Issue - meetings

To provide an update on treasury management activity as at 31/12/2022.

The Senior Accounting Officer introduced the report and provided a brief overview of the contents of the report. She drew the committees attention to the following key points:

·         Paragraph 9 detailed the review of the LIBID/LIBOR benchmark.

·         Table 1 showed the interest rate as a result of the number of base rate increases over the year.

·         Table 2 provided a breakdown of the property and multi-asset performance. She informed the committee of the presentation taking place on the 24 April 2023 which would detail the changes to the Lothbury Fund.

·         Table 3 contained the investments and borrowing and had recently been colour coded to analyse the Environmental Social Governance (ESG) rating.

·         Tables 4,5 and 6 were new to this type of report.

·         Table 4 detailed the return on the specified investments which was 2.66%.

·         Table 6 outlined a minus 14% return, the biggest drop was due to the Lothbury Fund.

In response to Members questions, Officers confirmed that the ESG rating was the fourth priority after Security, Liquidity and Yield. They also informed the Committee that this linked in with the Ethical Investment Policy which was approved at Full Council on 16 February 2023.

In response to Councillor Kay, the Strategic Director of Resources explained that if a particular company went against any of the criteria set out in the Ethical Investment Policy, then they would not look to invest. All of the investments set out in table 3 on page 78 of the reports pack had good ESG ratings within the limits.

Councillor Pearson questioned the drop in the Lothbury investment detailed in table 2 as there was a positive return percentage. The Principal Accountant explained that at the time there was an unprecedented economic turmoil which caused the value of investments to drop.

Councillor Pearcy raised concerns that the figures in table 2 did not add up correctly. The Strategic Director of Resources agreed to look into this.

Councillor Davies proposed and Councillor Hurst seconded.

Councillor Pearcy debated whether to accept the report with the incorrect figures mentioned above. It was agreed to circulate the correct figures outside of the meeting. 

After being put to vote, the Motion was carried unanimously.

RESOLVED To accept the treasury management activity third quarter report for 2022/2023.