West Berkshire Council to invest £123m on infrastructure in next three years

Money allocated for Robin Hood and Burger King roundabouts, schools and leisure

WEST Berkshire Council is proposing to invest almost £123m over the next three years to make the district a better place to live, work and learn.

Almost a third of that money – £39.7m – will be spent on developing local infrastructure, including housing and roads.

Of those projects, almost £1.5m has been allocated to improving the capacity of Newbury’s Robin Hood Roundabout.

More than £2.5m has been set aside to complete the new link road from the A339 into Highwood Copse Primary School and proposed Sandleford Park development.

A further £950,000 will be spent on the construction of a new link road at Kings Road in Newbury, while the council will also invest £440,000 on improving capacity at Newbury’s Burger King roundabout and £320,000 upgrading the traffic lights at the Faraday Road junction.

It is also proposing to spend £35.6m on education to provide extra capacity and improve existing schools.

A further £53.8m will go towards improving the environment, with £12.5m set aside to achieve the aims of the council’s environment strategy.

This includes £1.6m of carbon reduction initiatives and £10.4m on solar photovoltaic energy generation and £150,000 on installing solar panels on council-owned buildings.

It is also proposing to invest £375,000 in new pitches at Henwick and £125,000 on an interpretation space at Thatcham’s Nature Discovery Centre.

Altogether, £200,000 has also been allocated for the refurbishment of Thatcham’s Kennet Leisure Centre.

Another £331,880 will be spent on refurbishing children’s playgrounds, while £450,000 will go towards the maintenance of care homes and resource centres.

The local authority will invest £900,000 on an additional weekly food waste collection service and £140,000 on installing covered cycle stands at all West Berkshire secondary schools.

The capital budget is funded by a combination of external grants and council borrowing.

It is separate from the revenue budget, which is funded largely by council tax and is spent on day-to-day expenditure.

More than half of the £122.9m – £64.4m – will come from external borrowing, while £53.5m will come from external funding.

The capital budget is expected to be approved by the council’s executive committee tonight (Thursday), before being voted on at the full council budget meeting in March.

The commitee will also vote on increasing council tax by 1.99 per cent.

The council has a £3.7m funding shortfall, which will be found through income generation (predominantly the council tax rise) and ‘internal efficiencies’.

The council is not proposing to make any redundancies or cuts to public services in the next financial year, nor will there be an increase in the adult social care precept.