Cash Limits (Hansard, 20 March 1997)

§ Mr. Gummer

The DOE/HC—Housing Corporation— cash limit will be decreased by £5,916,000 from £1,037,868,000 to £1,031,952,000. This reflects a switch within city challenge expenditure from funding via the Housing Corporation to funding via other single regeneration budget schemes.

The external financing limit for urban development corporations will be increased by £764,000 from £209,817,000 to £210,581,000. This reflects a transfer of an underspend of £600,000 from city challenge to Tyne and Wear development corporation's grant in aid and a transfer of £600,000 from the city challenge and single regeneration budget challenge fund programmes to the Black Country development corporation's grant in aid, both transfers allowing regeneration projects to be brought forward. The transfers will be offset by a reduction in Plymouth development corporation's grant in aid of £436,000, transferred to the urban programme and the single regeneration budget challenge fund.

The external financing limit for the urban regeneration agency—English Partnerships—will be increased by £52,883,000 from £158,082,000 to £210,965,000. This reflects a transfer of provision from English Partnerships' derelict land grant of £2,000,000, and also amends the limit to take account of the increases in grant in aid at the winter supplementary estimates of £30,883,000, and at the spring supplementary estimates of £20,000,000.

The external financing limit for the housing action trusts will be increased by £457,000, from £89,210,000 to £89,667,000, consisting of a reduction of £1,550,000 at the spring supplementary estimates and a subsequent increase of £2,007,000, transferred from estate action, city challenge and the single regeneration budget challenge fund. I draw attention to the figures for the external financing limit for the housing action trusts in my answer of 4 November 1996 to my hon. Friend the Member for Cheadle (Mr. Day) Official Report, column 346. This incorrectly showed the limit rising from £878,960,000 to £879,210,000. The correct figures were £88,960,000 rising to £89,210,000.

The DOE/NT—new towns—non-voted cash limit will be reduced by £4,554,000 from minus £110,000,000 to minus £114,554,000. This reduction reflects an increase in capital receipts to the Commission for New Towns of £1,750,000 and a technical transfer of £2,804,000 to the DOE/OES—other environmental services—non-voted cash limit which is described later.

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The DOE/OES non-voted cash limit will be increased £2,804,000 from £25,289,000 to £28,093,000. This reflects a transfer from the DOE/NT—new towns— non-voted cash limit to provide for supplementary credit approvals to local authorities to cover their capital contributions to the Commission for the New Towns under road cost sharing arrangements.

The cash limit for class VI, vote 4—local government and planning, England—covering sections A to F of that vote, will be reduced by £1,250,000 from £31,127,007,000 to £31,125,757,000. The decrease is the cumulative result of reductions in the payments made to the Valuation Office Agency, and in the expenses of valuation tribunals in section A—valuation services, in the grant payable to the Local Government Commission in section B—reorganisation of local government; and in the planning and minerals research programme, section D. This amount will be transferred to the DOE/LGR—local government reorganisation—non-voted cash limit for the reasons given later.

The DOE/LGR—local government reorganisation— non-voted cash limit will be increased by £1,250,000 from £105,669,000 to £106,919,000 to meet a greater than forecast demand for commutation and transitional costs of reorganisation supplementary credit approvals. The increase will be a met by the transfer from class VI vote 4—local government and planning, England—cash limit referred to above.

Some of the increases will be offset either by savings or transfers; the remainder is allowed for in the 1996–97 control total forecast outturn shown in the "Public Expenditure Statistical Analyses", Cm 3601, published on Thursday 20 March 1997.