To recommend to Council for approval the capital investment budget and capital strategy for 2022/23 onwards.

The cabinet member finance, corporate services and planning introduced the report and explained the sources of funding and the approach to managing investment and borrowing. She stressed that approval for a project to be added to the capital programme was not approval to proceed and that full business cases would be developed before expenditure was incurred, compliant with the council’s contract rules and project management approach.

Cabinet members highlighted the key projects in their portfolio areas and the expected benefits to the council.

The chairman of the general scrutiny committee commented on the work of the committee in scrutinising the proposals and welcomed the responses from the cabinet. He noted that it had been challenging to review everything in one meeting and that it would be helpful to have the figures earlier. The cabinet member explained the difficulty in achieving this as details of the settlement from central government was only received in late December.

The chairperson of the adult and wellbeing scrutiny committee highlighted the support of the committee for the use of technology in supported living and that proposals for the care home would be scrutinised when they came forward.

Group leaders made comments on behalf of their groups. The list of projects was generally welcomed. Key points noted included:

·       importance placed on robust project management;

·       the importance of investment in infrastructure to attract new businesses to the county;

·       the capital programme did not currently include money to improve the energy efficiency of older homes but the retrofit strategy would research ways to deliver this and would hopefully lead to future a capital project.

Concluding the debate cabinet members noted that it was important to consider the environmental impact of projects and that the council should aim for net zero carbon in its investments. The business case template now included a section on environmental and social impact. Every decision taken should be considered through the lens of the environment and sustainability. Future training and development for officers would look to incorporate opportunities to move to net zero carbon.

It was resolved that the following be recommended to Council:

a)             To approve the proposed capital programme from 2022/23 attached at appendix C; and

b)             To approve the capital strategy at appendix D.