The leader of Surrey County Council has urged the Government to ‘write off’ £1bn of Woking Borough Council’s debt to enable the creation of a unitary authority.
As part of the Government’s reorganisation and devolution drive, 12 councils in Surrey could be merged to form a new unitary authority.
However, Surrey CC leader Cllr Tim Oliver has written to the deputy prime minister, Angela Rayner, stating that any devolution deal would need to account for the ‘significant financial risk’ of the debt held by some councils.
Woking BC holds an estimated £2bn of debt, £1bn of which councillors argue can only be managed with Government intervention.
