Agenda item

Report to follow

Cllr Daniel Levy, Cabinet member for Finance, and Vic Kurzeja, Director of Property and Assets, have been invited to present a report on the City Centre Accommodation Strategy.

The Committee is asked to consider the report and raise any questions, and to AGREE any recommendations it wishes to make to Cabinet arising therefrom.

The annex to the report is exempt from disclosure.  The information in this case is exempt in that it falls within the following prescribed categories: 3. Information relating to the financial or business affairs of any particular person (including the authority holding that information) and since it is considered that, in all the circumstances of the case, the public interest in maintaining the exemption outweighs the public interest in disclosing the information, in that a negotiation is ongoing and would prejudice the position of the authority in the process of that negotiation and the Council’s standing generally in relation to such matters in future, to the detriment of the Council’s ability properly to discharge its fiduciary and other duties as a public authority.

Cllr Daniel Levy, Cabinet Member for Finance, Lorna Baxter, Executive Director of Resources and Section 151 Officer (Deputy Chief Executive), Vic Kurzeja, Director of Property and Assets, Michael Smedley, Head of Estates, Charles Butters, Strategic property Advisor, Charles Rowton-Lee, Head of Commercial Agency (Savills), Jonothan Holmes, Investment Director and Development Funding Head (Savills), and Sophie Holder MRICS, Surveyor in Commercial Agency team (Savills), were invited to present a report on the City Centre Accommodation Strategy. Cllr Neil Fawcett, Cabinet Member for Community & Corporate Services, and Cllr Judy Roberts, Cabinet Member for Infrastructure and Development Strategy, also attended online.

The Cabinet Member for Finance reminded the Committee that the Council had been reviewing the city centre accommodation held by the Council.  The Council had been working to reduce the number of county council buildings to reduce expenditure and to reflect contemporary working practices.  In addition, the carbon inefficiency of the current estate meant that significant expenditure would be needed were County Hall to be retained. 

The Director of Property and Assets took the Committee through a powerpoint presentation providing an overview of the background to the decision being proposed.  PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) had undertaken a strategic review of the Council’s city centre accommodation and, following its assessment of options with a recommended view, a report to Cabinet on 23 January 2024 recommended that option 2 be progressed.  That option was to consolidate into Speedwell House and to dispose of New County Hall and to engage the market to inform a decision on Old County Hall.

Savills had been engaged by the Council to engage the market and to seek bids.  Nineteen bids had been received with 16 of those being for both New and Old County Hall together whilst three were for either New County Hall or Old County Hall alone.  The Committee was provided with the information in draft that was expected to be before Cabinet on 25 February 2025 when it will be recommended to, inter alia, “agree to the freehold disposal of New and Old County Hall, on the terms set out in exempt Annex 4.”

The Committee was advised that both the disposal of County Hall and the transformation of Speedwell House provided the Council with the opportunity to use its assets, covenant and influence to be the ‘place-shaper of choice’ in Oxford city centre and to be at the heart of social regeneration.   The capital receipt from the disposal of County House would be sufficient to fund the delivery of the refurbished Speedwell House complex and would also enable the wider regeneration and placemaking initiatives envisaged in and around Speedwell Street.

After the presentation, the Committee resolved to exclude the public for the duration of the meeting as the information provided in Annexes 2, 3, and 4 to the Cabinet report were deemed to contain exempt information and the public interest was weighted in favour of considering the information in private as the information related to a current commercial negotiation. 

Topics explored by the Committee included which scrutiny committee should most appropriately have considered the proposal; the assessment of alternative options; potential socio-economic benefits; redevelopment strategies for Speedwell House; market engagement and bid processes; issues related to public access and heritage conservation; planning considerations; the implications of local government reorganisation.

The Committee resolved to NOTE the report and to AGREE the following recommendations to Cabinet:

1.       That the Council should work to ensure that public access to New and Old County Hall is maintained insofar as is possible.

2.       That the Council should set out its strategy and action plan for the city centre’s redevelopment and regeneration.