Social Value Ideas for Harlow District Council

Large capital borrowing programme

The council discussed a substantial and growing capital investment programme linked to the corporate plan, with borrowing mainly drawn from the government-backed debt management office/PWLB and supple…

“You are quite right that there has been a really significant increase in capital investment and further plans for significant capital investment over …”

Finance capacity limits audit progress

Both KPMG and officers repeatedly highlighted that finance team capacity is a major constraint on rebuilding assurance and completing the current year's audit. The auditor is waiting for a meeting wit…

“We have a meeting with the finance team tomorrow because I know officers have been looking at capacity, available resources to kind of cope with this …”

Borrowing costs rising sharply

A councillor highlighted that interest costs on council borrowing had risen from around £340,000 in 2022-2024 to over £1.1 million in 2025-2026. The leader defended the borrowing by citing increased i…

“To my knowledge, interest rates for high low council borrowings has risen from approximately £340 ,000 in 2022, 2024 to 2025, to over 1 .1 million for…”

Review housing compliance policies

A task and finish group is to review how the recently introduced housing compliance policies are being implemented and whether they are achieving their intended outcomes. The review is expected to exa…

“So as you will know, we over the last six, nine months or so, introduced a new suite of compliance policies, which were extensively researched, benchm…”

Legionella backlog to close

Housing compliance teams are working through a backlog of Legionella water risk assessments using weekly tracking, a new contractor brought in through HTS’s supply chain, and support operatives to imp…

“Speaker 10: Yes, okay. So we have a weekly rectification plan for water hygiene. So our starting point is that we are now completely assured that our …”

Third-party validation for compliance

The council is procuring software and a single third-party validation supplier to independently check a percentage of compliance activity across housing safety areas. This is intended to strengthen lo…

“Speaker 10: So we've got new software that is being installed. It's called TCW and it verifies it checks the certificates. It uses I suppose it uses A…”

£65,520 ambulance contribution corrected

Members were informed that a previously approved section 106 contribution of £65,520 for health infrastructure upgrades on the Post Office Road redevelopment should be paid to the East of England Ambu…

“At which meeting the members resolved to approve the application reference hwf ul 25 00 166 and that recommendation was for approval subject to the sa…”

£11,251 ambulance contribution corrected

A second section 106 correction was noted for the 4th Avenue / Princess Alexandra Hospital key worker accommodation scheme. The approved £11,251 contribution was also meant for the East of England Amb…

“And the same situation in respect of an application that came to the committee on the 19th of March this year for the redevelopment of the site on 4th…”

Section 106 health contribution

A Section 106 obligation will secure financial contributions tied to health impacts from the development, including funding for local GP or integrated care provision. The amount was still under negoti…

“Section 106 is required for planning obligations for health facilities, ambulance service, travel plan monitoring, biodiversity net gain monitoring an…”