To amend the contract price for the acquisition of the Lanham Way housing development site from Oxfordshire County Council from £935,000 to £870,000.

To award a JCT design and build contract to Feltham Construction Limited to deliver the Lanham Way housing project, accessed from Medhurst Way in Littlemore, Oxford.

Following a tender evaluation exercise, to enter into a Pre-Construction Services Agreement and award full contract with Equans Limited to construct 51 homes on the site of the former Oxfordshire County Council Northfield Hostel now owned by Oxford City Council.

To enter into an exchange of contracts to acquire 2 properties: Northfield Hostel and Land at Lanham Way.  This requires a 5 % deposit payment for each site to be paid by Oxford City Council to Oxfordshire County Council (to be placed in a holding account with the purchaser’s lawyers). Completion of the contracts is subject to the receipt of satisfactory planning permission for each site. The deposit is returnable in the event completion does not occur. Assuming completion occurs the remainder of the purchase prices becomes payable. Contract purchase prices are £1,489,000 (Northfield Hostel) and £935,000 (Lanham Way).

To contract with consultants to provide commercial advice on a programme of affordable housing sites.

The funding for this agreement to be paid initially from the HRA revenue budget – using the HRA scheme feasibility budget.  As schemes progress into delivery, the costs of this advice, on a scheme by scheme basis, will then be capitalised into the acquisition cost of that scheme, as it brought into the HRA.

Council considered the report of the Head of Housing Services seeking project approval, delegations, and budget, to enable spending from the Housing Revenue Account (HRA), on land purchases, build contracts and other necessary agreements and associated development costs for the purpose of delivering affordable housing.

The Cabinet Member for Affordable Housing, Cllr Rowley, introduced the report, proposed the recommendations and answered questions. The recommendations were agreed on being seconded and put to the vote.

The Monitoring Officer advised and Cllr Henwood then confirmed that he would not take part in the vote because one of the sites listed in the report was adjacent to his property and so the outcome of the vote may affect an area close to his property which was a disclosable pecuniary interest. It was not possible for the Monitoring Officer to check the location of the site relative to the property more precisely at that late stage and upon advice Cllr Henwood abstained in the vote.

Council resolved to:

1.    approve a revision to the HRA capital budget in 2020/21 of £31.647m, in order for the schemes listed in this report (paras 11 to 40) to be added into the capital programme funded predominantly from additional borrowing; and

2.    approve a revision to the HRA base (revenue) budget from 2021/22 on, for £235k to be added, for the creation of the Affordable Supply Programme and Enabling Team to manage and co-ordinate the various work streams to deliver the programmes.