 metres by 23 metres close to the river bank which could turn out to be an abandoned 13th or 14th Century settlement 'of high standing'.

But this site, like all the others, will require co-operation from local landowners if it is to benefit from further expert research. 

Uncovering the Tweed Project Officer, Charlotte Douglas, told us: “We’re in the very early stages of the project but are extremely excited at the prospect of new discoveries and, subject to landowner permission, hope to follow up some of the LiDAR research conducted to date with a number of on-the-ground surveys in early 2025. 

"Uncovering the Tweed is a community-based archaeology programme, so we’ve been particularly pleased at the enthusiastic response from the general public who are obviously keen to play an active part in finding out more about the history of the Tweed and its communities.  We’re greatly looking forward to seeing what the next stage of the project will reveal.”

Anyone interested in finding out more about the programme or wanting to get involved can access information at:

 https://destinationtweed.org/project/uncovering-the-tweed/

Borders Council's record £60 million borrowing spree

by OUR LOCAL GOVERNMENT EDITOR

Scottish Borders Council smashed all of its previous monthly borrowing records in November when it asked the Treasury Debt Management Office for advances totalling £60 million, bringing the authority's debts for the calendar year to an eye-watering £136 million.

Figures published today by the Public Works Loan Board [PWLB] reveal that the Borders local authority took the cash in three separate "instalments" of £20 million on November 18th, November 26th and November 27th. The loans will add hundreds of thousands of pounds to the considerable sum in interest payments already being met from council funds via taxpayers.

The November 18th agreement came with a 5.17% interest rate with a maturity date for that loan given as May 21st 2026.

The £20 million borrowed eight days later on November 26th carries an interest rate of 5.08%, and a maturity date of November 26th 2029.

Then, the following day (November 27th) the third £20 million advance of the month was transacted, again at 5.08% and with maturity due on November 27th 2029.

As previously reported, cash from the growing portfolio of loans held by the council will be used to partly bankroll the authority's £454 million of capital investment which is planned over the next ten years. The various PWLB advances handed to SBC in the first ten months of 2024 totalled £76 million.

A report from John Boyd, the auditor appointed by the public spending watchdog to inspect SBC's books, noted: "The extensive capital plan is primarily focused on economic regeneration and the learning estate. £187 million is on the school estate including the new high schools for Galashiels, Peebles and Hawick estimated at £145 million, with the majority of this invested over the next three financial years."

That report concluded that SBC's total external debt, which includes the council’s long-term liabilities, is within the authorised limit and operational boundary set in the Treasury Management Strategy 2023/24. The current borrowing position complies with the Prudential Code, and the Council continues to consider the affordability of future borrowing.

It has been estimated that SBC will borrow £170 million over the coming three years.

Only last week, a new report produced by the Controller of Audit to Scotland's Accounts Commission claimed SBC has consistently laid out a clear vision and strategic priorities that respond to its geographic and demographic challenges. 

"The Commission is impressed by the council’s strong approach to financial management and recognises its financial strategy risk register as an area of good practice that should be shared. There is a strong track record of delivering planned savings, a significant proportion of which are recurring. Going forward, recognising the financial challenges faced, the focus should be on making savings on a recurring basis."

The report noted there had been a significant increase in the level of General Fund reserves held by the council. They increased from £49.6 million in 2022/23 to £60.1 million in 2023/24, a net increase of £10.5 million, predominately from service concession arrangements.

The council recognised the revenue implications of borrowing and ensured borrowing was in line with prudential indicators detailed in the Chartered Institute of Public Finance and Accountancy (CIPFA) Prudential Code for Capital Finance in Local Authorities 2021. 

According to the Controller of Audit: "In 2023/24, the council noted the higher interest rates in the UK and sought advice from its treasury management specialists. As a result, the council undertook short-term borrowing and used existing cash balances for capital investment. The council has reported that they were able to maintain service performance levels with some improvements in education indicators and recycling. 

"Challenges exist in indicators relating to looked after children and complaints handling and completing freedom of information (FOI) requests within the statutory deadline which have both declined in year. The council is making changes to its FOI process to address the statutory deadlines not being met, and there is a focus for improvement for looked after children being progressed via the Children and Young People Planning Partnership."