FI15204

Request

I believe that councils are constantly bombarded by FOI requests, with questions relating to unspent/unexpended S106 monies, as various articles have been published in various newspapers and trade magazines over the last 7-10 years. 

I am also guilty of raising similar questions. 

I want to change this, I want to make a difference. Under the current structure, after 5-10 years, unspent/unexpended monies has to be returned to the party that paid (in most cases) and if councils are faced with this, intended plans don't happen and worthy causes fail. But, it does avoid the money falling into a black hole where the money can not be used by the council. 

How much money is sat in this black hole, one where the council can't use it but the developer doesn't know it's there. This is another pointless situation, with neither party benefitting. 

Imagine if the unspent/unexpended money was defined and returned to the developer/person that paid and that the receiving party made a contribution back to the council, towards solving the issue of homelessness within the borough? 

I would like to help. Would you be willing to engage further around this topic? 

Do you have an excel sheet of unexpended/unused/unspent s106 contributions as the particular clawback of 5/7/10 years has expired? Perhaps we could start there?

Response

The Council’s Cabinet will be considering the annual Infrastructure Funding Statement (IFS) at its meeting on 7 October 2024.  This document lists all the financial transactions taken place up to March 2024. The Cabinet report, which has recently been published highlights the funding retained, received, spent and the balance as of 31 March 2024. The report can be found on our website here: https://moderngov.dover.gov.uk/ieListDocuments.aspx?CId=121&MID=4958#AI25108.  Once the IFS has been approved the full report will be published on the Council’s website at https://www.dover.gov.uk/Planning/Planning-Policy/Infrastructure-Delivery-and-S106-Obligations/Home.aspx.  The Council has a robust system in place, which tracks all the funding retained, received, spent throughout the year, as well as any time limit attached to any of the contributions.  To date, we have not had to repay any funding that has not been spent and which has exceeded it’s time limit, and this is also reported in the Headline table in the Cabinet Report.