£5,000,000.00 plus and they cannot see it,

[baswaldsmate]

When you read the statement on our web site, about the relocation of the football club, you do wonder who is in charge of our council.

Its a win win win win for all if they let it go through.

£5,000,000.00 plus to council
So no need for cuts
People keep their jobs/Money spent in Braintree shops etc
Job created with building work in Braintree area
Jobs created at Football clubs new Stadium,
And jobs created when cressing road is developed.

Any other council would bite your arm off to have this LUCK.
Braintree....Have they got nobody who can see further than cuts.

I just hope the press pick up this story
I see the Headlines now
I'll let you all make that up.

[strangelybrown]

The old adage applies Bas: "You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink"

If the Council turn down a deal like this, one that saves the district from budget cuts and helps the Football Club at the same time, people will soon start to wonder if the Council have an ulterior motive.

[oldiron]

Thanks Mr BUTland this is what you get for having a blue run Council do anything NOT to help BTFC

[Iron Fans Chief]

No brainer isn't it!!

The offer to build plenty of affordable housing and private housing in an area which frnkly needs improvement and all the facilties that will go with it on the edge of the bypass, not tucked away in the back of beyond.

It beats me!!

[jimbo]

Actually it is very simple - when someone comes up with a good idea, a Leader of any Council wants it to be his or an idea that he can take credit for; it is called "Local Politics"

However, I am surprised at how naive our Directors are being - if you want to work on good terms with someone and sit down with them at the table to reach an agreement, then the kind of negative comments our Directors are shouting out are the last thing you should be doing.

[strangelybrown]

"However, I am surprised at how naive our Directors are being - if you want to work on good terms with someone and sit down with them at the table to reach an agreement, then the kind of negative comments our Directors are shouting out are the last thing you should be doing."

I think you'll find they've tried that for the past six years and got to a point a month ago when they found out Braintree Council were going to pull their commitment to relocation.

But, then again, we're dealing with shrewd local politicians that invest in Icelandic banks ...

[localfan]

Perhaps providing a 4000 capacity stadium for 300 fans, and prob not all are residents of the Borough, is not a priority in the current climate? They aready have a sports centre to the north of Braintree which is, as I understand it, under used.

It is a fact that if you upset local politicians at any point, they never forgive and acn be very obstructive.

[oldiron]

300 fans?

[ironfoureva]

Sept 14, 2010 22:10:13 GMT oldiron said:

300 fans?

Just A Chelmo chavs attempt at Big Billy Rollox

[chelmsfordiron]

I'd rather have just 300 fans than be £600,000 in debt.

But that's just me.

[Iron Webbo]

Thank you for your comments. There will be a further update on this in Saturday's programme.

[Iron Fans Chief]

Chelmsford got a 4000+ capacity ground then some prat put a running track around the pitch!! Binoculars anyone!!
Seriously though at least their council not only kept their promise and gave them a ground but put up a load of dough that they hadn't taken off them in the first place.

Colchester's layer road is soon to be a housing estate and now their community stadium is getting its own junction off the A12.

We could already have had our own junction off the A120 without the need for extra funds required and a developer who can build a stadium without council tax payers money!! then the sale of the "old estate" will pay for the construction of a new one on the site and probably cover the cost of the stadium build before a brick has been laid at either location.

Common sense - I've got some - maybe I should stand for council- no better not- seems that goes out the window!!.

[oldiron]

Well I.F.C i think i may well stand too. It will not be for the blue party as you may well know X

[ferrum26]

I tend to agree with jimbos point that it may not be the best idea for the club to be posting such comments about the council making "own goals" etc, if it wants to have a good dialogue with the council going forward. As evidenced by the council's reply in the braintree and witham this week.

As an aside, I really don't think this plan would have helped save any cuts to services in the district anyway. All the country's money has been spent by the previous government and there is nothing left in the pot! The money that needs to be saved is enormous.

[strangelybrown]

It's all about opinions I agree, but I don't think the Club have done a lot wrong here.

I do know that they were very alarmed at the proposal by the Council's developers to pull the commitment for relocation. The Council's officers seem to have watered that down and we'll find out more next week.

But we should not forget that it was Butland that came out with the story of the £5 million shortfall in last week's paper. All the Club have done is said - 'hey if you help us move to a new stadium we can pay for it ourselves and cover your budget shortfall'.

