The Council have acknowledged errors in its budgeting after forgetting to include demolition costs in the budget for a building project.

A report by Labour’s Exec Member for Finance and Governance Cllr Vicky McGurk at July’s Exec Board contained an overspend of £568,000 on the project. Part of the explanation was that £239,000 demolition costs were omitted from the original budget.

Resident and Conservative campaigner Jon Baldwin was quick to question the demolition costs, asking the following question of Cllr McGurk at the Exec Board:

“In my career as a Quantity Surveyor, if I forgot to include demolition costs in a budget then I would likely lose my job or client. It certainly displays a level of incompetency. Do you think it is acceptable to forget to include demolition costs and who is ultimately responsible for that oversight?”

Cllr McGurk’s response reiterated that the demolition costs were accidentally omitted from the budget. She said “The Council acknowledges the error in failing to include the cost of the demolition in the original scheme budget and as a consequence it has reviewed and amended its processes and procedures to ensure that this does not happen again”.

It is little wonder that Labour struggle to manage budgets when such elementary errors are being made.