Lancaster City Council’s Cabinet has accepted an offer of support in drawing up a tender brief for the Lawson’s Bridge site in Scotforth, a sell off which has prompted furious reaction from local residents as it could well mean a supermarket will be built on the Scotforth site.
Last Wednesday (31 October) members of the council’s Overview and Scrutiny Committee asked for the tender brief to be referred to them before it goes to Cabinet.
The request was accepted at Cabinet’s meeting on Tuesday (6 November).
Coun Roger Mace, leader of the council and chairman of the Cabinet, said: “I am more than happy for the Overview and Scrutiny Committee to offer some input into the future of the land at Lawson’s Bridge.
“It can only be constructive and it is in the interests of all of us that the tender brief should deal effectively with the land in question.
“To that end Graham Cox (Head of Property Services) and I have already met with the chairman of Scotforth Parish Council to discuss the issues.”
The request from Overview and Scrutiny followed a call-in of Cabinet’s decision on October 9 to draw up a tender brief for the land.
If the brief is approved it is likely the land will then be marketed by way of a development agreement.
The draft tender brief is due to go back to cabinet in December.
It is likely that a special meeting of Overview and Scrutiny will take place prior to the meeting of Cabinet so committee members can discuss the tender brief.
Coun Stuart Langhorn, chairman of the Overview and Scrutiny Committee, said: “I am pleased that the request for the committee to examine the tender brief before it goes to cabinet has been accepted.
“Effective scrutiny of decisions made by the cabinet is necessary to ensure the council achieves the best outcome possible for all parties, including the residents of Scotforth.”
The inclusion of the land at South Lancaster in the Council’s asset sales programme has been discussed by the Council on a number of previous occasions. Originally it was discussed by Council some years ago when a planning application for a housing development was refused.
More recently it was discussed in public at both Cabinet and full Council in January and February earlier this year when Council approved the inclusion of the sale of the land in its list of asset sales, along with a number of other assets, in order to help finance the schemes included in the Council’s five year Capital Programme.
A receipts target for asset sales was subsequently included in the Council’s Corporate Plan, approved by Council in April, which set specific targets for generating receipts within this financial year.
The report to Cabinet in October included proposals to implement the Council’s earlier decision and to meet the receipts targets in its Corporate Plan.