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uk Evening Post, Monday, March 9, 2009 +5

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Bucking
the shops £180m of our money
trend...
● From Page 1
Deepdale Retail Park, said
it continued to attract
strong visitor numbers with
is in foreign banks
Britain
trading this weekend re-
Where (and how

£10m Iceland
£251m
portedly “very healthy.”
He said: “It is certainly
much) Lancs 12 months reprieve for

Finland
not meltdown. Our footfall
figures are up on previous cash is invested

£30m
Iceland cash crisis councils
years and while some £50m
stores will be struggling,
others are holding their Of the £251m invested
Ireland

own. in Britain, the main

“People are being far
more prudent in what they
purchase.”
The Mall manager Ken
Williams said it expected
to see a 1.5% increase in
shoppers on the 320,000
which came through its
doors between Christmas
and New Year.
He said “As the reces-
sion takes hold, consumers
shopping habits are chang-
ing and instead of ‘buying
for want’, people are in-
accounts are held in: LANCASHIRE coun- local authorities who £668,000 belongs to
Royal Bank of Scotland £58m cils at risk of losing invested in Iceland the county’s Police
£20m
Nationwide £44m more than £20m in will not have to slash Authority and
£34m
HSBC £30m Belgium Iceland’s collapsed services or increase £410,000 is from Lan-
banks have been council taxes this year cashire Combined
Lloyds TSB £20m given a year’s breath- to make up for any Fire Authority.
Newcastle City Council £10m
France ing space before they shortfall. The local authority
need to plug their Lancashire County recently admitted
£10m
blackholes. Council invested that there is a possi-
The Government money into Lands- bility that at least
Italy has taken the excep- banki before the bank some of the money
tional step of chang- went into receivership will never be seen
ing accounting rules last year. again.
so any potential im-
Of that cash invest- Lancaster Council
£27m

creasingly ‘buying for
need.’
“While there are retail-
ers who are struggling,
there is activity showing
that consumers are spend-
ing, and there is room for
new businesses to enter the
retail market.”
Administrators Deloitte,
which is handling the
chains owned by the now-
defunct Mosaic group,
have confirmed they will
shut 66 Principles stores
and 121 concessions in
Debenhams stores across
the country, but will keep
on 19 of the most prof-
itable stores.
A spokesman could not
confirm whether the high
street store in Fishergate
or the shop’s concession in
the city’s Debenhams de-
partment store would
close, but reports suggest
the “vast majority” of 2,300
staff employed by Princi-
ples nationally are to go.
Hugh Evans, policy di-
rector at the Fulwood-
based North and Western
Chamber of Commerce,
said independent stores
and those selling ‘non-es-
sential’ items in Preston
are still struggling, but food
retail is doing well.
He said: “In some of the
new year sales a lot of the
old stock was cleared out
because of heavy discount-
ing, so we have got new
products in now and when
people see new products
they tend to buy.
The Evening Post can
also reveal that talks are
ongoing with “two or three
interested parties” about
taking over the former
Woolworths store in Fish-
ergate, which is available
to rent.
Australia
(Clydesdale
Bank)
by Chris Visser
chris.visser@lep.co.uk
MORE than £180m of
Lancashire taxpayers’
cash is invested in
banks outside the UK,
it has been revealed.
Despite the setback of
having £10m frozen in Ice-
landic accounts, the county
council still has millions in
accounts far and wide such
as in Finland, Belgium, the
Republic of Ireland, France,
Italy and Australia.
One Lancashire-based fi-
nancial expert says he is not
surprised, but has warned the
authority that you “get what
you pay for” and has advised
bosses to invest in the UK and
in building societies.
Of the £432m invested by
the county council, of which
around £100m is linked to the
county’s pension scheme,
£251m is held in UK banks
such as the Royal Bank of
Scotland.
But, as of March 4, around
£30m was invested in Finnish-
based banks, £20m in Belgium,
£27m in the Australian-backed
Clydesdale Bank, £10m in
Italy, £34m in France, £50m in
the Republic of Ireland. An-
other £10m is frozen in Iceland
and it is unclear if the council
will get the money back.
Coun Tony Martin, the
county council’s cabinet mem-
ber for resources, said: “It’s
our duty to get the best return
DUE CARE: Coun Tony
Martin says Lancs invests
abroad as some English
banks are not top rated
we can on council taxpayers’
money and we will exercise
due care on where we put it.
“We invest abroad as some
of the English banks aren’t
AAA credit rated banks and
don’t offer the best interest
rates.
“The Audit Commission has
also been saying that councils
are being too risk averse but
when you have problems with
the Icelandic and the Irish
banks, they say we didn’t mean
to invest there.”
The county council’s chief
finance officer Adrian Cutts
said the investments have been
giving interest as high as 6%.
He said: “This is money we
pact on council budg- ed, £6.4m belongs to had invested £6m,
ets is postponed for 12
months.
the county council, South Ribble Council
£2.5m is from the £5m and Chorley
It will mean that pension fund, Council £2m.
have put aside which we do not
need yet, such as for highways
liability claims, pensions and
extra costs being built up for
the waste PFI scheme which
we will need £45m for in
2011/12.”
But Neil Shoesmith, chief
executive of Lancashire-based
Marsden Building Society,
which has 12 branches around
the county, said: “You get
what you pay for. It’s not for
me to say what council treas-
urers should do, but building
societies remain an investment
vehicle which has not caused
problems.
“It doesn’t surprise me at all
that investments are being
made outside the UK, but it’s
sometimes easier to under-
stand finances within the UK
than abroad.
“You have greater access to
the economic influences by
being within a country than
outside it unless you have got a
sophisticated system.”
Mr Shoesmith said all of his
building society’s investors are
based in the UK with more
than 90% from England.
previous
stories
lep.co.uk
● Fears over return of
Iceland £10m
● Lancashire councils
could lose millions tied up
in Icelandic banks