Council's beach hut sale plan gets special scrutiny meeting

BCP Council’s budget for 2022/23 outlined the plan to set up a company wholly or majority owned by the local authority, which would buy the beach hut stock.

This sale would give the council £54million and plug a financial gap in the ongoing transformation programme following the councils merger in 2019.

The company, which would be a special purpose vehicle (SPV), needs full council sign off before it can be formed.

Read more: Why BCP Council want to raise debt limit to more than a billion pounds

BCP Council’s cabinet forward plan had listed the beach hut SPV down for its June meeting, however, this will no longer take place.

Instead the plans will go before the recently formed corporate and community scrutiny committee in July and then cabinet later that month. The proposal will not get to full council for final debate and sign off until September.

Councillor Lawrence Williams, corporate and community scrutiny committee, said: “This proposal is an important one which deserves the time and space to be scrutinised properly before going to cabinet and council.

Cllr Lawrence Williams

“I have therefore agreed with the leader of the council that we will have a special standalone session to scrutinise the proposals in greater detail.

“To ensure that we have time to undertake this special session before the cabinet meeting, the Leader has agreed to bring the item to July’s cabinet. We will have more details on the date and time of the special meeting in due course.”

Read more: Letter: ‘Horrified with proposals for beach huts’

Councillor Drew Mellor, BCP Council leader, said: “I welcome the proposal to have a dedicated meeting for this important issue, which shows that we continue to take scrutiny seriously.

Cllr Drew Mellor (Image: BCP Council)

“There will be no financial impact of moving this decision to the July cabinet cycle as our budget only dictates that we conclude these changes within this financial year, which runs to early 2023.”

Opposition groups have repeatedly questioned the beach hut sell off plan, which first came to light in the Conservative budget plans for 2022/23 earlier this year.

Councillor Paul Hilliard, chair of the Christchurch Independents, said: “This scheme is about getting a lump sum cash deposit now, and forego all income for many years to come.

Cllr Paul Hilliard (Image: UGC)

“This appears short sighted as BCP Council would be tied into an agreement for many years to come.

“If it is straightforward, you have to ask why all councils are not doing it.”

As reported, the SPV would purchase the huts along Poole and Christchurch bays at market value using mostly third-party debt and an additional shareholder loan from the council.

In future years the company would use income from beach hut rents for operation and management costs, corporation tax, guarantee fees and paying back the money used to purchase the huts.

Once the SPV has paid off the borrowed money the beach huts could be returned to council control or they could be refinanced again.