megilleland

I see that the missing spreadsheets mentioned above are now on the new website.

Today in The Guardian £122m is a drop in the ocean if we get back £9bn.

Update on parking revenue for Herefordshire Council from RAC Foundation. Local authority parking surplus hits new high The surplus produced from council parking operations in England has reached a record high of just over three quarters of a billion pounds. In the 2015-16 financial year the 353 local authorities in England generated a combined ‘profit’ of £756 million from their on- and off-street parking activities. This is a 9% leap on the 2014-15 figure of £693 million, and 34% higher than in 2011-12. Although not all individual councils made a large surplus on their parking activities just 49 (14%) reported negative numbers. The figures are calculated by taking income from parking charges and penalty notices and then deducting running costs. Herefordshire Council 2011-2012 £1,355,000 2012-2013 £1,563,000 2013-2014 £1,880,000 2014-2015 £2,613,000 2015-2016 £3,644,000 55th ranking out of 353 authorities Westminster had the largest surplus in England (£55.9 million) followed by Kensington & Chelsea (£34.2 million) and Camden (£25.2 million).

And now the RAC Foundation say that more than 3,000 council-maintained road bridges in Great Britain are substandard. In Herefordshire the figures are: 670 Number of bridges in Herefordshire 20 Number of substandard bridges 3% Proportion of substandard bridges 1 Of which are intended to be returned to full load capacity in next 5 years 20 Of which, if no resource restrictions, that would be returned to full load carrying capacity £5,929,200 Backlog (workbank)* *Backlog is the amount of work required to bring the stock (of bridges/carriageways etc.) to a good – but not necessarily perfect condition.

Looking at the page on the new website which details the Council's expenditure under Open Data, I note that there are no spreadsheets for: October 2016, November 2016, December 2016. On the old website only one of the three months was not published, I assumed that there was no expenditure for that month. As they haven't published the three months on the new website are they trying to hide something or is it just an oversight? All the links on past Hereford Voice posts linking to the Council now do not work. Is this an attempt to further obstruct the public's right to see this information? It is obvious that this site is not produced for the benefit of the public. A lot of information that could be helpful is now buried elsewhere on the new site. Anyone else had this problem? Also no A to Z menu which was of help finding specific information.

This is part of a bigger picture - The Midlands Engine for Growth. Midlands Connect can be found in this prospectus which sets out a plan by 11 Local Enterprise Partnerships (LEPs) to encourage economic growth and investment in the Midlands. It focuses on 5 themes: * skills * innovation * transport * promoting the plan * finance for business The prospectus is a response to government ambitions that the Midlands economy could grow by £34 billion by 2030, if it matches the predicted growth rate for the UK. Interestingly Hereford and Herefordshire are not mentioned in the 24pp document and The Marches Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) only once. I note there is a strong regional approach in the document, so eventually I predict the local authorities will disappear and be replaced by this new conglomerate. It fits the original EU plan to create regions and as a lot of what is proposed will rely on EU funding, if we come out of the EU, I can see the wheels falling off this engine. But then maybe we are not meant to come out of the EU, as I get the feeling no matter what these politicians tell us, it is just a front to carry on as normal, and keep shoveling loads of cash into the EU coffers.

The selling off of county farmland followed the stupid idea of selling off our forests which the conservative government were forced to do a U-turn on in 2012. Coming across this piece on the then environment minister: How big is society when only 7 cabinet councillors decide the future for farmers on the counties smallholdings.

THE COUNTY FARMS: PROTECTING BRITAIN'S SMALLHOLDINGS The fashion for selling off county farms and smallholdings is not new as this old article proves. It's just typical that Herefordshire has jumped on the bandwagon as a last resort to cover their debts.

Today in the Independent: Herefordshire top of the league. Although for how long once the road building starts. Did the council take this into account - I don't think so.

William Hill offering odds on Hereford being chosen as City of Culture.

They can't do that now let alone in the future.

