Agenda item

Alex Bain Stewart asked the Chairman of the Policy & Resources Committee about Crossrail funding commitments.

In response, the Chairman reported that the City Corporation had made two funding commitments towards the Crossrail project; firstly a direct contribution of £200m from the City Fund during the period 2016 to 2018 and secondly to seek contributions totalling £150m from London businesses, with the first £50m being guaranteed by the Corporation from City’s Cash. He confirmed that according to forecasts, sufficient capital receipts would be generated to fund the Crossrail commitment of £200m and that the earliest date for payment was estimated to be 31 March 2016. He added that the forecast was dependent upon the delivery of £114.4m capital receipts from the sale of Crossrail investment properties, of which £58.1m had been received to date. He reminded Members that at the Court meeting in March 2013 Members were advised that there was an expected shortfall of £6.2m in expected receipts. However, since then, forecasts show that this gap had reduced to £5.2m and with three years yet to run, officers would seek to address this shortfall within the present Crossrail funding strategy. He indicated that the intention had always been that the Treasury would assist with the raising of contributions from London businesses and negotiations were on-going with both the Treasury and with Transport for London to facilitate that and to identify potential schemes that would lend themselves towards business contributions.

In response to a supplementary question from Mr Bain Stewart, the Chairman stated that although he was reasonably confident that the anticipated sums would be achieved, regular monitoring of the situation would continue and reports would be submitted to the relevant Committees accordingly.