Well I am pleased to be able to report that Babergh doesn't have any deposits with Icelandic banks so for today at least Council Taxpayers can breathe a sigh of relief.
It does seem to me that it probably isn’t very sensible to put money into banks whose assets are worth several hundred percent of their home country’s GDP. However, the Government, ever the meddler, has put a lot of pressure on Councils to do lots of things in recent years, and seeking out the highest returns for spare funds has been one of them. Page one of the textbook for baby investment bankers is that higher returns do not come without commensurate higher risk, there being no such thing as a free lunch. It is a pity that this isn’t on page one of the text book for those engaged as advisers to local authorities.
This brings me onto the question of Belle Vue House, about which there has been considerable debate while I have been away.
I can speak with the voice of experience on this one since I spend quite a lot of time at Belle Vue House due to my association with Sudbury Citizens Advice. While I can understand to a certain extent the sentimental attachment that many in Sudbury seem to have for the property, which I suppose is quite attractive in its red-brick way, my enthusiasm is tempered both by the fact that it reminds me of my boarding school, and also, I can assure you, the house is not a great place in which to have to work. The CAB rooms are cramped, stuffy, too few, and the basement wringing wet. Little money appears to have been spent over the years on a good proportion of the building (the college part seems to be in quite good condition superficially however).
The CAB would serve its very deserving clients very much better if it had appropriate offices in a new purpose built community building and this might be the outcome if Babergh releases significant funds from the development of the site. Other community groups would also be beneficiaries. Incidentally, the threat to Belle Vue Park itself has, I believe, been much exaggerated.
Belle Vue House has been the victim, in my view, of the inevitable neglect that is suffered by many publicly owned assets, which rarely get the care and attention they deserve. This is due, it seems, to the barmy system of public finance which runs from year to year and hand to mouth and never seems to have any concept of depreciation, sinking funds or any of the other mechanisms that are used in the private sector to make sure that buildings and other assets are properly maintained. Hadleigh swimming pool is another case in point; were schools and swimmers to have been charged just a small percentage more per swim and were money to have been set aside over the years in a sinking fund then another pool may not have been unaffordable today.