On a national level tax payers money is disappearing at a faster rate. A bit like disappearing down a black hole! The National Debt Clock

The council's new website is unable to load up its financial pages today (Saturday 4th March). Their figures are so transparent you can't see them!

From BBC Hereford & Worcester: Not long to get the bid in. You won't see me stripping off. Hereford City of Culture 2021 website here.

Listen to this Radio 4 Money Box programme broadcast today on business rates which takes effect 1st April 2017 and imagine what the outcome will be for some independent traders in UK town centres. I don't think it matters whether your rates go up or down, but how you manage/budget for them in running a profitable business - some people are in for a big shock.

Following on from the opening topic above, the January 2017 expenditure figures are out and yet again we have a single payment of £634,668.32 listed as redacted under commissioning capital and capital expenditure. This is the second payment, the December payment which was redacted in similar fashion was for £481,700.54 giving a total £1,116,368.86 and not a clue on what it has been spent on. From a total of £11,238,383.87 paid out in January 2017 here are the top 10 payments: £2,346,971.16 Balfour Beatty Living Places Ltd £634,668.32 REDACTED £549,955.01 Worcestershire County Council £528,606.52 Hereford & Worcester Fire & Rescue Service £474,469.31 Integral UK Ltd £440,081.88 Highways England Company Ltd £324,688.75 Speller Metcalfe Malvern Ltd £317,833.66 FCC Environment Services (UK) Ltd £254,675.54 Shaw Healthcare (Herefordshire) Ltd £238,529.96 Whitecross Stepnell Ltd £6,110,480.11 Total - 54% of all payments made Is Highways England Company Ltd the Highways Agency and has it been privatised?

BBC Radio 4 - Farming Today, 21st February 2017 Council Tenant Farm sell-off Herefordshire County Council is selling off its entire stock of farms, despite a report it commissioned, which advised against doing so. 24 days to listen - starts at 07:45

The break up starts.

And lets not forget the PFI scandal. PFI deals were invented in 1992 by the Conservative government led by Sir John Major, but became widespread under Labour after 1997. The schemes usually involved large scale buildings such as new schools and hospitals, or infrastructure projects which would previously have been publicly funded by the Treasury. Public money siphoned offshore by our banks and investment companies.

In the Guardian today: Bet they won't look at the council tax the small people pay. Remember band H in Hereford City £3284.41 against band H in Westminster £1337.62. Also all those living in bands C to G pay more in council tax in Herefordshire than those in Westmister.

Herefordshire Council Newsroom: 21 February 2017 Maybe Herefordshire Housing can get some of their tenants to tidy up around Sherborne Close.

Changes in your locality that may affect your rateable value What is meant by a ‘material change of circumstance’ (MCC) Examples of the type of change within the locality that may be an MCC include: * Road or streetworks which affect your property – closures; changes to road layout; pedestrianisation * Building work or demolition nearby or the erection of scaffolding on a neighbouring property * Damage to infrastructure caused by flooding * An increase in the number of vacant properties in the vicinity * Opening of a new development within the locality eg a supermarket or retail park which competes directly with existing business properties * A change in the use of another property in the locality I would have thought that most of these would apply to Hereford businesses.

To appease Ragwert I have started a new topic on Business rates revaluation 2017.

Following on from the Matabeau topic and its possible effect on the independent trader and local shopping scene. I am sure we are going to hear a lot more of this from small businesses.

A bit like looking for a needle in a haystack. The Council's expenditure and contracts page lists all expenditures over £500 since April 2010. The easiest way to open the spreadsheets is to select the latest (ie December 2016 expenditure CSV format) This will open the spreadsheet and to make it easier to read drag across columns A-G and select format on your menu bar and then auto fit column width. To analyse the data select column then go to Data on menu bar and then sort. No sign of any payment to Fisher German, although the monthly expenditures are displayed about 3 months behind events. Their report was published in November so payment could appear after January 2017, providing that the council have not redacted the figure when published. I noted that this redaction figure was very high in the latest accounts.