Telford & Wrekin Council in £21m budget gap as Newport store bid delayed
Telford & Wrekin Council has taken £21 million out of its budget for this year because it will not receive cash expected from a controversial supermarket development in Newport.
The local authority was banking on receiving the huge windfall this year in land sales when Sainsbury's was expected to start construction on greenfield land in Station Road.
But the development remains in doubt as a smaller Morrisons supermarket has been given the go-ahead elsewhere in the town.
A public inquiry over Sainsbury's is due to be held at the start of next year.
The council says that it now expects to be able to put the £21 million in its budget for 2013/14 – and insists that services will not be affected by the delay.
Council spokesman Nigel Newman said: "Given the ongoing and lengthy legal issues surrounding this site, the council has revised its budget monitoring to show that we do not expect to receive this receipt in the current financial year and that this is now expected in the next financial year 2014/15.
"Any cash flow costs in the current year from this are more than covered by revenue from rephasing of a number of other capital schemes."
Councillor Andrew Eade, the leader of the opposition Conservative group, said the money should never have been included in this year's budget.
He said: "We always maintained that this huge receipt should not be included within the council's budget as it has always been subject to huge risk as has now been proved."
The council has budgeted £1.5 million for legal costs concerning three separate supermarkets in Newport – Sainsbury's in Station Road, Morrisons in Audley Avenue and an unnamed store at Mere Park Garden Centre.
The council argues that Sainsbury's would be the best option because of its size and location.
It has fought against the Audley Avenue and Mere Park developments through the courts, while spending thousands of pounds on barristers to support Station Road at a public inquiry.
The inquiry has to be re-run from scratch as the inspector hearing the evidence, Trevor Cookson, died suddenly.
Councillor Eade said: "I am extremely concerned that a seemingly bottomless supply of public money has been spent fighting the local community over such a lost cause that was so dismissively thrown out of court by a High Court judge, who made it perfectly clear that a council cannot make the development plan mean what they would like it to mean."
