Last night at Vale full council meeting, in response to the Treasury Outturn Report, I asked the following questions:

Please can you explain the loss in investment property net book value of £12.4 million over the past year?  Can someone perhaps create a one paragraph plain English translation? 

• Emcor house was sold; what was the net book value lost there? 
• Land in Botley was reclassified, which led to a book value loss of how much? Why does reclassification result in a loss of value in 2015/16?

In section 14, how do the void periods in Old Abbey House affect net book value, or is it only income that’s affected?

Cllr Robert Sharp, Cabinet member for finance replied. I’ll post the exact reply once I have it from the officers, probably in form of minutes. But from my notes…

• Emcor house had a net book value of £800k. It was sold for £1.495m
• Land at Botley was reclassified. Loss for last year to net book value is £7m
• Void periods at Old Abbey House don’t affect net book value, only income.

There was no place for me to ask a follow up, so I have done via email this morning. ”

“As I understood what you said, the net book value reduction was from Emcor House sale (£800k) and Botley land reclassification (£7m). But the total change reported was £12.4 million. What makes up the rest of the change please?”

My questions refer to Appendix D of the Treasury Outturn Report. See sections 12-15.