If the Council had agreed, the Club are correct in that it would be a win, win deal. The money would have saved Braintree people from having their services slashed, further rises in Council tax, the Club would've got its new stadium and it could've helped staff at Causeway House keep their jobs.

All this smoke and mirrors about capital and revenue budgets is nonsense as far as I'm concerned and didn't prevent the Council from taking £450,000 off the Club three years ago. Turning their backs on £5 million is a cracking own goal. How many other local authorities would do the same?

Finally I do not think the Club (or anyone for that matter) should be frightened to criticise the Council if it sees fit. They are not perfect, as the £282,000 fine for polluting the River Blackwater in 2008 and the millions lost in Icelandic banks last year displays all too clearly.

These people are not untouchables. This is not the middle ages, we are not serfs! Never forget that we elect them and will consider doing so again, if they deserve it, next May.

[garygray]

It will be good to see what Lee has to say in saturdays prog as it is every sat. X

[ferrum26]

I totally agree that we shouldn't be afraid to criticise the council when they deserve it, couldn't agree more with that. There are plenty of things that they get wrong.

However in this case I'm not sure that the criticism is deserved. As far as I know, the distinction between revenue and capital budgets IS real and therefore I don't think the council would be able to use the money to prevent any cuts to revenue budgets, and they have been honest about that in the B+W times. Regarding the £450,000 that the council received from the sale of land a few years back, I believe that this was because the sale broke a covenant on the land that was agreed between club and council some 17 years or so earlier. Whether that money went into the revenue or capital budget I don't know, but I imagine it went into the capital budget as it was a sale of an asset, ie land. The same as the sale of cressing road as a whole would be.

Don't get me wrong, i would love to see us move to a new site and grow as a club. But portraying BDC as the enemy (when their hands are tied by central government budget rules) is not helpful to that aim, surely we should be trying to work together.

[jimbo]

The article in the Braintree and Witham Times ends with an invitation for talks with the club, which clearly is the next step.

Actually the reply from the Council demonstrates how complicated local authority funding can be and sounds convincing. Sometimes it is better to consult with someone who knows how these things work rather than shooting our mouths off in generalised terms and looking rather foolish when we do not appear to have correctly understood the legal position regarding the finances.

Personally I am going to find about a bit more about relevant Council meetings and see if we can get our voice heard. It is true that we are not serfs any more, but unless we use our right to get involved in politics, then we can be brushed aside. This Council is already well-known for having "consultations" and then going ahead with what they ended already.

[Iron Webbo]

Just for the avoidance of any doubt on the issue of differentiating between capital and revenue budgets, we have taken advice and the general consensus is that Cllr Butland is absolutely correct to assert that the Council’s revenue budget is being cut and that the sale of the Cressing Road site would generate 'capital' receipts for the authority.

However, to present these as entirely separate issues could itself be misleading.

His comments fail to take into account the various ways in which any Council might use a multi-million pound capital receipt to generate revenue, and consequently reduce an existing shortfall in its day to day or 'revenue' budget.

Various options are open to a council in utilising a capital receipt of this size to generate revenue. An authority could invest the capital into bond markets, or property – obtaining returns and/or rents which it could then use in its revenue budget.

Alternatively, if a council is carrying debt, that authority could use capital receipts to pay down debt, which is serviced from the revenue account. This generates a saving from the revenue budget which can then be used for other purposes.

I have contacted again Cllr Butland to arrange a meeting and will let you all know how we get on.

[Iron Fans Chief]

The whole affair revolves around the fact as to whether BDC will grant planning permission for the new stadium to be built at Pods Brook Road, on land already purchased by a development company, trading off against a purchase of Cressing Road Stadium land which will ultimately get planning permission because we have already got dwellings on the site.
Regardless of Core Strategy policies or developments elsewhere in the area (Panfield Lane for example) which is all by the by, simply because on the whole, the proper place to put the stadium is beside a major trunk route with the infrastructure already in existance, exactly what Colchester did, and they are now getting a junction for the stadium.
We as fans have visited a great many "new" stadiums like Crawley and Salisbury to name but two, where it works, freeing up brown space land for housing in towns instead of building beyond the boundries of ring roads.
We know all the plusses for a move and a lot of people will throw in a few minusses as well, but as I have said at the end of the day its the planning permission that counts and that is to do with the Council Planning Department and not the Financial Department. Everything else is posturing, job saving and election winning, something we all have a hand in and a say in.

So lets be heard.