I trust that all readers have made a full recovery from the excesses of the Christmas and New Year period.

The story of the last 10 years for local government has been about the effects of austerity. The City Council has been forced to make savings of over £10 million over that period, which has led to some difficult decisions.

The loss of funding from central government forces councils to either cut spending or find alternative sources of income. Spending has certainly been cut, but we have been looking at means to improve income as well.

The establishment of the property investment fund in 2017 has enabled Gloucester City Council to make two substantial investments in Gloucester – the first is the purchase of St Oswald’s shopping centre; the second is the purchase of the Eastgate shopping centre.

Delivering a return on investment as well as promoting the local economy

Many other councils around the country have made similar investments, some much larger and at times away from their locale, while our investments have deliberately been within the city and will benefit the city. We have taken our time to find the right investments to make, which will deliver us a return and at the same time promote our local economy.

These two purchases are expected to provide a return on investment which will provide additional income. This reduces the need to cut spending in the future and enables the council to continue to provide the services, which our residents value. I can confirm that there will be no plans for cuts in either services or staff in the next year.

Available land at St Oswald’s could be utilised to provide more housing, especially affordable housing. The council already owns Kings Walk shopping centre and along with Eastgate this gives us a huge stake in the retail offering in the city. This can help to rebalance the city centre as shopping habits change, and can potentially refurbish the indoor market to make it fit for the 21st century.

In the long term, ensuring that we have the ability to support ourselves financially removes the dependence on government, for funding, which is rapidly disappearing.